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To what extent is language used differently and similarly by males and females?

This paper assesses the claim that language is gendered, that is to say, that there is a significant difference between the way language is used by men and women. Discussion about gendered patterns of communication frequently appear in both the popular press and in psychology literature (Basow & Rubenfeld, 2003, pp. 183-187). This paper explores both the more anecdotal discussions of the subject in the popular press, and the more sophisticated discussions in academic works. During the course of this paper, it is argued that sex is not the determinate factor influencing the use of language. Instead, the use of language is much more dependent on individual differences and personalities, the social structure, and the context in which language is being used.

However, before proceeding, it is worth exploring the term “gendered” and similar, associated terms. Gender is to some extent a performative and iterated social construct. Thus, gender is the characteristics attached to the male and female sex (Butler, 2002). This lacuna between sex and gender causes some problems when assessing whether language is gendered since much of the literature on the topic is not precise about whether what is being discussed is a difference between the two sexes (Men and Women) or a difference between the gender performances of the two genders (Male and Female). However, this paper does not have the space to discuss this complex area. Therefore, the focus of the paper is whether we can establish a claim that language is used differently by men and women. It will be concluded that such a claim cannot be proved or substantiated, and differences in language use are determined by the individual’s personality/idiosyncrasies, temporal-socio-cultural location, and the specific context/situation in which language is being used.

This paper assesses two distinct claims (“myths”) about the differences between how men and women use language. The first commonly held “myth” that shall be considered is the claim that women talk more than men. This is a commonly held “myth” within society, and one which is explored in much of the literature about language use in men and women (see: D Cameron, 2007; J Holmes, 2007, pp. 299-305; T Kornheiser, 2007, pp. 305-307). The second “myth” considered in this paper is the claim that men and women use language for different purposes/goals. Specifically, I shall examine Rossetti’s claim that: ‘the main distinction between the way boys and girls communicate is that girls generally use the language to negotiate closeness [… whereas] boys generally use language to negotiate their status in the group (competition-oriented)’ (Rossetti, 1998, pp. 1-6). I also consider Tannen’s similar and related claim that men use language to impart knowledge; whereas, women use language in a supportive role (Tannen, 2007, pp. 322-334). Specifically, Tannen argues that men play ‘a game of “Have I Won?” while … women … [play] a game of “Have I been sufficiently helpful?”‘ (Tannen, 2007, p. 326).

Korneiser provides an amusing anecdote involving his children to suggest that differences in their linguistic styles are based on differences of sex (Kornheiser, 2007, pp. 305-307). Although Kornheiser’s article is explicitly about how boys/men and girls/women respond to questions, the article implicitly demonstrates an anecdotal example of the “myth” that girls/women talk more, since Kornheiser’s daughter is depicted as far more verbose than her brother (Kornheiser, 2007, pp. 305-307). Kornheiser uses the anecdote of his more talkative daughter to suggest that this is typical of differences between how the sexes use language. More explicitly, Holmes begins her article by raising the “myth” that women talk more than men, opening with the question, ‘Do women talk more than men?’ (Holmes, 2007, p. 299). Cameron is explicit that this attitude is a widely-held belief, and argues that it is one of ‘”the myth[s] of Mars and Venus” is… [that] women talk more than men’ (Cameron, 2007).

Both Holmes and Cameron aim to show that it is a myth that women talk more than men, by reporting, in detail, a vast number of studies as evidence. They rely on quantitative data to support their argument. For instance, Holmes describes a study by James and Drakich which examined “the amount of talk” used by men and women in 63 studies; the resulting study showed that women only talked more than men in 2 of the 63 studies (Holmes, 2007, p. 300). Precisely what is meant by “amount of talk”, here, is slightly unclear – it is not explicitly stated whether the studies are discussing the total number of words used by the men and women, or whether “amount of talk” refers to the amount of time each speaker talks for. “Amount of talk” is a somewhat unclear term; however, Holmes is keen to demonstrate that detailed research has been conducted, and that this has debunked the myth that women talk more than men. In contrast, the “evidence” that women talk more than men is mostly based on anecdote and commonly accepted ideas about gender differences. Cameron uses an even more quantitative approach to back-up her argument by detailing Hyde’s “meta-analysis” statistical technique (Cameron, 2007). Cameron also shows that the author of The Female Brain (where it was claimed that women use 20,000 words a day, whilst men only use 7,000 words a day) had later accepted that the claim could not be substantiated and would be deleted from later editions (Cameron, 2007).

Tannen takes a different approach. Although Tannen does claim that there are differences between how men and women they use language, Tannen implicitly argues that it is a myth that women talk more than men, since her anecdotes suggest that women do not talk more than men. Tannen relies, primarily, on anecdotal evidence to illuminate her argument that women listen and men talk. Her point is that men have information they wish to impart; and, thus, they lecture. Men, she claims, do not listen but use language as a form of monologue to impart information, whereas women play the role of the supportive listening audience (Tannen, 2007, pp. 322-334). Tannen is not necessarily aiming to dispel the “myth” that women talk more, but this is implicit in her depiction of men as lecturers and women as the audience. In contrast to Holmes’ and Cameron’s presentation of their arguments, Tannen’s discussion primarily relies on qualitative data, in the sense that her article is based on personal anecdotes and her interactions with male and female colleagues.

Both the approaches taken by Holmes/Cameron and Tannen fail to tell the whole story about the “myth” that women talk more. Holmes and Cameron dismiss the claim by referring to quantitative data and “meta-analysis” which fails to illuminate individual differences and context, whereas Tannen relies on anecdote and qualitative data to imply that it is “myth” that women talk more. Whilst Tannen’s article provides specific incidents and explores the context, situation and status of participants, she does not provide statistical or quantitative data to demonstrate that men really do lecture and women really do play the part of a listening audience.

Whilst the evidence provided by Holmes, Cameron and Tannen seems to suggest that it is only “myth” that women talk more, this does not take into account individual personalities/differences, the socio-cultural context in which gender roles are played out or the specific situations and contexts that determine language usage. Interactions do not take place in a vacuum, but within a certain socio-cultural structure (that could still be argued is patriarchal). On this point, Macaulay makes the observation that ‘in Western industrialized societies men have more often been in positions of power over women rather than the reverse’ (Macaulay, 2007, p. 309). Macaulay makes this observation in order to show that, given such a socio-cultural structure, it is not surprising if women are sometimes found to use more deferential language (Macaulay, 2007). Within such a context, it is not surprising if men are pushed into the role of lecturer, and women into the role of listening audience. Therefore, it seems that (rather than women talking more than men) men may talk more than women if they occupy a “higher” status in society. Instead of thinking that the “amount of talk” is differentiated along gender lines, it may be more accurate to think that the “amount of talk” is differentiated along hierarchical lines.

The final section of this paper explores the second “myth” – the claim that men and women use language for different purposes/goals. Again, it shall be argued that to differentiate the way language is used along gender/sex lines is flawed and that a deeper understanding of the use of language requires consideration of individual peoples’ personalities, as well as the socio-cultural structure and the specific context/situation in which language is being used.

Rossetti argues that ‘language styles… reflect the different goals of the users’ (Rossetti, 1998). This is an innocuous claim, as it is reasonable to argue that language styles are dependent upon the goal(s) of the user. However, Rossetti argues that the different goals of the users can be differentiated along gender lines, that is to say men and women have different goals when they use language. Specifically, men use language to extend their ‘authority and respect in society; while women [use language]… to nurture existing relationships and develop new ones’ (Rossetti, 1998). Rossetti’s view of how men and women use language seems very similar to Tannen’s view (previously mentioned) where men use language to lecture, and women play the role of audience (Tannen, 2007, pp. 322-334). Basow & Rubenfeld provide a succinct summary of the supposed difference in the goals of men and women when they use language: ‘in general, women are expected to use language to enhance social connection, and men are expected to use language to enhance social dominance’ (Basow & Rubenfeld, 2003, p. 183). Thus, it seems that the two claims are linked. Men use language to enhance social dominance, and those who have social dominance are able to occupy more of the “amount of talk” time.

However, differentiation of language usage along sex binaries fails when we step away from quantitative analysis, and consider specific and unique contexts and situations. Generalizations based on quantitative analysis obscure individual differences between people by focusing on sex and analyzing sex as the determinate factor. Thus, Cameron succinctly argues that ‘focusing on the differences between men and women while ignoring differences within them is extremely misleading’ (Cameron, 2007). To argue that a specific goal is pursued when using language which is determined by the sex of the speaker does seem to ignore the differences within a sex, and between individuals. Thus, an argument that one’s purposes and goals when using language are determined by sex is a very blunt and unrealistic explanation for differences in language usage in a complex world in which there is a wide variety and difference within a sex, as well as between the sexes.

A feminist analysis might suggest that it is not so much the case that men and women have different goals when they use language; rather, differences are due to perceived gender roles that become re-iterated and played out, for instance the role assigned to women which often sees them ‘provid[ing] a silent, decorative background in many social contexts’ (Holmes, 2007, p. 304). Thus, if ‘female loquacity is generally combined with disapproval of it’ (Cameron, 2007), a socio-cultural structure develops in which men have a dominant hierarchical place within it. From this position, it is plausible that society may develop a false belief that women talk more than men. A feminist analysis suggests that ‘people overestimate how much women talk because they think that, ideally, women would not talk at all’ (Cameron, 2007). Thus, given the overestimation of how much women talk, the belief comes to exist that women talk more than men.

However, this analysis reverts to the original argument that differences in language usage (whether it is the amount of words spoken, or the goal/purpose of language), cannot be differentiated along simple gender lines. It is necessary to take account of the individuals using language, and therefore the differences within a sex, as well as the socio-cultural structure in which language is used, as well as the specific situation/context of a particular utterance. Holmes argues that ‘many different factors including the social context in which the talk is taking place, the kind of talk involved and the relative social confidence of the speakers, which is affected by such things as their social roles… and their familiarity with the topic’ (Holmes, 2007, p. 304) are all involved in the way language is used. Thus, sex/gender is only one factor that influences how language is used, and it would be difficult to substantiate a claim that sex is the most important factor when considering how language is being used in a specific context.

