Women in Crime and War on Drugs

 

Women in Crime and War on Drugs

Final Essay Guidelines:

1. Generally speaking, papers that include more citations from course material (readings + lectures) are preferred to those with fewer. With that said, there is a point at which there are too many citations. Just make sure that your essay is grounded in what we read about and discussed in class.

2. All papers should be between 12-15 pages, double-spaced, in Calibri 11 pt. font, and with standard (1 inch) margins.

3. Cite ALL sources used in a Works Cited page at the end of your paper. I don’t care about the formatting of your citations in the Works Cited, but your in-text citations should look like the following:

“No one was hurt at the strike that occurred last weekend at the Mitsubishi plant (McIntyre 2015).”

“U.S. criminal justice policy has come under fire in recent years as scholars have begun to place it into a comparative perspective (Giles, Quan, and Murray 2007).”

Or

“Redding (2003) argues that bloodshed works against movement goals in the end.”

 

Part I: Application of Criminological Theory (7-10 pages)

1. Pick two or three (no more) criminological theories from Chapters 5-9 that you find interesting and use them to explain and interpret some contemporary criminal issue. For instance, you could write about Islamic or White, nationalist terrorism, violence against women, the peculiarity of the high U.S. homicide rate, drug violence in the U.S. or Mexico, or some other issue. Choose an issue and obtain my approval for it no later than July 16th. Be sure to include a descriptive discussion of your case.

2. Make sure to compare and contrast the theoretical approaches in light of the contemporary issue you have chosen. Ultimately, I would like you to discuss which theory you find most compelling as an explanation for your issue, and to say why you think so.

 

3. Also make sure that you discuss both the strengths and the weaknesses for each theory as applied to your issue. You have to choose a “favorite” but no theory is perfect – include the blind spots of the theory as well as its virtues.

 

Part II: Evaluating the War on Drugs and Mass Imprisonment (5-8 pages)

1. Use course readings and lecture notes to discuss the so-called War on Drugs and the phenomenon known as Mass Imprisonment. Make sure to discuss the following issues:

a. Define and describe the War on Drugs and Mass Imprisonment. Be sure also to discuss the racial inequalities involved in both cases.
b. Has the War on Drugs been successful in its goals of reducing drug use and the sale and distribution of illicit drugs?
c. Regardless of whether your answer to (b) is Yes or No, and in light of the social implications of the War on Drugs for some neighborhoods in the U.S., explain why you think the War on Drugs has or has not been successful in a broader sense.

2. Use what you’ve learned throughout the course to craft an alternative piece of legislation that would replace the War on Drugs. This legislation should attempt to reduce drug use, reduce violence and crime associated with the sale and distribution of illegal drugs, and do all of this while minimizing the social costs associated with punishing offenders.

a. Essays that receive high grades for this section will integrate course material in skillful ways. It would be very easy to just talk about what you’d like to see here, but much more challenging to do so while grounded in the existing stock of knowledge in criminology.

 

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