Introduction

The definition of Crime is beautifully quoted by Lord William Blackstone, an eminent English jurist of eighteenth-century A.D. that, “ Crime as an act committed or omitted in violation of public-law either forbidding or commanding it”. In this definition, Lord Blackstone has emphasized crime as the harm or injury carried out on the community at large.

Early ideas about crime were either linked to religion or property. Immoral acts, moralities and sacrilege was considered sins (which was equivalent to crime) and was primarily dealt with by the church. Besides this, the church also maintained law and order, discipline and probity.

Ingredients Of Crime

There are four elements or ingredients which are necessary for the commission of crime:

Human Being

The first ingredient required for a crime is that the unlawful act must be done by a human. In ancient times, when Criminal law was dictated by the concept of retribution, punishments were imposed on humans as well as animals for causing any harm. For e.g. often horses or cows were killed for causing harm to human beings like kicking a man or destroying property.

This concept was not considered much logical consequently discarded. The rules of crime and criminal jurisprudence have been amended time and time again for refinement. Now, the first ingredient of crime is a human being. It is mandatory that the human being or person must be under a legal duty to act in a specific manner and should be fit for rewarding punishments. Further, Section 11 of Indian Penal Code (IPC) 1860 elaborates on this concept and states that the word “person” aside from a human being may include a Company or Association or body of persons, whether incorporated or not. Therefore, the word “person” may include artificial or juridical persons as well.

Mens Rea (Guilty Mind) 

The second significant ingredient of the crime is mens rea or evil mind or intentions. This is based on the maxim, “actus non facit reum nisi mens sit rea” which means guilty acts and guilty intentions together comprise crime. Every crime requires a mental element or ingredient which is considered as the basic principle of criminal liability. Therefore, no person can be punished in a criminal proceeding unless it can be shown that he had a guilty mind.

Actus Reus (Guilty Act or Omission) 

The third essential ingredient of crime is Actus Reus or Guilty Act. This term (Actus Reus) was first used by Prof.Kenny. Actus Reus is the manifestation of Mens Rea in the external world. It denotes the act done by a person in furtherance of his mens rea or guilty intention. In criminal law, along with mens rea, it’s important to prove the actus reus of the accused in order to convict him for an offence.

Injury

The fourth requirement for the commission of crime is Injury. This injury could be to a specific person or society as a whole. Section 44 of Indian Penal Code (IPC) 1860, describes that the injury caused should be done illegally by the offender and could be to the body, mind, reputation or property of the person.

Classification of Crime

Almost every legal system divides crimes into several categories for various purposes connected with the working of the court. The Common Law primitively divides crime into four categories:-

Modern Approach

Sociological Approach

Psychological Approach

Legal Approach

From the above-mentioned approaches to the crime, only three have been discussed below.

Sociological Approach to Crime

Environmental determinants like physical, social, economical, cultural and political may shape the behaviour and attitude of people. Meager social, physical and family environment may lead the person to strengthen his intentions towards the crime. Living in poverty and destitution, lack of social support and pessimistic familial background may increase the possibility of occurrence of criminal acts in the society. Furthermore, unemployment, illiteracy and lack of awareness add to the risks of criminal acts. Crime can be the repercussion of defective social structure and persons living in those societies may learn criminal acts because of socialization.

The Strain Theory given by Merton in 1938 is based on a socio-structural outlook. According to this theory, the social structure within the society can give rise to criminal acts in society. When people experience stress or strain in their lives, they start to behave like criminals to reduce the negativity from their lives. On the basis of general Strain Theory, two general types of strain or stress can lead to committing of criminal acts by a person:

i) when someone prevents an individual from achieving his goals; 

ii) when someone takes valuable things owned by an individual. 

The goals mentioned above could be money, status or autonomy from adolescents. If there are limited ways to achieve these goals, people will stick to committing criminal acts even by using illegal ways. Moreover, if anything which is precious to an individual is snatched away, it is likely that he will go to all extent to restore it, even if he has to take up unlawful means.

empathy and altruism on the approaches to crime. Empathy is an emotional and cognitive capacity to perceive the feelings and agony of others. While altruism is an active concern for others welfare. Studies proved that the lower level of empathy and altruism causes greater anti-social behavior and criminal acts. Moreover,

impulsiveness and negative sentimentality are other influenced personality traits and characteristics which may increase criminal acts due to the fact that impulsive person act and behave without thinking of consequences while a negative sentimentality trait can’t control their behavior. Behavioral Psychology, on the other hand, claims that people learn their behaviours through punishments and rewards. Thus, the criminal activities may increase with reinforcements and decrease with punishments and retribution.