References

Basow, S. & Rubenfeld, K. (2003) “‘Troubles Talk’: Effects of Gender and Gender-Typing”, Sex Roles, 48(3/4), 183-187.

Butler, J. (2002). Gender trouble. New York: Routledge.

Cameron, D. (2007, October 1). “What language barrier?”, The Guardian. Retrieved October 2, 2015.

Holmes, J. (2007) “Women Talk Too Much” in Exploring Language (11th edition) (ed. G. Goshgarian). New York: Pearson/Longman, 209-305.

Kornheiser, T. (2007) “No Detail is Too Small for Girls Answering a Simple Question” in Exploring Language (11th edition) (ed. Gary Goshgarian). New York: Pearson/Longman, 305-307.

Macaulay, R. (2007) “Sex Differences” in Exploring Language (11th edition) (ed. Gary Goshgarian). New York: Pearson/Longman, 305-322.

Rossetti, P. (1998). Gender differences in e-mail communication. The Internet TESL Journal, 4(7), 1-6.

Tannen, D. (2007) “‘I’ll Explain It to You’: Lecturing and Listening” in Exploring Language (11th edition) (ed. Gary Goshgarian). New York: Pearson/Longman, 332-334.

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Discuss Barthes’ essay with reference to social media

In his seminal essay ‘The Death of the Author’, Barthes (1977) challenged the world of orthodox literary criticism by claiming that its obsession with distilling the truth of an author’s intentions from his works is futile. The act of writing is ‘the destruction of every voice, of every point of origin’ (Barthes, 1977, p. 142). The author’s aims and motives are obscured by the duplicity of language: not only is language inadequate to express the author’s inner world, but language also skews the reader’s interpretation of the work. Language is a complex network of cultural codes and associations over which the author has no control.

Yet, the notion of authorship is not confined to literature. In this essay, I shall be examining how Barthes’ ideas apply to Facebook, a social media website. Here, users create Facebook ‘pages’, which are in effect mini-autobiographies that they update with news, photos, biographical details etc. Users are also able to make ‘friends’, i.e. to subscribe for updates from other users’ pages, and to comment on these updates. Facebook is then a vast network of individuals who are both authors of their own pages and readers cum critics of their friends’ pages. Moreover, not only is communication between author and reader mediated via language, it is also restricted by the Facebook software, which as shall be seen, permits only certain kinds of expression on the part of the author.

This essay is structured as follows. Firstly, I will review Barthes’ essay in more depth, emphasizing the issues relevant to my study. Secondly, I will consider how Facebook mediates between author and reader, providing a cultural template through which an individual’s biography is filtered. Finally, I will consider how Facebook alienates users in the manner envisaged by Barthes in his essay.

According to Barthes, it is the identity of the author that is paramount for the literary critic: the work is ‘tyrannically centred on the author, his person, his life, his tastes, his passions’ (Barthes, 1977, p. 143). The responsibility for meaning, for the “truth” of the work, as well as its success or failure, is placed squarely on the author’s shoulders. The work of literary criticism is to enlighten the readership as to the author’s motives by invoking their personal biography: Van Gogh’s genius is attributed to his madness, Tchaikovsky’s to his alcoholism and Baudelaire’s to his ‘failure’ (ib.) as a man.

Yet, Barthes maintained that the medium of language interferes with the process of writing, such that an author necessarily relinquishes control over the manner in which his work is interpreted. Influenced by contemporary advances in linguistics, Barthes claimed that ‘language knows a “subject” not a “person”‘ (Barthes, 1977, p. 145). The “subject”, or author, of the work is not an individual. In other words, the author as individual with a biography, emotions and intentions is invisible to the reader. Rather, they see the subject, an empty construct, an abstraction formed by the words on the page. This subject is ’empty outside the enunciation which defines it’ (ib.): it is the work that calls the subject into being and the subject is entirely dependent on the work. The author’s true identity has been hollowed out due to the alienating effects of language and has been replaced by the subject, a mere place-marker holding language together.

Language, argues Barthes, has this alienating effect since a text is nothing more than a ’tissue of quotations drawn from the innumerable centres of culture’ (Barthes, 1977, p. 146). An author’s words, and the manner in which he utilizes them, are not the author’s own but are drawn from a huge cultural reservoir of previous texts. A phrase elicits a culturally determined meaning, provoking a myriad of contextual associations giving the text a life of its own, constantly displacing its meaning even further from the author’s intentions. Attempting to pin down meaning is futile since no text was ever written in a vacuum; the cultural landscape has no origin, no founding text that would guarantee all meaning. Rather, the origin is language itself, which ‘ceaselessly calls into question all origins’ (Barthes, 1977, p. 146).

The author is then doubly deceived by language. Firstly, language does not belong to the author. It is an alien presence that inhabits him and that enforces a culturally dependent mode of expression. The author can never perfectly capture his inner experience through language, as there is always some part of that experience that evades capture through words. Rather, he evokes the subject, his avatar, as seen through the lens of language. The author’s true identity, if indeed there is a “truth” of his existence, will always elude the reader and in fact, himself.

Secondly, the reader also has this alienating relationship with language. The “meaning” of a text, as supposed by the reader, is coloured by their cultural context. The author, in allowing his work to be read, relinquishes control over how it is received by his audience. They will draw their own conclusions, make their own associations and interpretations which depend on the ‘immense dictionary’ (Barthes, 1977, p. 147) of cultural references that they have at their disposal. Thus, the reader imagines the author as a subject, a construct of their own conception of language. This subject differs not only from reader to reader, but temporally, being reconstructed every time a particular reader approaches the same text.

Any attempt to attribute a work’s success or failure to a particular author is fruitless. When a critic examines and re-examines a text, they are merely reconstructing their own conception of the author as subject, which can never coincide with the author’s conception, let alone his true identity. Asking an author to explain a text merely creates another text with another subject, and the game begins again. The author is effectively powerless—responsibility for a text’s interpretation is passed to the reader. There is no ultimate meaning: ‘In the multiplicity of writing everything is to be disentangled, nothing deciphered’ (Barthes, 1977, p. 148).

Yet the effects of language are not disproportionately visited upon the author. According to Barthes, language’s alienating effects apply equally to the reader. The reader is ‘without history, biography, psychology’ (Barthes, 1977, p. 148), an impersonal ‘destination’ (ib.) for the author’s work. The reader’s role is to hold the text together, to create a unity from the cultural codes that make up the text. In other words, the author’s relationship with the reader cannot be personal: they can make no assumptions about the reader’s identity because the reader, in the process of reading, is also an abstraction evoked by the text. By symmetry, both author and reader, as represented by the text, are subjects.

Barthes’ textual examples in ‘Death of the Author’ (1977) are not limited to literary texts: as mentioned previously he uses the music of Tchaikovsky and the work of Van Gogh as illustrations of his thesis. Indeed, Barthes never limited his analysis to so-called high culture: in his book ‘Mythologies’ (Barthes, 1972) he deconstructs the cultural meanings of, for example, advertisements and films. Facebook is therefore an entirely appropriate medium for a Barthesian analysis. First, however, I will examine what is meant by a text in Facebook, and nature of the cultural codes peculiar to it.

Facebook can be viewed as a form of relational biography (Richardson & Hessey, 2009). Users update their biographies by adding essentially static information (date of birth, education etc.) as well as time-dependent data about their feelings, social commitments etc. This data can be annotated by other users in the form of comments. The user in essence constructs a “timeline” which amounts to a somewhat haphazard diary of their inner life and social relations. This timeline can be read by the user and, within certain restrictions, the user’s friends. It therefore amounts to a text, from which an interpretation of the author-as-subject is constructed in the reader’s mind.

Facebook updates can take written form, which is subject to the constraints of language and alienating to both author and reader as demonstrated earlier. Yet, the architecture of Facebook is such that further restrictions are imposed on the author. One example of this is the “like” button. A user demonstrates his or her preferences by “liking” other users’ comments or updates. Yet, this restricts the user’s reaction to mere approval. This has led some users to call for a “dislike” button, or a range of options to indicate, for example, humour or sadness (Guynn, 2015) in response to an update. Such an innovation would, however, still place a limit on the user’s reaction. Facebook texts are therefore subject to a far more restrictive cultural template than literary texts. The Facebook user-author is potentially alienated as a subject to a greater extent than the author of a literary text.

However, such alienation appears to be exactly what users of Facebook want. Das and Kramer (2013) note that a large proportion of users (over 70%) practice self-censorship. That is, they manipulate both the data they post to Facebook and their reactions to other user’s activities, in an attempt to create an idealized autobiography. They might attempt to post only positive updates in order to seem optimistic, or they might “like” other user’s posts in order to appear friendly. In Barthesian terms, they are manipulating the “language” of Facebook in an attempt to manifest themselves as an ideal subject. The Facebook author is not only dead, but the cause of death appears to be suicide.

Unfortunately, as Barthes predicts, such an exercise is futile. The restrictive cultural code inscribed in the apparatus of Facebook leads to far greater opportunity for the reader to misunderstand the user-author. Such misunderstandings can lead to “flame wars”—heated comment exchanges between users—or in extreme cases “unfriending” (the revoking of the right of another user to read one’s Facebook page). This had led to the publication of numerous books on Facebook etiquette that document the possible ways in which such misunderstandings occur and provide tips on how to avoid these situations (see e.g. Awl (2011)). However, such rules of etiquette serve only to narrow the options a user has for self-expression, leading to further alienation.

