Crime and Media According to Marx

This week I was watching an episode of Under Surveillance on channel 7 and I thought I would try to apply one of the theories that we read about this week surrounding media and crime to deconstruct and analyse the show.

According to Marsh and Melville (2009) the Marxist approach stresses the power of the media to control people in society, with an overarching goal to maintain the social and economic order for the capitalist (as these conditions allow for the exploitation of surplus labour and continuing of the concentration of wealth in the hands of a few). When I first read the Marxist theory I thought it was a little farfetched, and belonged back in the 1960’s. But after some discussion and more reading, I was able to see the merits of Marxism and how it applies to media and crime today. The show that I watched this week depicted the investigation and apprehension of a Sydney Drug Baron named Richard Buttrose. The show illustrated the arduous hours that police undertook for surveillance (6 months worth), as well as the clever tactics of police entrapment, police professionalism and really amplified the power and accuracy of police intelligence. It should be noted that these elements were not discussed in such detail that would allow an individual to harness them in their own deviant pursuit of crime (criminogenic elements) but presented them in a manner, to persuade the public that these crime control methods are highly efficient and effective. Subliminally, what this does is create an image in the mind of the public, that the Police are some invincible, ever watching and unstoppable power that will apprehend you if you dare to break the law and cause a rupture in the social order (we know that this is not the norm, and that many cases go unsolved). So where does Marxism fit into all this?

Illegal activity like drug trafficking and protection rackets, generates wealth that feeds into a black market economy. In this episode of Under Surveillance, the police seized almost twelve million dollars worth of cash and drugs. I would suspect that the ruling class or capitalists aren’t all in favour of this illegal economy as it is money that they are not generating themselves, and is essentially wasted resources. The capitalist law and order agenda than, is characterized by conservatism, which is pursued by the mainstream media (which itself is becoming ever more concentrated, by capitalists). The popular media images continually portray the iron hand of the law (with the exception of new media which boats diversity and opinion). Popular crime entertainment and infotainment programs are notorious for showing the apprehension of the offender through clever police work. This in turn enforces the public’s attitude of, why commit crime when there looks like a very strong possibility of getting caught? With the media as an instrument, anomalies such as crime are contained to a minimum and discouraged, while the economy and social order continue to function, unchecked in favour of the ruling class.

I would like to finish this week's blog with yet another quote, which ties up the ideas of Marxism and the media;

'Although the media claim to reinforce public opinion it is worth asking whether they are a voice for the people or a propaganda tool for the rich and powerful' (Elridge, 1997, p.123).

Reference Page

Elridge, J., Kitzinger, J. And Williams, K. (1997) The Mass Media and Power in Modern Britian, Oxford University Press, Oxford.

Marsh, I., & Melville, G. (2009) Crime, Justice and the Media, Routledge, New York