Process and Outcome in the Study of Social Problems - Multiple Methods and Theoretical Transformation

• NCJ Number: 75776
• Author(s): I N Bernstein; J Hagan
• Date Published: 1978
• Length: 25 pages
• Publication Format: Document
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America
• Note: Paper presented at the Law and Society Meetings, Minneapolis, Minnesota, 1978.

Annotation

This paper contends that the debate between critics and proponents of labeling and conflict theory has reached an impasse on the theoretical level due to a bifurcation of methodological approaches (i.e., response as outcome versus response as process).

Abstract

The quantitative study of societal response as outcome has produced disaggregated knowledge which does show how measurable attributes of individuals affect social responses to them but is of limited general applicability. These incremental results are due to emphasis on isolated individual decisions, lack of attention to variables not found in official records, lack of attention to the organizational and political factors of social contexts, use of single institutions as research settings, and the failure to recognize the link between response as process and response as outcome. Studies of response as process have emerged from the labeling theory and examine how responses to social problems take place and what interaction occurs among the societal members who shape these responses. These qualitative accounts are seldom tested against actual outcomes in official records. An integrated research approach is proposed that combines multiple sources of data and macro and micro levels of data analysis of multiple decision points and in multiple organizational contexts. A study of decisionmaking at 10 Federal district courts illustrates the integrative approach. Jurisdictional differences in the application of criminal law and procedures were studied, as were differential applications of law and procedures to various subgroups of defendants. The study discerned a patterning of court organizational aspects, identifying 'entrepreneurial justice' in courts oriented toward making important cases and dealing harshly with 'upperworld' offenders, and 'service justice' courts where interest was on response to enforcement agencies and dealing harshly with 'underworld' offenders. The study demonstrates that multiple indicators of qualitative contextual factors can be used to provide quantitative measures of these factors such that qualitatively and quantitatively collected data can be examined in the same analysis, separating the effect of social context from the effect of individual factors of the defendant on outcome decisions. Tabular data are provided.