These cases serve to illustrate Barthes’ claim that the reader is ‘without history, biography, psychology’ (Barthes, 1977, p. 148), an abstract concept emptied of intention and affect. When a user-author makes an update on Facebook, they make certain assumptions about the reader and how they will react, and tailor the update to such a reader. Yet, these assumptions are not necessarily transmitted to the readership, each of whom infers their own reader-subject from the text. An example is the relationship status: a user can define themselves as “single”, “married”, in a “complicated” relationship etc., and a complex etiquette has arisen to prevent misunderstandings of this status (Suddath, 2009). For example, the author might set their relationship status to “complicated” and assume readers will interpret this as “difficult” and view it fairly neutrally. However, the author’s partner might interpret it in an entirely different fashion—as an open relationship, perhaps—and have a negative reaction. The author and their partner each invest the reader of the text with a different identity: the reader-subject of the text is an abstract concept, given flesh by the individual reactions of the text’s consumers.

In conclusion, I have examined the phenomenon of Facebook from the perspective of Barthes’ essay, ‘The Death of the Author’ (1977). I have argued, not only that the Facebook author is dead in the sense that their identity cannot be inferred from their text, but that Facebook architecture and the self-censorship of its participants lead to a greater alienation of the author from their text than that achieved in a purely literary context. Moreover, I have demonstrated that this alienation applies both to the author and the reader of the text. Not only is the censorship practised by user-authors with the aim of creating an idealized self-image counterproductive, but the message the user-readers receive about their identity is equally alienating. Since Facebook authors are at the same time readers, this leads to a double alienation that Barthes had not anticipated when he wrote his essay.

Bibliography

Awl, D. (2011). Facebook Me! A Guide to Socializing, Sharing, and Promoting on Facebook. Berkeley, CA: Peachpit Press.

Barry, D. (2012). How To Facebook – The No Nonsense Guide To Using Facebook. UK: KernowWeb.

Barthes, R. (1972). Mythologies. New York: The Noonday Press.

Barthes, R. (1977). The Death of the Author. In R. Barthes, Image, Music, Text (pp. 142-148). London: Fontana Press.

Das, S., & Kramer, A. (2013). Self-Censorship on Facebook. San Diego: Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence.

Guynn, J. (2015). USA Today. Retrieved October 19, 2015, from http://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2015/10/08/facebook-reactions-emotions-like-button-dislike/73574704/

Richardson, K., & Hessey, S. (2009). Archiving the self? Facebook as biography of social and relational memory. Journal of Information, Communication and Ethics in Society, 7(1), 25-38.

Suddath, C. (2009). Your Facebook Relationship Status: It’s Complicated. Retrieved October 19, 2015, from Time: http://content.time.com/time/business/article/0,8599,1895694,00.html

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When individuals either witness or are a victim of crime they may be required to give evidence in court. This can involve recounting events that took place or identifying a suspect from an identity parade. Evidence presented in a trial contributes to a judge or jury deciding whether an individual is innocent or guilty and if the information provided by the eyewitness is incorrect then innocent people may be found guilty or guilty people may go free (Loftus, 1986). With DNA testing, many individuals initially identified by eyewitnesses as being the perpetrator have subsequently been found to be innocent (Wells and Olson, 2003). Therefore, it is important that eyewitness testimony presented in court is accurate. The following essay will present research that has investigated why eyewitness testimony can be inaccurate and may consequently not be relevant in a court case. The essay will also consider whether children are accurate and reliable eye witnesses.

Reconstructive Memory and Schemas

When individuals observe an unusual event, such as a crime, their memory is often affected by their mental schemata, which involves prior knowledge and factors such as cultural background and values, and not solely information from the event. If there are gaps in people’s understanding of an incident they can reconstruct their memories so that they can make sense of them. The notion of reconstructive memory was proposed by Bartlett (1932, cited in Toglia, 2007, pp.240-241). Witnesses’ memories may be influenced by events that occur after the crime, for example, information from news reports in the media or other witnesses talking immediately after the event about what they saw or heard. This is relevant in particular to witnesses who observe one part of an event who then incorporate such information to elaborate and reconstruct their own memories. Toglia (2007) states that this is known as the misinformation effect and also source misattribution, which occurs when witnesses are unable to remember where the information originated from and they are then seen as being unreliable and not relevant to the court procedure.

In their 1974 study, Loftus and Palmer found that the wording of questions affected the recall of witness. Participants watched a film of a car accident and were then asked to write a brief summary of what they had seen. They were then were asked questions about the accident using different verbs to describe the accident such as, ‘how fast were the cars going when they smashed/hit/bumped each other?’ (Loftus and Palmer, 1974, p.586). The different words implied that the car was travelling at different speeds with some words implying a faster speed than other words. It was found that there was a 9 mile per hour difference between the slowest and fasted estimated speeds of the cars made by the participants. One week later, the participants returned and were asked further questions including ‘did you see any broken glass’ and, depending on the verb used in the original question, the faster the car was perceived to be travelling, the more participants reported seeing broken glass, even though there was no glass in the film (Loftus and Palmer, 1974, p.587). The study supports Bartlett and the way in which witnesses can reconstruct their memories with their previous knowledge. In a similar study, Loftus and Zanni (1975) reported that more participants said they had seen the broken headlight, rather than participants who were asked if they had seen a broken headlight, even there was no broken headlight in the film. However, both studies were undertaken in a laboratory environment and involved participants watching films, therefore it may not be possible to generalise the findings to the way witnesses respond when witnessing real-life accidents. The studies show the importance of the way in which language can alter perceptions or memories of an event. This has been addressed by introducing a cognitive interview technique which Fisher, Geiselman and Raymond (1987) suggest avoids influencing the answers given by witnesses.

If a car was travelling fast and was involved in an accident, it would be expected that there would be glass or a broken headlight, even though the witnesses (participants) did not see any in the film scenario. Individuals use their schemas to explain what happens in certain situations for example, how a burglar behaves or what type of objects would be present in a specific context, for example, the layout inside a bank or restaurant. Therefore, if something unusual is seen Loftus, Loftus and Messo (1987) argue that a witness will pay more attention to the unusual object. This has been found to be the case for crimes where weapons are involved. Participants in the Loftus et al. study were shown a series of slides of a crime in a fast-food restaurant where a customer either pointed a gun or a cheque at the cashier. It was found that there were more eye fixations on the gun than the cheque. In a second study, it was found that participant’s memory for events was poorer in the weapon scenario than in the cheque condition which according to Loftus et al. (1987) emphasises the focus on weapons.

The Effect of Stress on Witnesses.

Observing a weapon in a crime may cause a witness considerable stress and this may have an effect on their ability to accurately remember details. This has been demonstrated by Clifford and Scott (1978) in a study that involved participants watching a film of a violent attack and a control group that watched a less violent version of the film. It was found that participants who watched the violent film remember fewer details than the control group. As the study was conducted in a laboratory, it is possible that the stress experienced by witnesses to violent events is greater in real-life crime and therefore, suggests that accurate recall may be impaired. A review of the literature undertaken by Deffenbacher, Bornstein, Penrod and McGorty (2004) undertook a review of studies that investigated the effects of stress on eye witnesses and found support for the negative effects of stress on accurate recall. Stress was notably higher, for example, if suspect was present in a line-up in comparison to the suspect being absent. A number of studies have attempted to induce stress-related scenarios to study the effects on participants as witnesses, although it could be suggested that this is unethical as it may cause the participants psychological harm. However, in a study with real-life witnesses who had been present during a robbery at gun shop where the perpetrator was shot dead, Yuille and Cutshall (1986) argue that stress may not have an adverse effect on memory and eyewitness testimony. The witness in the gun shop event had very accurate and clear memories of the event, which endured over a period of 5 months.

Intergroup Bias

Another factor that may influence the accurate memory of a crime in intergroup bias. Lindholm and Christianson (1998) found that the eyewitness testimony of Swedish students taking part in a mock crime scenario involving an armed robbery was influenced by whether the perpetrator was Swedish (in-group perpetrator) or an immigrant (out-group perpetrator). The participants in the study were both immigrant and Swedish students and when both groups were shown the film and asked to identify the perpetrator in a line-up afterwards the majority incorrectly identified an innocent immigrant. Both groups of participants typically identified an innocent perpetrator who was ethnically dissimilar more often than an innocent Swede. The study appears to show that witnesses can be influenced by biases and expectations regarding the type of person who is more likely to commit a certain type of crime. However, because the study involves a mock crime scenario it lacks the emotional aspects of a real crime and witnesses may not have the same biases they demonstrate in a laboratory task.

Loftus (1986) reports that in cross-racial identification by eyewitness, individuals are less accurate at identifying a member of a different ethnic group or culture than identifying features of a person’s own race. Such findings would appear to be particularly relevant in contemporary, multi-racial society in the UK, and other countries. Alderson (2010) reports that the majority of men held for violent and sexual crimes in inner city London between 2009 and 2010 were black, however, black men have also been found to constitute the greatest number of victims of crime (e.g. 29% male victims of gun crimes, 24% of knife crimes). This can lead to the stereotyping of certain groups such as black men being responsible for violent actions in comparison to white men as found by Duncan (1976).

Children as Eye-Witnesses

There have been some concerns expressed regarding the relevance and reliability of children as witnesses. There may also be concerns about older people as West and Stone (2013) for example, report that young adults are more accurate in their recall as witnesses than older adults. Children who appear as witnesses in a court case may have been exposed to very stressful events such as sexual or physical abuse, which would be unethical to replicate in laboratory conditions. According to Bidrose and Goodman (2000), childhood sexual abuse is additionally accompanied by feelings of shame as well as a lack of emotional support because of the secrecy that surrounds such events. In a study undertaken by Bidrose and Goodman, they investigated the testimony given by four female children aged between 8 and 15 years, in a sexual abuse case in New Zealand and also assessed the level of support regarding the allegations. The findings showed that there was a high degree of support for the children’s allegations which was matched to audiotapes and photos of the abuse (Bidrose and Goodman, 2000). The real-life study indicates that children’s testimony can be highly accurate although the children in the study were older and younger children may not be able to articulate what happened to them in cases of abuse.