Legal Approach to Crime

During most of the time when the sphere of Criminology was being developed, people supposed that crime was a behaviour that had been judged to be a violation of the criminal law. This concept was clearly expressed by an eminent criminologist, Paul Tappan in 1947 when he noticed that “ crime is an intentional act in violation of Criminal Law which includes( statutes, case laws, acts) committed without defence or excuse and penalized by the state as a felony or misdemeanour”. Obviously, in this approach crime is factually easy to fathom, but it suffers from the relativity of criminal law and the operation of the criminal justice system. Explanations and clarification of crime would have to be relative to the legal system and historical period and could not have a standing of scientific explanations.

A powerful legal system and target hardening may decrease the rate of crime in a society. Especially, the efficacy of laws and punishments may decrease criminal acts. The fair legal system shapes and outlines the decision-making process of potential criminals positively.

What is Criminology

Criminology derives from the Latin word

'crimen' (crime) and the Greek word 'logos'(doctrine) 

The word Criminology’ originated in 1890. The general meaning of the term is the scientific study of crime as a social phenomenon, of criminals and of penal institutions.Kenny (analyzed /defined/ described) that Criminology is a branch of criminal science which deals with crime causation, analysis and prevention of crime Criminology as a branch of knowledge is concerned with those particular conducts of human behavior which are prohibited by society. It is, therefore, a socio-legal study which seeks to discover the causes of criminality and suggests the remedies to reduce crimes. Therefore, it flows that criminology and criminal policy are interdependent and mutually support one another. Thus criminology seeks to study the phenomenon of criminality in its entirety. The problem of crime control essentially involves the need for a study of the forces 

operating behind the incidence of crime and a variety of co-related factors influencing the personality of the offender. This has eventually led to development of modern criminology during the preceding two centuries. The purpose of study of this branch of knowledge is to analyze different aspects of crime and device effective measures for treatment of criminals to bring about their re-socialization and rehabilitation in the community. Thus criminology as a branch of knowledge has a practical utility in so far as it aims at bringing about the welfare of the community as a whole. 

Defining Criminology 

Criminology maybe defined as “the scientific study of the causation, correction, and 

prevention of crime”. Criminology is the social science approach to the study of crime as an 

individual and social phenomenon. Although contemporary definitions vary in the exact words used, there is considerable consensus that criminology involves the application of the scientific method to the study of variation in criminal law, the causes of crime, and reactions to crime (Akers 2000). 

Definitions 

Edwin Sutherland 

Criminology is the body of knowledge regarding crime as a social phenomenon. It includes within its scope the processes of making laws, breaking laws and reacting towards the breaking of law. (From the above definition it is apparent that criminology is a combination of how the society defines and deals with crime within a social and legal context). 

Nature and Scope of Criminology 

Criminology is an inter-disciplinary field of study, involving scholars and practitioners representing a wide range of behavioral and social sciences as well as numerous natural sciences. Sociologists played a major role in defining and developing the field of study and criminology emerged as an academic discipline housed in sociology programs. However, with the establishment of schools of criminology and the proliferation of academic departments and programs concentrating specifically on crime and justice in the last half of the 20 century, the criminology emerged as a distinct professional field with a broad, interdisciplinary focus and a shared commitment to generating knowledge through systematic research. 4 One ultimate goal of criminology has been the development of theories expressed with sufficient precision that they can be tested, using data collected in a manner that allows verification and replication.As a subdivision of the larger field of sociology, criminology draws on psychology, economics, anthropology, psychiatry, biology, statistics, and other disciplines to explain the 

causes and prevention of criminal behavior. Subdivisions of criminology include penology, the 

study of prisons and prison systems; bio-criminology, the study of the biological basis of 

criminal behavior; feminist criminology, the study of women and crime; and criminalistics, the 

study of crime detection, which is related to the field of Forensic Science. Much research related to criminology has focused on the biological basis of criminal behavior. In fact, bio-criminology, attempts to explore the biological basis of criminal behavior. Research in this area has focused on chromosomal abnormalities, hormonal and brain chemical imbalances, diet,neurological conditions, drugs, and alcohol as variables that contribute to criminal behavior. Criminology has historically played a reforming role in relation to Criminal Law and the criminal justice system. As an applied discipline, it has produced findings that have influenced legislators, judges, prosecutors, lawyers, Probation officers, and prison officials, prompting them to better understand crime and criminals and to develop better and more human sentences and treatments for criminal behavior.

association planned for considering counteraction and reasons for wrongdoing and treatment of crooks.

Importance of criminology

There are several reasons that explain why criminology is important:

Reduction in crime: Criminology helps society understand, control, and reduce crime. Studying crime helps discover and analyse its causes, which can be used towards crime reduction policies and initiatives.

It helps understand the mindset of criminals: Criminology helps understand the mindset of criminals, why they commit crimes, and the factors that affect them. This helps in the proper allocation of resources to control crime.

