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Criminals: Blue-Collar Crimes

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Encyclopedia of Security and Emergency Management

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Definition

Blue-collar criminals tend to be from low income homes and their crimes involve physical or violent interactions. Since this population is constantly facing inadequate economic resources to satisfy their needs, they perpetrate blue-collar crimes in the context of economic pressure, financial need, or impoverishment.

Introduction

In criminology and criminal justice study, scholars usually agree that crimes can be committed by people of different social classes. Blue-collar crimes are survival-oriented (i.e., the main purpose/motivation for people to commit these crimes is to solve the problems of economic hardship, livelihood crisis, or extreme poverty). Since these offenses are largely committed by low-income or lower-class individuals (i.e., persons who frequently face the challenges of financial difficulty, economic scarcity, or shortage of income), such misbehaviors are called blue-collar crimes (or crimes of accommodation).

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References

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Further Reading

  • Canter, D., & Alison, L. (Eds.). (2000). Profiling property crimes. Burlington: Ashgate.

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  • Katz, M. B. (Ed.). (1993). The “underclass” debate: Views from history. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

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  • Quinney, R. (2001). The social reality of crime. New Brunswick: Transaction Publishers.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Sociology, Anthropology, and Child & Family Studies, University of Louisiana, Lafayette, LA, USA

    Hua-Lun Huang

Authors
  1. Hua-Lun Huang
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Correspondence to Hua-Lun Huang .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Dept of Security, Fire & Emergency Mgmt, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, New York, USA

    Lauren R. Shapiro

  2. Dept. of Security, Fire & Emergency Mgmt, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, New York, NY, USA

    Marie-Helen Maras

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Huang, HL. (2019). Criminals: Blue-Collar Crimes. In: Shapiro, L., Maras, MH. (eds) Encyclopedia of Security and Emergency Management. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-69891-5_113-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-69891-5_113-1

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-69891-5

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-69891-5

  • eBook Packages: Springer Reference Law and CriminologyReference Module Humanities and Social SciencesReference Module Business, Economics and Social Sciences

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