Krahenbuhl, Blades and Eiser (2009) conducted a study with 156 children aged between 4 and 9 years to investigate the effects of repeating questions several times in an interview situation as a witness. The children watched a staged event and were asked eight open-ended questions, each of which was repeated 4 times. Some questions could be answered from watching the scenario although others could not, and it was expected that the children would say that they did not know the answer. The children returned again after one week. It was found that for over 25% of children there was a decline in accuracy which was greatest after the first repetition of questions. There was little change with the questions that could be answered but considerable decline in accuracy with those questions with no accurate answers. Krahenbuhl et al. (2009) concluded that if there is considerable repetition of questions with child witnesses, the accuracy of responses changes significantly and that if children cannot answer a question, they are more likely to fabricate answers with repeated questioning.

Conclusion

The evidence presented indicates that there are a number of problems around the issue of eyewitness testimony although it would appear that research has attempted to address some of the problems. This means that eyewitness testimony should be considered a valuable and relevant part of court procedure. Avoiding leading questions (Loftus and Palmer, 1974) and the introduction of the cognitive interview technique (Fisher et al. 1987) have helped to contribute to the more accurate recall of witnesses. Some problems are less easy to address, such as the stress experienced at a crime scene which may negatively affect recall although, Yuille and Cutshall (1986) have argued that in real-life witnesses are able to recall stressful events accurately. Similarly, intergroup biases are difficult issues to address in particular the perceptions of black people and their relationship with crime. Children as witnesses has a more positive outcome as their recall has been shown to be accurate (Bidrose and Goodman, 2000). A further problem is that of the methodology used when researching eyewitness testimony which is predominately undertaken in a laboratory and may not be generalisable to real-life situations.

References

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What is distinctive about the political ideas underpinning crime control in the past 30 years?

Margaret Thatcher famously commented that “there is no such thing as society” (1987) and in that comment is ample evidence of the Thatcher governments adherence to ‘New Right Realism’, arguably the dominant political philosophy underpinning crime control policies throughout the 1980’s and 1990’s and which continues to be a major influence on criminal justice policy to this day.

Walklate explains the concept of Right Realism as a product of governments targeting public expenditure in response to the changing economic climates of the 1970’s. It entailed a completely new discussion of how social problems should be dealt with. The shift to this new understanding occurred both in the UK, particularly as a result of the election of the Conservative government of Margaret Thatcher, and in the US under the Reagan administration among others.

One of the foremost American theorists in the US at the time was criminologist James Q. Wilson. Wilson was President Reagan’s adviser on crime and argued that crime does not have ‘root causes’ embodied in the context of individual citizens lives but that people choose to commit crime on the basis of the possible rewards offered (Blake, 2001). Essentially, New Right Realism as a political and criminological philosophy began with Wilson who proposed, in association with George Kelling (1982), the idea that crime is an inevitable result of disorder. They argued that if a window is broken and left unrepaired people walking by will believe that no one is in control and no one cares. This will lead inexorably to more windows being broken and before too long a sense of anarchy and disorder will develop. This idea became known as the ‘broken windows’ theory. Young (1983) noted Wilson’s rise as an influential figure in the US, but he became even more influential with his association with Richard Hernstein with whom he wrote the book Crime and Human Nature (Wilson & Hernstein, 1985). In this book, the authors wrote that crime was disproportionately the preserve of young men living in large cities.

Walklate argues that these two authors essentially constructed a criminal personality based on age, sex, body type and personality and that these qualities are presented almost as ‘biological givens’. Walklate cites Young (1994) in observing that essentially Wilson and Hernstein concerned themselves primarily with maintaining order rather than necessarily delivering justice. Young comments that such a view is based on Rational Choice Theory which (in its criminological manifestation) refuses to address the causes of crime but instead is concerned with its management. Cornish and Clarke (1986) not only supported this notion but went on to describe the actions of the criminal as being based purely on economic motives in which human beings are regarded as being driven by profit motives. Fundamentally this way of thinking was a product of the work of Cohen and Felson (1979) who argue that crime is the product of three factors coming together at a particular time, notably motivation, a victim and a lack of a potential guardian. This then set the pattern for the New Right Realism that was to be adopted in the UK, primarily by the Thatcher government.

John Lea (1997) argues that the central task of the Thatcher government was the political and ideological management of the process of destroying the old Keynesian welfare state but that necessarily entailed a deepening authoritarianism throughout society. Essentially Thatcher sought to isolate the problems of the poor from any consideration of state responsibility arguing that people were responsible for themselves. In this context, the welfare state moved from being seen as a system of support to being a source of debilitating passivity which must be replaced by a concept of people acting for themselves and thereby taking responsibility for their own misfortune. Part of this thinking involved the breakup of the trade union movement or at least placing strong restraints on unions ability to interfere with the labour market, local government or to resist the Thatcherite programme. It also meant that society had to be depoliticised so that libertarian politics and free market capitalism remained formed the basis of everyday life in every sector. Crime control was therefore an essential part of this programme (Downes & Morgan, 1994).

To a certain extent, Lea maintains, a crackdown on crime would have been essential since crime levels had been rising steadily since the 1960’s and according to police statistics had doubled in the 1980’s. The British Crime Survey (BCS) also indicated such a rise in crime figures. What is important however is that the Thatcher government integrated crime control into political and particularly ideologically-driven thinking since it was considered to be an important element in the drive towards creating the model apolitical citizen advocated by New Right Conservatism. One of the main initiatives in this programme was the Neighbourhood Watch scheme, introduced in 1983. This was an American idea based on the encouragement of ordinary citizens to keep watch on their own areas and report suspicious behaviour to the police.

Lea argues that the idea of an ‘active citizen’ as espoused in the thinking behind the Neighbourhood Watch Scheme, was an essentially middle class concept and this explains why the scheme had little effect on crime, since Neighbourhood Watch systems were set up in middle class areas where there was little actual crime and therefore where they were not actually needed. They were areas where the fear of crime was growing rather than crime itself. Meanwhile, in areas affected by real poverty, in which there was little sense of community, high unemployment and high crime rates such initiatives were actually quite useless, since there often tended to be a sense of active warfare between young people and the police. Local council estates were particularly affected and so local authorities were considered to be the main agents for crime control. A philosophy of ‘dangerousness’ and ‘risk management’ began to form the basis for discussion with regard to crime and this led to the idea of poverty and homelessness being breeding grounds for disorder rather than being considered as social problems.

Because much of the funding for crime prevention came from central government, the government came to insist that in order to be eligible for funding, local authorities had to coordinate their crime prevention plans with the police. This was little more than an attempt to ensure that political influence was kept to a minimum. While all this was going on the Thatcher government also began to compel local authorities to sell off public housing to those people who could afford to buy their own homes. This meant that the remaining public housing stock was inhabited by the poorest communities in the country and therefore areas in which crime was rife. Central government funding was increasingly restricted and was accompanied by measures to reduce the power of local authorities to vary local taxes. This meant that while local authorities were being asked to become the main agents for crime control they very often found they had limited resources to fund initiatives.

Many local authorities concentrated ‘problem families’ in particular areas and with regards to the physical environment of council estates, a form of ‘architectural determinism’, as Lea puts it, began to take over. In essence, a number of theorists began to suggest that particular architectural styles of building could be used as an agent against crime. Much of this was directed towards council estates and one of the most prominent thinkers in this respect was Alice Colman who offered guidance to the Design Improvement Controlled Experiment (DICE) programme of redesign begun in 1990. Lea notes that the idea was to make it harder for criminals to enter and also to escape from these estates but he observes that this has led to an assumption in which a criminal is someone who is essentially an outsider, who needs to be watched and deterred from entry. In practice however, most criminals are locals rather than strangers. A number of critics have condemned these ideas as almost completely ineffective (e.g. Foster, 1983; Osborne & Shaftoe, 1995) while according to Rose Gilroy et al (1995) some tenants have complained that the practice of dividing blocks into units and encouraging accompanying gardens merely prepares public housing units for private ownership.

It can be seen therefore that the essence of Right Realism is essentially punitive. Montorosso refers to this as ‘popular punitivism’ and he explains it as something that is based more on emotions and symbolism than on expert-driven penal policy. This lends itself to political advantage (Maruna & King, 2004), particularly to those politicians advocating prison as an almost default solution – the ‘prison works’ idea (Frieberg, 2001). This then tends to diminish criminology by virtue of subordinating criminal policy to tabloid interpretation, something that has been extended by the Labour government through their courting of the media. In essence, high profile cases are allowed to take precedence which then creates a fertile ground for authoritarian responses. In the process the debate is transferred from the realm of criminologists to the public arena, particularly with regard to those who are ‘living in fear’ and thus demand action (Garland, 1996, Thomas, 2004). Thomas notes that in this climate, the interests of the victim and ‘victim status’ underpin punitive approaches.

Montorosso comments that the Thatcher government maintained a sustained discourse based on a punitive rhetoric characterised by themes of retribution and deterrence and reinforced by a ‘near-unconditionally backed police service’. This approach continued to be followed by the Major government. Both administrations argued that crime could not be explained by ‘social conditions’, thus following the philsophy of Wilson and Hernstein. To some extent, having also been promulgated by the New Labour governments of Blair and Brown and characterised by the stock phrase ‘tough on crime and tough on the causes of crime’, it continues to this day. Some may express surprise that the New Labour government followed their Conservative predecessors, but Montorosso accurately notes that New Labour has regularly been described as ‘popularist’ and ‘punitively managerialist’ in nature, drawing attention that after Blair’s election over 1000 new offences were created up until early 2005.
Indeed, Montorosso comments that the Blair government showed ‘incredible aptitude’ in its management of ‘message’ through a policy of focusing public attention on toughness via press conferences, interviews and public meetings. Mackenzie (2008) has suggested that New Labour’s approach effectively established moral and normative reference points for governance through a media and politically driven focus on the icon of ‘the other’, in essence the perceived sense of threat represented by archetypes of the irritant, the outsider and the dangerous. This then provided encouragement and justification for punitive state action and this was further encouraged by the ‘war on terror’ rhetoric (Loader, 2006). These messages were delivered in a language that was easily understood by the public, particularly via tabloid journalism (Mackenzie).