Reform of criminals: As well as controlling and reducing crime, criminology can also suggest appropriate measures for the rehabilitation of criminals.

Criminology as a separate branch of study

Despite the tremendous promise and significant potential, Criminology as a subject in this nation is in a condition of avoidable disregard and apathy. The teaching of criminology at degree and post-degree level isn’t widely accessible as there are just not many organizations giving instructing, exploration, or practices in criminology. The circumstance has brought about numerous untoward results. For example, the scholastic openings and a wide system of academicians in criminology couldn’t develop in India. 

increasingly specific regions, as ecological criminology which has acquired headways, police strategies, networks arranged to police, and so forth. It endeavors to clarify why certain occasions are viewed as wrongdoing in specific social orders and not in the others, subsequently, setting up law for the improvement of the law. Through this, it additionally builds up the contrast among societies and social orders, lawful and unlawful, etc. 

Criminology incorporates the investigation of a few unique speculations like old-style, positivist, and so on, which encourages us to comprehend why violations are submitted. Through its different speculations, it recommends that individuals carry out violations either when they see an advantage or through interior and outside variables, which incorporate organic elements or social factors. The entirety of this helps the lawmakers and the legal executive to comprehend wrongdoing in a  more comprehensive manner subsequent with laying more powerful and substantial laws. 

It puts forth a reasonable strategy for balancing bad behavior and controlling and preventing law infringement depending on its gravity. By making disciplines increasingly harsher, crooks get aware of the potential consequences that their criminal behaviour and actions could result in. This, in turn, reduces the crime percentage.

Another road of criminology, i.e., explains the reason, causes, and motive behind a crime executed by a criminal and what was the mindset behind it. In entirety, criminology encourages us to get wrongdoing and hoodlums all the more profoundly. It expresses that humans can settle on choices and in this manner if he/she violates a law, he/she is at risk to be rebuffed. It underlines the harshness of the criminal equity framework, which can help forestall wrongdoings. It likewise prepares the legal executive to take reasonable measures for comprehending and setting up laws against violations. Through every one of these ways, modern criminology encourages us to comprehend the main drivers of wrongdoing and gives us the most ideal approach to address and forestall it, along these lines additionally helping the equity conveyance framework.

provide entirely different guidance to the equity conveyance arrangement of the country.

Future trends to be followed

Criminology addresses a different assortment of data that combines a wide arrangement of approaches. Although not many contemporary patterns can be applied to the entire field of study, it is in any case where the examination is progressively quantitative, especially in contemplating and analyzing the reasons for crime. A portion of this work applies the quantifiable procedure started by Quetelet to explain the crime rates related with explicit social gatherings; other works utilize the methodology put forth by Lombroso, to clarify the probability of a person carrying out a crime as far as his natural, mental, or social attributes. Moreover, these methodologies are progressively focused on probabilistic forecasts as opposed to supreme or deterministic ones. At last, criminologists presently focus on recognizing factors in social orders that are related with moderately little argumentations in crime percentage and variables in people that are related with moderately little additions in the likelihood that they will perpetuate crime. The entirety of this mirrors the intrinsic multifaceted nature of the subject and focuses on the end where no single factor decides about if an individual carries out wrongdoing or whether a general public has high or low crime percentages.

Criminology addresses a different assortment of data that combines a wide collection of approaches. Even though relatively few contemporary examples can be applied to the whole field of study, it is regardless that much assessment is dynamically quantitative, particularly in considering investigating the explanations behind bad behavior. A segment of this work applies the quantifiable approach started by Quetelet to explain the wrongdoing rates related with explicit social requests and get-togethers; other work uses the strategy began by Lombroso, to explain the likelihood of an individual’s completing a bad behavior to the extent his regular, mental, or social qualities. Additionally, these procedures are dynamically centered around probabilistic gauges rather than incomparable or deterministic ones. Finally, criminologists by and by will when all is said in the done concentrate on perceiving factors in social requests that are connected with modestly little additions in wrongdoing rates and factors in individuals that are connected with tolerably little augmentations in the probability that they will sustain bad behaviors. The total of this reflects the inborn multifaceted nature of the subject and centers towards the end where no single factor truly chooses about if an individual completes bad behavior or whether an overall population has high or low wrongdoing rates.

Conclusion

The origin of criminal activities has been discussed by different scientific disciplines and various approaches. The article tended to rationalize the query of “why people commit a crime?”. It could be concluded that there are various factors which affect the behaviour of individuals and their decision to commit a crime. The article aimed to present different approaches to criminal activities within a society. The research on various approaches to crime makes it intelligible and lucid clear that it is impossible to determine a specific approach to crime which gives an infallible answer to all questions of crime causation and their solutions. However, the different approaches to crime do provide better grounds for the determination of particular policies for dealing with crimes and criminals more smoothly.

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