3.1.3: Strain Theory

Merton and Anomie

The main question that preoccupied early criminology in North America was, “Why do young, working-class men engage in crime?” It was the concept of anomie that interested Merton the most. For Merton, anomie is a condition whereby society exerts pressure on the individual to achieve culturally defined goals but does not provide the institutional means to achieve them or devalues the institutional rules in favor of achieving the goals (Merton, 1938). His macro-level theory has come to be known as strain theory, because the strain people feel to achieve the culturally defined goals (i.e., wealth and prestige) leads them to engage in innovative (i.e., criminal) activities to achieve their goals.

Within the context of American capitalism, the primary cultural goal is money, yet the institutional means to achieve that goal is not available to everyone. Despite the American dream that everyone can become rich, the United States has relatively low levels of social mobility. For Merton, this explains the “higher association between poverty and crime” (Merton, 1938, p. 681). It is not that poverty leads to crime, but that American culture sets up the goal of wealth as the objective to achieve regardless of the means. This goal permeates all aspects of life, from business and education to organized crime and sports competitions.

Take for example the doping scandal that hit the world of competitive biking in 2012. After winning the Tour de France seven years in a row, Lance Armstrong was found to have been taking performance-enhancing drugs. Not only did he admit to taking these drugs, but he also said that this was simply part of how things were done in the cycling world and that they were as common as water bottles and tire pumps. The scandal illustrates how cultural goals (winning) exist in tension with institutional rules. When a competitor begins to perceive the rules as an impediment to achieving their goal, widespread anomie can set in, which leads them to circumvent the regulations in their attempt to win (Merton, 1938, p. 676).

Merton lays out five adaptations or modes of adjustment that people use to relate culturally defined goals with legitimate means. These adaptations include conformity, innovation, ritualism, retreatism, and rebellion. Innovation is the adaptation that best explains most crime and was the primary focus of Merton’s work. Most people living in a society accept the culturally prescribed goals and pursue them following the rules laid down by society. Some people, though, innovate by taking a shortcut to the goal, bypassing the rules.

Merton defined five ways people respond to this gap between having a socially accepted goal and having no socially accepted way to pursue it.

1. Conformity: Those who conform choose not to deviate. They pursue their goals to the extent that they can through socially accepted means.
2. Innovation: Those who innovate pursue goals they cannot reach through legitimate means, instead using criminal or deviant means.
3. Ritualism: People who ritualize lower their goals until they can reach them through socially acceptable ways. These members of society focus on conformity rather than attaining a distant dream.
4. Retreatism: Others retreat and reject society’s goals and means. Some beggars and street people have withdrawn from society’s goal of financial success.
5. Rebellion: A handful of people rebel and replace a society’s goals and means with their own. Terrorists or freedom fighters look to overthrow a society’s goals through socially unacceptable means.

Figure \(\PageIndex{1}\): One of Robert Merton’s adaptations in his strain theory is retreatism, in which poor people abandon society’s goal of economic success and reject its means of employment to reach this goal. Some of today’s homeless people might be considered retreatists under Merton’s typology, however most homeless do not fall into this category because they are forced to be homeless and not choose it as a lifestyle. Franco Folini – Homeless woman with dogs – CC BY-SA 2.0.

In Merton’s fourth adaptation, retreatism, some poor people withdraw from society by becoming hobos or vagrants or by becoming addicted to alcohol, heroin, or other drugs. Their response to the strain they feel is to reject both the goal of economic success and the means of working.

Ritualism, on the other hand, is a condition in which the rules are followed at the expense of goals, where there “develops a tradition-bound, sacred society characterized by neophobia” (Merton, 1938, p. 673). Retreatism involves rejecting both the means and the goals, a condition that characterizes serious drug addiction and living on the streets (Merton, 1938), while rebellion overturns the goals and means society has to offer, creating new goals and institutional regulations.

Merton’s Modes of Adaptation
Adaption to Structural Strain	Want the American Dream? (Goals)	Follow conventional societal rules? (Means)
Conformity People who embrace both society’s conventional goals and the means of achieving them.	Yes	Yes
Ritualism Are not really concerned with becoming wealthy or meeting other major societal goals. However, they are still content with or enjoy the traditional practices in society.	No	Yes
Innovation Are people who very much want to reach conventional goals but reject or are incapable of reaching them through socially accepted means.	Yes	No
Retreatism There is one thing that separates retreatists from rebels. Neither are after the conventional goals or means of society, but rebels substitute alternative goals and means. retreatists withdraw from society and may be voluntarily or involuntarily unhoused, survivalists, people in addiction, or people with severe mental illness.	No	No
Rebellion	Reject culture and strive for change—may use legitimate or illegitimate means to do so	Reject culture and strive for change—may use legitimate or illegitimate means to do so

Merton’s model is specific to North America, but as capitalism has spread around the globe, the goal of acquiring wealth has also spread, leading to a globalization of anomie and, correspondingly, certain forms of criminal behavior. “The-end-justifies-the-means” has become the guiding norm, which is really a case of normlessness or anomie. For Messner and Rosenfeld (1997), this represents a state of institutional anomie, a condition that correlates with higher homicide rates cross-nationally.