Montorosso correctly identifies American influence in the policies of the Blair government. He comments that the ‘tough on crime’ rhetoric has been prevalent in the US since the days of President Nixon with his ‘war on crime’ of the 1960’s, turning into a ‘war on drugs’ during the Reagan administration of the 1980’s. Montorosso observes that this form of discourse is a ‘well entrenched’ ingredient in American political debate. It formed an important part of President Bill Clinton’s electoral victory over Michael Dukakis, primarily through the support of George Bush Senior who instituted a negative advertising campaign claiming that Dukakis was ‘soft on crime’.

Conclusion:

Lilly, Cullen and Ball (1995) argue that there is no particular dispensation of conservative politics towards Right Realism but Walklate argues that the obsession with the individual in Right Realist theories lends itself towards such a conclusion in particular social contexts. He argues that in times of economic stress, it is tempting for governments to blame the individual as a means of cutting back public expenditure. Lily, Cullen and Ball critique Wilson and Hernstein’s work on the basis that, through viewing criminality in terms of a particular biological disposition, credence is given to the idea that criminals are beyond redemption and therefore worthy of punitive action. Walklate supports this conclusion by arguing that it tends to result in particular policy inconsistencies and even contradictions. Thus Right Realism argues that crime is directly a result of what is ‘real’, rather than resulting in changes in reporting practice, policy or the law. It is therefore inherently political and ideological.
This meant that the approach taken by the Thatcher government towards crime control was characterised most notably by its authoritarianism. Rather than moving away from this approach, both the Major and New Labour governments enforced it. New Labour particularly were very effective in managing an authoritarian crime control policy in the style of an almost ‘corporate’ PR campaign which manipulated and milked public support.

This is the distinguishing feature of political involvement in crime control of the past thirty years. An attitude marked by authoritarian penal policy, extensive state support for the police, isolation of poverty stricken areas within the community accompanied by a certain level of ‘demonisation’ both directly and through the media. Something that hasn’t been discussed in this essay but which forms an important part of the authoritarian approach of the past thirty years is the, again American inspired, philosophy of ‘zero tolerance policing’. Lea discusses this in his online essay noting that a great deal of support for this idea has been expressed by British police forces. It originated in New York, the brainchild of the NYPD police chief William Bratton (1997) and described by Lea as essentially a more belligerent form of the Wilson-Kelling strategy and involving an aggressive response by police officers towards incidences of disorder and petty anti-social behaviour. As with other forms of punitive penalism, it targeted the poor, particularly street beggars, drinkers and ‘squeegee’ car washers operating at traffic junctions. Bratton and others claimed it was an effective measure, but the reality is, as Lea points out, that crime rates had been falling in most North American cities for some years previously and therefore had nothing to do with the aggressiveness of police officers. Nevertheless, the UK Home Secretary at the time warmed to the idea enthusiastically despite the fact that aggressive policing in the UK is hardly new. As Lea points out, such policing tactics were often used to clear young black males from London streets but Chief Constable Charles Pollard of Thames Valley Police has argued that such an approach merely ends up targeting ethnic minorities resulting in potentially explosive situations and actual riots such as that which occurred in Brixton in 1981.

As Montorosso notes, punitive approaches are not limited to the UK. Having spread across the globe, originating primarily from the US, such attitudes are now found in many countries across the world. Montoross argues that penal policy should embrace values of safety and freedom from fear but that it should be achieved through a mix of measures including rehabilitation of offenders, developmental or situational crime prevention, socialization and education alongside deterrence and incarceration. However, achieving the right level of balance is not easy but the dangers of getting it wrong through the implementation of an overzealous penal policy means that a state can become, as Montorosso puts it, ‘unduly and unjustly intrusive on the liberty of citizens’.

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Loader, I. (2004), ‘Fall of the Platonic Guardians, Liberalism, Criminology and Political Responses to Crime in England and Wales’ 46(4) British Journal of Criminology,561, 574-8

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Thatcher, Margaret (1987), comment made during an interview with Woman’s Own magazine, October 31st 1987

This work was produced by one of our professional writers as a learning aid to help you with your studies

Once a criminal, always a criminal: myth or fact?
Introduction

The introduction of psychotherapy programs into criminal rehabilitation settings has been vitally documented primarily within only the past few decades. This has contributed insight into a different realm of criminal rehabilitation that has yet to fully be understood by psychologists and jail managers alike.

Estimates run as high as 70% that the majority of inmates released from prison in the US, are convicted of new crimes within five years (McGuire, 2008, p.29). Existential psychotherapy programs suggest an effective means for criminal rehabilitation and for reduction of jail populations.

Effective criminal rehabilitation programs would contribute to notably reduce recidivism rates, consequently, decreasing jail populations. Kramer (1971) suggests that art therapy is ideal for working with aggressive children as aggression is an abundant source of energy for creative activity. The creative process both utilizes and neutralizes the client’s pent-up aggression.

By analysing the impact of such programs among children, psychologists are able to develop rehabilitations programs to undertake with adults. When addressing the aggressive aspect of numerous inmates, these latest programs aim high with intent to achieve desired reductions of displayed aggression and potentially the cause of recidivism.

Validation of the previous statements could generate a wide variety of answers from more than one academic discipline. According to Repko (2005), complex issues of this condition necessitate the use of the interdisciplinary approach to be thoroughly explored. Additionally, the discussion concerning the relationship between effective existential psychotherapy approaches and recidivism cannot be fully explained by scholars from one single discipline.

Finally, the debate about whether effective psychotherapy programs can positively influence offender rehabilitation adequately enough to shrink recidivism rates, therefore, reducing jail populations, is cross cultural and addresses a practical societal problem. By meeting these criteria, this topic warrants investigation using the interdisciplinary approach (Repko, 2005, p.88).

Given the broad nature of such a topic, ways in which an existential approach to psychotherapy can affect individuals could be discussed from the vantage point of several disciplines; in fact, most of the published research on the matter is integrative in nature. Disciplines that accurately encompass the entirety of this topic include psychology, sociology, art, economics, socioeconomics and humanities. Most pertinent to this research, however, are the disciplines of psychology, sociology and art.

As a discipline which links behaviour with cognitive processes (Repko, 2005), psychology will provide a context in which to understand the emotional and cognitive nature of who psychotherapy influences. Given the continued rise in prison populations, a premium is placed on identifying efficient, yet effective prison based interventions (Morgan, 2006).

Society is composed of individuals; therefore, to understand the sociological implications of psychotherapy or recidivism, it is first necessary to understand psychotherapy’s effect on an individual level. Prison inmates are some of the most maladjusted people in society. Most of the inmates have had too little discipline or too much, come from broken homes, and have no self-esteem (Kennedy, 1984, p.275).

Art as art therapy provides a unique solution for children and adults with special needs or issues, as it addresses many aspects of the individual, including those of cognitive, emotional, and social nature that are hard to address initially separately within that personality (Nissimov-Nahum, 2008, p.1). Through the interdisciplinary process, the separate ideas presented by psychologists, sociologists, and art therapists will synthesize into a new whole, thus resulting in a significantly more comprehensive analysis.

Despite being such a prolific form of treatment, psychotherapy’s ability to cognitively and behaviourally affect the mind is remarkably essential. Methods of research for this discussion will comprise of exploratory research, which structures and identifies new problems, constructive research, which develops solutions to a problem, and empirical research, which tests the feasibility of a solution using empirical evidence.

Another method will be to study the results of experiments done by scientists and to perform statistical analyses. The purpose of this paper is to place a premium on identifying efficient, yet effective prison based interventions. Doing so will result in a hope of dissipating the problem until there is a more detailed understanding of an effective means for criminal rehabilitation and for reduction of jail populations.

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This work was produced by one of our professional writers as a learning aid to help you with your studies

Why has the analysis of crimes of the powerful been such a growth area in criminology over the past century?

It is tempting to give a simple or even simplistic answer to the above question: it is tempting to say that analysis and theory of crimes of the powerful have grown so quickly in the last century because the quantity and diversity of such crimes have themselves exploded outwards. As the number of crimes committed by the powerful have risen exponentially across the years and continents, so the police forces, crime-prevention agencies and legislators of the governments charged with halting these crimes have had to evolve into larger and more complex organizations also. For instance, amongst myriad forms of organized crime that developed in the twentieth century, one pertinent recent example is the efflorescence of high-tech and internet crime, where professional and international gangs manipulate technology to extort or steal large sums of money from the public. High-tech crime is of course a recent phenomenon; it did not exist at the turn of the last century. Therefore analysis of such activities by law agencies has grown to respond to this new threat; moreover, the analysis and prevention of such crimes has had to grow in sophistication and size just as the crimes themselves have done. Organized crime – be it narcotic trafficking, prostitution rings, corporate crimes and so on – has become a massive international business, and it has required larger agencies equipped with better criminal theory and technology and international cooperation between agencies to deal with it. Moreover, the clear lapse between the professionalism and techniques of many criminal organizations and the law agencies that pursue them will require these agencies to catch-up to the advances of these criminals in the next decades. Meaning, of course, that this catch-up will depend heavily upon advances in criminal theory and analysis.

‘Crimes of the powerful‘ are not exclusively concerned with illegal activities of the above description, but also with ‘crimes’ committed by corporations, by governments, by dictators and even, in an interesting new perspective, by patriarchal gender structures that sanction crimes of power against women. The attention of law agencies and legislators upon these crimes has led to a mass of new analysis and theory by criminologists on the nature of such crimes. Likewise, several theories compete to describe the causes of organized crime and crimes of the powerful. One such theory points to social change as the most profound catalyst in the spread of organized crime and the detection of organized crime. This theory assimilates the teachings of sociology, psychology, anthropology and history to produce a detailed sociological critique of these causes. In the eighteenth or nineteenth centuries, many acts committed by the powerful that would today be classified as criminal were then merely pseudo-illegal or socially disapproved of; they carried no specific criminal offence. But social and legislative advances have made the prosecution of crimes of the powerful easier. For instance, the prosecution of corporate crime is, theoretically at least, far easier to identify and prosecute than it was in the early twentieth century. Moreover, greater media exposure of the life of corporations and governments has magnified their crimes whenever they are committed.

A moment of this essay might be given to discuss exactly what is meant by the phrase ‘crimes of the powerful‘. Indeed, a person unfamiliar with the literature of criminology might be forgiven for regarding the term as somewhat amorphous and nebulous: he might argue that nearly any criminal phenomenon could be termed a crime of the powerful. The dictionary defines a crime as ‘ an act punishable by law, as being forbidden by statute or injurious to the public welfare. … An evil or injurious act; an offence, as in; esp. of grave character ‘ (Oxford, 1989). It is difficult to see how the word ‘power’ could not be inserted into any part of this definition and for it still to make sense. There is therefore in the pure ‘black letter’ interpretation of the law a huge shaded area that allows for misinterpretation of the term ‘crime of power’. Can, for instance, a crime of the powerful be a physical act? Or must it the top levels of an organization? Moreover, the use of the word ‘crime’ is itself ambiguous. The trafficking of drugs or children is clearly illegal and criminal according to the principles of law; but we also speak of corporate crimes against the public — withholding medicines from the dying, adulterating foods etc., — as ‘crimes’ even though they have no explicit recognition as such in law. There is then a near infinite possible extension of the word ‘crime’ when one uses the word in the sense of something that ought to be illegal rather than something that is presently illegal. In Smith’s words: ‘ If a crime is to be understood simply as law violation, then…no matter how immoral, reprehensible, damaging or dangerous an act is, it is not a crime unless it is made such by the authorities of the state ‘.

There is moreover often the paradoxical situation where a government that commits ‘crimes of power’ against its people can only be legally recognized as doing such if it passes legislation against itself. This is obviously extremely unlikely to happen and so many such crimes go unnoticed. It is often directly against the interests of certain groups or interests to recognize the existence of certain ‘crimes’ because they then have to recognize theory legal existence also. Recently however, one growth of criminal analysis of the powerful has come from greater international laws that allow for the international legal recognition of crimes committed by dictators or despots when they would never do this themselves. For instance, Saddam Hussein is near universally thought to have committed crimes of power against his people; such things were never legally recognized as ‘crimes’ as such until a body such as the United Nations had the international authority to declare the illegal actions of heads of states.

Sociologists and psychologists amongst other groups (Chesterton, 1997) have argued that the moral, sociological and psychological aspects of ‘crimes of the powerful’ should be recognized by criminologists to a far greater extent. By using approaches such as these criminologists can add the activities of environmental pollution, insider trading, and tax evasion to the public consciousness of what constitute crimes of the powerful. In Sellin’s (2003) words ‘ if the study of crime is to attain an objective and scientific status, it should not allow itself to be restricted to the terms and boundaries of enquiry established by legislators and politicians’ .

According to scholars authors like Chesterton and Dupont the intense interest in by criminologists in the analysis and prevention of crimes of the powerful is due to the massive growth and myriad new forms of these crimes. Perhaps the most powerful criminals whose crimes are explicitly illegal are international drug trafficking organizations. In 2004, according to Smith (Smith, 2004) 550 billion of cocaine and other illegal substances were transported illegally internationally. This trade is therefore lager than the GDP of many African and other third-world countries. Faced with this massive business and with its catastrophic social consequences traditional law agencies and their democratic legislators have had to radically alter the way they investigate and prosecute these crimes. The extreme complexity and ingenuity of international drug cartels have meant that governments have had to build equally complex systems of criminological analysis and technique to limit these crimes. Complex intelligence agencies like the MI5 and MI6 in England and the CIA and FBI in the United States now have innumerable specialist intelligence groups of scientists, field-officers and so on investigating the criminal nature and consequences of organized crime such as drug trafficking, the shipping of illegal weapons and so on.

Perhaps the only organizations on earth with greater power than the above organized crime syndicates are the international corporations of Western countries like Britain, America and soon. Many critics of these organizations (Chomsky, 2003) allege that the secret crimes of these corporations exceed even those of the drug barons. For instance, everyone will be familiar with the recent scandals of Enron, Anderson and Paramalat where billions of pounds were swindled by these massive companies. This ‘white-collar’ crime was half a century ago hardly investigated and such crimes went essentially unnoticed. But greater public consciousness of the activities of these companies through the media has theoretically at least imposed a greater accountability and potential punishment for companies who exploit either their shareholders or their customers. This increased interest in corporate crime has led in turn to the need for a vast number of criminologists to produce theories to explain the causes of such crimes and then strategies for their prevention.

A further consequence of the media revolution of the past century and the changed social assumptions of our society has meant that the ‘crimes of governments’ as ‘crimes of power’ are now open to far greater than public and professional scrutiny and analysis than they ever have been before. Twenty-four hour television and instant access to news stories and the daily events of our political life have meant that the public can therefore criticise the ‘crimes’ of their governments with greater ease than before. For instance, the vociferous protests in 2003 by citizens of Western democracies against the invasion of Iraq were due to the belief of those citizens that their governments had acted illegally and ‘criminally’ in invading that country. Traditionally, such crimes do not fall into the sphere of ‘criminology’ because of the numerous problems identified in the definition paragraph of this essay. However, criminologists, at least theoretically, and urged by famous opponents of the war like Noam Chomsky and Michael Moore, are coming to analyse and investigate the issues and theoretical difficulties of holding entire governments to account for committing ‘crimes of power’. Many of the principles used by criminologists to analyse the techniques and structures of organized crime indicates are being suggested to be transferred to an analysis of the crimes of government. The analysis of government crime may prove to be one of the most fruitful of the coming decades for criminologists.

In this essay then, the term ‘crimes of the powerful’ refers to such crimes as are carried out by organized criminal gangs (either national or international), by corporations, by governments, by powerful individuals such as corrupt magnates, businessmen and so on. Such crimes might include: corporate fraud, corporate mal-practise, illegal narcotics or arms; high-tech crimes such as computer fraud.

It is necessary for the student of criminology to know something of the state criminal affairs at the end of the 19^th century if he is to find a clear answer for the growth of analysis of crimes of the powerful in the twentieth century. One strong reason why analysis of such crimes was less in say 1900 was that many organized crimes did not exist at all. For instance, the use of narcotics like opium and heroin were widespread amongst all levels of society but legal also; the trade of these drugs were controlled by legally registered companies and there existed no illegal market for their production or importation. Accordingly, since these acts were not understood as crimes, British police did not need to analyse the behaviour or causes of these. Moreover, the size of the police force as well as its technical and theoretical know-how were far smaller than they are today in Britain, America, France and so on. Similarly, whilst many companies exploited the Victorian workforce, none did so in the systematic and pre-determined fashion that is characteristic of Anderson, Enron or Parmalat in the past ten years. Other crimes of the powerful like high-tech computer fraud obviously required no analysis or theory of criminology since they did not exist at all. Similarly, in James Smith’s (Smith,1999, p44) memorable phrase ‘ At the dawn of the twenty-first century the Western world faces a plethora of organised criminality of the like that it has never known before. From the mass trafficking of illegal narcotics, to whole-scale prostitution, to high-tech computer fraud, to corporate offences on a giant scale, the police forces and criminal prevention agencies of the new century will meet challenges as they have never glimpsed in the past. And, a little further on, ‘ They will no longer compete against petty or isolated crimes of individuals, but against the sophisticated and organized attempts to make vast fortunes by systematically breaking the law. In this contest between law officer and criminal former is now far behind; it remains to be seen whether he will catch-up in the near decades’ (Smith, 1999, p44).

Another area of rapid growth in crimes of the powerful has been the feminist critique of domestic violence committed against women by dominant males. Feminists of the last few decades have argued cogently that the term ‘crimes of the powerful’ should include also these domestic abuses because of the patriarchal structures within our society that promote such abuses. The explosion of such feminist critiques flows from the fact that before this century there was no feminism as such, and domestic abuse was either not considered a crime or it was publicly invisible or ignored. The changing social philosophies such as liberalism and attitudes of the twentieth century gave birth to a greater consciousness for women and therefore greater demands for them for social and legal equality. This, in the 1960’s and 1970’s, leading feminists like Germane Greer campaigned for recognition of the domination of women by societal institutions and conventions that are massively weighted in favour of men. Feminist scholars and theorists argue that the vast majority of these structures and the crimes they inflict upon women are unreported; marital rape is the most frequent abuse, and nearly 80% of women in this predicament are abused repeatedly (Painter, 1991). A whole host of crimes committed by men supported by social institutions go unreported and unprosecuted. Some feminists therefore describe a fundamental imbalance in the power structures of Western society, and that agencies and organizations should be set up to combat and prevent this crime. In S. Griffin’s words: ‘ Men in our culture are taught and encouraged to rape women as the symbolic expression of male power‘ (Griffin, 1971) and Brownmiller says eloquently that rapists are the shock troops of patriarchy, necessary for male domination. Some men may not rape, but only because their power over women is already secured by the rapists who have done their work for them ‘ (Brownmiller, 1976). This feminine critique therefore demands a considerable extension of the definition of the term ‘crimes of the powerful’ to include all those thousands of incidents of unseen violence issued from an entire gender that has power over another. In this sense, arguably feminists have uncovered the ‘crime of the powerful’ of all. According to feminists, the truths of this oppression has been recognised partially by criminological theorists by the tides of social legislation that have been passed in recent years to protect women from domestic violence. Nonetheless, say that criminologists yet lack a complete or detailed analytical theory of such violence; this itself being reflected by the dominance in criminology of males.