Strain theory is useful for explaining particular types of crime, especially the ability to make money through illicit means. It is less useful, however, for explaining crime that is non-utilitarian, such as breaking windows, spray painting walls with graffiti, and shoplifting small items that are readily discarded after the act (Cohen, 1955). Another critique of Merton’s theory pertains to crimes committed by bankers and executives. People who engage in corporate crime often have access to the institutional means, and many hold degrees from highly respectable universities. In response, Murphy and Robinson (2008) propose an additional mode of adaptation to anomie and strain – maximization to describe those who combine both legitimate and illegitimate means in their pursuit of wealth and privilege.

Figure \(\PageIndex{2}\): Diagram of how crime occurs according to Merton’s Structural Strain Theory

In a more recent formulation, two sociologists, Steven F. Messner and Richard Rosenfeld (2007), expanded Merton’s view by arguing that in the United States crime arises from several of our most important values, including an overemphasis on economic success, individualism, and competition. These values produce crime by making many Americans, rich or poor, feel they never have enough money and by prompting them to help themselves even at other people’s expense. Crime in the United States, then, arises ironically from the country’s most basic values.

In yet another extension of Merton’s theory, Robert Agnew (2007) reasoned that adolescents experience various kinds of strain in addition to the economic type addressed by Merton. A romantic relationship may end, a family member may die, or students may be taunted or bullied at school. Repeated strain-inducing incidents such as these produce anger, frustration, and other negative emotions, and these emotions in turn prompt delinquency and drug use.

Agnew’s General Strain Theory

Taking Merton’s ideas about structural strain resulting from imbalances in society, Robert Agnew (1992) applied the concept of strain to people of all social classes and economic positions to explain crime. He identified strains that occur at the individual level rather than focusing on the broader, structural level of society as Merton did. Such sources of strain include:

1. failure to achieve positively valued goals
2. removal of positively valued stimuli
3. presentation of noxious (negative) stimuli

The first type of strain is quite similar to what Merton described: the inability to achieve a goal that you desire, such as wealth, due to blocked opportunities. The other two types of strain that Agnew identified sound complicated but are quite simple. The removal of positively valued stimuli means losing something you like. This could include getting laid off from your dream job, losing a loved one or pet, moving to a new city away from your friends, or even experiencing your parents’ divorce. Presentation of noxious stimuli refers to something unwanted entering your life. Examples of this might include experiencing abuse or discrimination from a loved one or acquaintance, developing health problems, or getting a new boss who is a major jerk. Agnew believed situations like these could cause strain on a person, even if they were anticipated or vicariously experienced by imagining the feelings of someone who was directly impacted.

Importantly, Agnew did not claim that these types of strain directly caused crime. Instead, they led to a negative affective state that could include anger, depression, disappointment, or fear. It is the negative affective state that leads to crime, especially among those who do not have support to help them cope, escape painful situations, or boost their self-confidence.

Figure \(\PageIndex{3}\): Diagram of how crime occurs according to Agnew’s Strain Theory

Richard Cloward and Lloyd Ohlin’s Differential Opportunity Theory

In the 1950s and 1960s, many cities in the United States saw an increase in juvenile gang activity. The actions of gangs were not only a focus in the media but also in popular culture with West Side Story and in S.E. Hinton’s 1967 publication of The Outsiders which later became a movie. During this era, criminologists turned their focus to opportunities we have in our everyday lives to commit crimes, tying their theories to gang activity and delinquency.

Criminologists Richard Cloward and Lloyd Ohlin (1960) combined Merton’s strain theory with Sutherland’s differential association theory to create differential opportunity theory. The focus of differential opportunity theory is on the discrepancy between what the lower-class juveniles desire and what means are available to them because they have fewer opportunities than their peers in other neighborhoods.

Like Merton, Cloward and Ohlin emphasized cultural goals and the means to achieve those goals. However, they added to Merton’s strain theory by suggesting that people’s access to both legitimate and illegitimate means is socially structured. In other words, when looking at obtaining cultural goals, different people have different opportunities (some have more legal opportunities; some more illegal). For instance, in some neighborhoods, there are more opportunities to participate in illegitimate means to achieve one’s goals. The most common of these means is selling illegal drugs. Even though the risk is high, the payoff for many is higher. They see this as an opportunity to achieve their goal rather than pursuing a more conventional method.

This theory focuses on the gap between what an adolescent wants and what they can legally get. The larger that gap, the greater their likely exposure to illegitimate means and willingness to use those means to get what they want. Cloward and Ohlin (1960) said this is evident when there are differences in access to learning structures (those that teach certain values and skills) and performance structures (those that reward delinquent or non-delinquent behavior based on those values and skills). They argue the social structure of the community is responsible for creating more access to legitimate opportunities than illegitimate ones, especially in lower-income communities.

Differential Opportunity Theory explains why not everyone exposed to strain or blocked opportunities turns to crime. It emphasizes that access to illegitimate means varies and shapes the pathways into criminal behavior. The theory combines insights from learning, subcultural, anomie, and social disorganization theories to explain why not everyone exposed to strain or blocked opportunities turns to crime. It posits that crime emerges when social environments offer criminal opportunities that match learned motives and techniques. The theory is foundational for situational crime prevention perspectives and integrates several criminological traditions. It suggests that crime is not just a result of individual pathology but rather a result of the social and economic conditions that shape an individual's opportunities.