In the final analysis, the growth of the analysis of crimes of the powerful may be attributed principally to the growth of the number and types of such crimes and the subsequent need to investigate and prevent them. Some crimes of the powerful such as drug trafficking are nearly entirely new to our age, and criminologists have had to develop wholly new theories and techniques to combat it. On the other hand, entirely new academic critiques like those of feminism, sociology and psychology have identified and produced theories to describe ‘invisible’ crimes of power against groups who before the last century had to suffer in silence. Criminologists too have had to swallow these theories and then learn methods and techniques to apply them to our modern world. Similarly, the rise of mass media and the extension of democratic institutions have enabled citizens with far better information about the behaviour of their corporations and governments; this awareness has in turn led to a consciousness of the similarity of nature between ‘illegal’ crimes like drug-smuggling and corporate crimes like deliberately withholding medicines from the sick or the invasion of a foreign country. These new fields of investigation have given the criminologist much to think about. The student of criminology should not forget that the subject he studies had itself evolved over the last century to become a highly professional and international and therefore capable of greater levels and specializations in analysis than it could ever have been before.

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Introduction

Modern Methods of construction (MMC) consist of a range of techniques aimed at improving efficiency in construction.

There is currently a serious shortage of homes in the UK. Mainly as a result of too few homes for sale being built, prices have been forced up to unaffordable levels. It is not possible for many people on average incomes to buy even a cheaper home.

The shortage of homes for rent is causing still greater problems for people on low incomes. Housing waiting lists have lengthened, resulting in more overcrowding and sharing and more homeless families than ever in temporary accommodation.

There is an urgent need for new homes – to make it possible for young families to buy a home, for essential workers in key public services to be able to afford somewhere to live, and for people on low incomes to have a home to rent.

The government are looking to MMC to solve this problem by creating affordable homes quickly, and in 2004 set targets to add an extra 120 000 homes to the housing stock every year for the next ten years. The government’s social housing funding body, The Housing Cooperation, has set a target that at least 25% of every new social housing development has to be built using MMC techniques.

A shortage of housing in the UK however is by no means a new problem. We’ve been in similar situations before, and looked for similar answers. Many solutions of the past have, in the long-term, failed.

The idea that Modern Methods of Construction could address a low cost housing issue has been used before.

Shortly after the First World War and the passing of a series of housing acts from 1919 the government became concerned at the high cost of ‘working class’ housing. In 1924 a committee on New Methods of House Construction (Later to become Modern Methods of construction (MMC)) was set up which produced a series of reports, which among other things recommended that they wanted to see ‘what may be called factory production of houses’

In the middle of the Second World War, a mission sent to study systems in America urged the wholesale reorganisation of the British building industry; among many other specific points it recommended

Simplification of building design for greater standardisation and mechanisation of constructional work

Much more use of factory produced units and assemblies

55 years later in1998, Egan, in his report ‘Rethinking Construction’, recommended exactly the same change of direction. So what went wrong? And has the industry yet listened?

Modern methods of Construction is the government’s initiative to push firms to look for new technologies as well as the government doing its own research, this is clearly a big problem.

The Office of the Deputy Prime Minister defines modern methods of construction as a process to produce more, better quality homes in less time. The Office of the Deputy Prime Minister also offers grants to firms to help them develop new methods, yet despite all this, there is still a problem. The UK is, again, in the middle of a housing crisis.

The Housing crisis

Merseyside housing renewal bosses are considering the use of flat pack Boklok housing to try to solve the problem of affordable housing in Merseyside which is of particular interest to me as it is in this area, my immediate concern with this project is whether the housing will actually be ‘affordable’

House factory – there are currently over 30 house factories in the UK, I will look at Westbury Homes Space4 factory near Birmingham which opened in 2001 Onsite house factory.

Despite there being many house factories in the UK none of them are quite the same as the on-site house factories being used in the US, I plan to see if these types of factories could be used in the UK

Problems in the past – quality has always suffered, aesthetics too

Modern Methods of Construction (MMC)

The Office of the Deputy Prime Minister defines modern methods of construction as a process to produce more, better quality homes in less time.

Post war pre fabricated housing failure

There is a current housing crisis

Volumetric: involves the manufacture of three-dimensional units in factory conditions for delivery to Site. Some units are delivered with all internal and external finishes and services installed.

Panellised: Flat panel units are produced in a factory and assembled on site. These may be ‘open’ panels or frames to which services, insulation and internal and external cladding is fixed on site, of fully-furnished panels containing more factory fabrication.

Hybrid: A combination of panellised and volumetric units typically with more highly serviced and repeatable elements (such as bathrooms) supplied as ‘pods’.

Subassemblies and components: Construction methods that incorporate factory-made subassemblies, such as floor cassettes or precise concrete foundations, within otherwise traditional structures can also be classified as MMC.

Non-off-site: Not all MMC’s are factory based. Some, such as those employing lightweight concrete and ‘thin-joint’ mortar construction, are site based.

Prefabricated housing has been used in the UK during periods of high demand, such as after the world wars and during the slum clearances of the 1960s. In total about 1 million prefabricated homes were built during the 20th century, many of which were designed to be temporary. However, problems arose over the quality of building materials and poor workmanship, leading to negative public attitudes towards prefabrication.

In Japan 40% of new housing uses MMC. In other European countries there is also much greater use of MMC, particularly in Scandinavia and Germany. Indeed, some house building companies in Europe have started to export their houses to the UK

The reasons for greater use of MMC in these countries are uncertain, but suggestions have included: 3

In colder climates the building season is short due to bad weather

Use of MMC allows quick construction.

MMC building materials, such as timber, are more readily available.

There is a greater tradition of self build housing. MMC appeals because faster construction reduces disruption to neighbours and allows earlier occupancy.

There are cultural preferences for certain house styles, e.g. timber frame in Scandinavia.

Issues surrounding MMC

While the Government is keen to encourage use of MMC for house building, research is still ongoing to assess its benefits. Issues arise over the cost of MMC; the industry capacity; its environmental benefits; the quality of such housing; public acceptance; and planning and building regulations. These questions are considered below.

Cost

Although some house builders argue that MMC is less expensive than traditional methods, industry sources indicate increased costs of around 7-10%. Reasons for the higher costs are difficult to discern because most project financial information is commercially confidential, and traditional masonry building costs vary widely too. It may be that the costs appear high because some benefits of using MMC, such as better quality housing and fewer accidents, are not obviously reflected in project accounts.

MMC housing is faster to build, reducing on-site construction time by up to 50%, and thus reducing labour costs. Quicker construction is an extra benefit for builders of apartments (because viewing often starts only once all flats are finished), and for Housing Associations, who receive rent earlier.

However, it is less important for private house builders as they rarely sell all the properties on a new development at once. An additional consideration is that the majority of factory overhead costs, e.g. labour, are fixed regardless of output. In contrast, site-based construction costs are only incurred if building is taking place. It is therefore less easy with MMC to respond to fluctuating demand.

Industry capacity

Industry capacity may be a barrier to increasing the number of houses built using MMC. Difficulties fall into two categories: a shortage of skills, and the factory capacity to manufacture parts.

Revisions to the Building Regulations

Building Regulations have been a major influence in the design specification for housing. They have been used by the Government to drive up standards and as the need for more sustainable buildings has increased, two of the regulations have been significantly revised which has had a large impact on construction methods.

Part L is concerned with the conservation of fuel and power.

Part E is concerned with resistance to the passage of sound, which is becoming more important as dwelling densities increase.

It is not just the improvement in the standards themselves that is exercising the minds of builders but that some aspects of the building’s performance (i.e. air tightness and sound resistance) will now be tested post construction. If the building falls short, expensive remedial work will have to be carried out.

Building performance in these areas is not just dependent on design detail, but also on the repeatability and consistency of good quality construction, aspects that lend themselves to the use of MMC.

Barriers to the use of MMC in housing

In a major survey of the top 100 house builders[8], the following factors were identified as being significant barriers to the introduction of MMC. They are summarised in Box 3 and discussed below in order of importance.

Capital costs

MMC are perceived as being more expensive than traditional methods with economies of scale being hard to achieve. 68% of housebuilders said that this was a barrier to the introduction of MMC. The National Audit Office (NAO)[9] reported that, for Registered Social Landlords (RSLs), open panel systems had a similar cost to traditional methods, but that hybrid and volumetric methods were slightly more expensive. To come to this conclusion, they took into account the following advantages: earlier rental income streams, the Social Housing Grant being drawn down earlier (thereby reducing borrowing and interest payments), reduced defects and reduced inspection. Some of these advantages would also benefit private developers.

The NAO estimated that as the market matured the cost of building elements could be reduced by 15% which would close the gap in costs between traditional build and volumetric/hybrid MMC. This appears obtainable, but is more likely to occur if developers and RSLs partner with manufacturers so that they can have the assurance of the long-term viability of the MMC market. This will enable investment in finding ways of reducing costs through product and process development.

Costs to the developer are also likely to reduce over time as developers become more familiar with MMC and are able to increase the efficiency of on-site trades as a result.

Concern over interfaces

This covers the interfaces (joints) of MMC to traditional build (eg how to fit roof trusses to a steel-frame house) and between different MMC systems (eg between a steel-frame house and a panellised timber-roof systems). This is a genuine concern that must be dealt with head-on. There are of course no reasons why interfaces should be more difficult than with traditional construction techniques. They are merely different and this needs to be planned for.

Early design freeze

MMC does require an early design freeze (when the details of the dwelling are set and cannot be altered) in comparison with traditional build. The timing of the design freeze will depend on the manufacturer’s lead times and this is in part to do with manufacturing capacity. Although MMC providers should do all that they can to minimise their lead times and to build in flexibility, it is likely that users will always experience this problem to some extent.

Planning

The constraint of planning on MMC may be perceived rather than actual. Planners, quite rightly, are keen to make sure that neighbourhoods do not all look the same. Some people’s perception of factory-produced housing is of lines of identical houses and clearly this should be avoided. The introduction of CADCAM techniques makes variation of MMC products relatively simple to achieve, although volumetric units will always have some constraints by their nature.

Having said that, the planners often want to see changes to storey heights, window design and window layout. These can sometimes be agreed at a late stage in the planning application process and can result in extending the factory lead times through:

Delaying the start of the MMC design process, which has to be completed before the MMC product can be produced in the factory.

Delaying the purchase of the fenestration, which is often on long lead times. Where the windows and doors are installed in the MMC product in the factory, the production is either delayed or the product has to be shipped without the fenestration being installed.

In traditional build, windows are fitted much later in the build process and hence their delayed specification is more easily accommodated.

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Review and evaluate the impact of the proposed Construction (Design and Management)(CDM) Regulations 2006 in the improvement and management of risk.

The proposed changes to the Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 1994 aim to simply clarify the existing regulations; make the current regulations more flexible and compatible with procurement requirements; place the emphasis on the management of health and safety risk rather than creating paperwork and to strengthen the co-ordination and co-operation between designers and contractors. The initial Act was introduced with a view to setting a safety standard because of the large accident record prior to its introduction. The HSC produced a consultation paper explaining the proposed changes on 31 March 2005 with the consultation open until 29 July 2005, though there has been an extension to receive response documents to 31 August 2005, as many were not submitted in time by the time of the consultation on 29 July 2005. The Regulations are expected to come into force in October 2006.

The CDM Regulations were made under section 15 of the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974, the principal Act dealing with securing the health and safety of people at work and those whose health and safety could be affected by work activities. The regulations came into force on 31 March 1995, and implemented provisions of European Directive No. 89/654/EEC, Temporary or Mobile Construction Sites Directive, which specifies a health and safety plan to be adhered to by five key parties to be involved in the Regulations when undertaking a project. These are the employer, planning supervisor, consultant, principal contractor and sub contractors and self-employed persons. The previous approach was statutory, with a view to avoiding unsafe situations.

Under regulation 6, the client or the developer must appoint a planning supervisor and a principal contractor. The planning supervisor must notify the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) about the project; fulfil specific requirements regarding design and ensure that the health and safety plan complies with the requirements (Regulations 14 &15). The consultant (or designer) has a duty to design to minimise risks in accordance with health and safety legislation. The principal contractor has to co-ordinate all contractors to ensure compliance with the health and safety plan. Contractors and self-employed persons have to co-operate with the principal contractor, and to advise of any risks connected with their work.

The CDM Regulations 1994 apply to construction work lasting for more than 30 days or involving more than 500 person days of work; construction work involving five or more people on site at any one time; design risk related to construction and demolition work.

Prior to the introduction of the CDM Regulations 1994, the accident statistics were 100 fatal accidents annually in the late 1980s. By 1994, the annual total of fatal accidents was reduced to 75, and thereafter, from 1994 to 2004 to between47 and 73, and furthermore for injuries lasting more than three days, the annual total was 17,177 in 1989/1990, which reduced to 8162 in 2003/2004. However, critics of the Regulations referred to the possibility that this may be influenced by a reduction in the amount of construction activity rather than purely as a result of implementation of the CDM Regulations alone.

There were inconsistencies in case law; it was considered that a subcontractor has the duty to warn contractor of a design defect for which another party was responsible and scope of implied term as to skill and care in performing contract owed by sub contractor to contractor. In the Court of Appeal case of McCook v Lobo in which an employee was injured on a construction site falling from a ladder, it was decided that although the site owner had breached the CDM Regulations 1994 by failing to prepare a health and safety plan in advance of the commencement of the building work, it was considered that it was unlikely that such a plan would cover the securing of ladders and therefore could not be considered as having caused the injuries.

In 2002 the construction Discussion Document (DD) formally recognised that there was a need for changes with regard to the industry’s health and safety performance, and the ensuing discussions led to the conclusion that although the principles underpinning the CDM Regulations were accepted, the methods adopted to implement the CDM Regulations often resulted in the principles being obscured beneath layers of bureaucracy and paperwork.

Therefore, the HSC concluded that the CDM Regulations needed to be revised by refocusing attention on effective, but practical, planning and management of construction projects. The Health and Safety Commission launched a 4 month consultation on its proposals to replace both the current Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 1994and the Construction (Health Safety and Welfare) Regulations 1996 with a single set of Regulations.

A draft set of amended CDM Regulations has been drafted together with a draft of revisions to the Approved Code of Practice by the HSC and the Construction Industry Advisory Committee (CONIAC). The new CDM Regulations were made available for comment in the hope that a set of Regulations can be formed that properly address the industry’s concerns in relation to health and safety and the inadequacies of the current Regulations.

The problems with the current Regulations also were argued to include the fact that many of the intended benefits were not being fully realized, contributed to by the difficulty in implementing radical change into the construction industry and the financial implications of full CDM compliance, together with the structure of the regulations themselves, the role of the planning supervisor being unsatisfactory as not being part of the core contraction team.

The complexity of the regulations themselves was a problem despite the consensus regarding the underlying ethos remaining valid. The proposed CDM Regulations are intended to be simpler and to remove any uncertainty regarding the nature of the duties imposed. They are also structured differently, setting out precisely what is expected of each duty holder.

The changes that have been introduced by the CDM Regulations 2006 include the following: for applicable projects there will be two types of construction projects, notifiable and non-notifiable, and a project will remain notifiable if it is likely to involve more than 30 days or500 person days of construction work. Notification to HSE must be made before design work, planning or preparation for construction begins; for the client, he must ensure there are suitable project management arrangements for health and safety and allocate sufficient resources, explicitly including time, to ensure that this can happen. To make sure principal contractors have sufficient time to make proper preparations for work on the site, the co-ordinator has to advise them of the minimum notice allowed between appointment and commencement of work.

The client and the principal contractor must also ensure adequate facilities are in place at the start of the construction phase of the project, by means of a document prepared by the principal contractor setting out the health and safety arrangements and site rules for a project.

The client can no longer appoint an agent to delegate these duties, as the provisions on agents will be removed as they are seen as a means to allow clients to absolve themselves of their legal obligations. Now several clients on the same project can now agree amongst themselves that one client should be the sole client, the aim being to prevent anyone retaining control and avoiding responsibility.

Furthermore, the client and the principal contractor must ensure that there are adequate welfare facilities are in place at the commencement of construction; in relation to the planning supervisor/co-ordinator, the planning supervisor has to be replaced by co-ordinator, the co-ordinator must be appointed before the design work commences and designers and contractors cannot be appointed in advance of the coordinator.

The designer must eliminate any hazards and reduce risks to the health and safety of persons carrying out construction work, cleaning or maintaining the permanent fixtures or using the structure as a place of work, and provide sufficient information about the design, construction or maintenance of the structure to assist any other designers and the principal contractor fulfil their duties.

Further requirements are specified in relation to competence, and it is stated that no appointment or engagement is to be accepted unless the particular person is competent, perhaps in relation to industry standards. In relation to a pre-tender or pre-construction plan this is to be replaced with an information pack that should focus attention on communication of the information that designers and contractors need to plan and do their work. In relation to the health and safety file, this will be required for a site rather than for each particular project. Demolition has to be planned and carried out in such a manner with a view to preventing, as far as possible, unnecessary danger, with arrangements for demolition work recorded in writing.

The civil liability that would arise from the introduction of the new Regulations is that employees (though not self-employed workers) will now be permitted to take action in the civil courts for injuries resulting from failure to comply with duties under the Regulations.

The new Regulations are regarded as representing a ‘radical and fundamental change in construction health and safety legislation’. The Regulations can be regarded as being much more detailed and prescriptive than CDM Regulations 1994 and will impose a wide range of new duties and potential abilities with a potential significant impact on allocation of risks and responsibilities in the construction industry. It can be argued that the biggest change is in the duties of the client, who now has a number of new responsibilities for health and safety. Furthermore, wider duties have been imposed upon both designer and principal contractor than under CDM Regulations1994, and all sectors of the construction industry need to be aware of the effect of the proposed Regulations and the significantly increased risk of enforcement action, including prosecutions by the HSE, for all members of the project team.

The purpose of the Regulations is arguably to ensure that responsibility for health and safety is placed with those who are best placed to manage it and to simplify the legislation to make it easier to understand the roles, responsibilities and duties of the various members of the project team.

In evaluating the changes introduced by the CDM Regulations 2006, the consequences thereof are demonstrated by the changes to the client’s responsibilities made on the basis that the client has the greatest control and influence over a construction project, though there is significant onus upon the client in the imposition of the obligation to appoint a competent co-ordinator and a principal contractor and the obligation to ensure that the co-ordinator performs his duties under the Regulations. The additional obligation is the duty to ensure that the designer, principal contractor and contractors are given sufficient time to plan and prepare for carrying out construction work.

In relation to co-ordinator duties, it can be seen that the role of the co-ordinator is similar to that of the planning supervisor under CDM Regulations 1994, but with a number of important additional responsibilities which make the role of co-ordinator prominent in the project team.

The co-ordinator’s role is intended to assist the client, designer and principal contractor to achieve better health and safety on site.

The client’s obligation is demonstrated by the need to appoint the co-ordinator at an early stage in the project and before any design work or preparation for construction is carried out.

The obligation of the co-ordinator is to “identify and extract” all the information to secure the health and safety of persons engaged in construction work and those who are liable to be affected by the way in which that construction work is carried out, and he is also required to identify and extract information to assist the client, the designer and the principal contractor to perform their duties under the Regulations arguably, the co-ordinator has a broader responsibility for design and is required to advise on the “suitability and compatibility” of designs and on any need for modification to those designs. The co-ordinator is also required to liaise with the principal contractor in relation to any design or design changes which affect the construction phase plan.

The obligations upon the designer include the requirement to “eliminate” hazards which may give rise to risks to health and safety (e.g. not specifying the use of materials which could be hazardous, addressing design issues to minimise use of scaffolding or working at height). Furthermore, he must also take into account the risk to any person using a structure which it designs as a place of work in the future when it prepares or modifies its design.

The obligations upon the principal contractor includes the obligation obliged to ensure that every contractor is given sufficient information to carry out its obligations under the regulations and to allow the contractor to carry out the work safely. He must ensure that every worker carrying out construction work is provided with site induction and any further information and training to ensure that a particular element of work is carried out without unnecessary risk to health and safety.

There is also an obligation that there is co-operation, and duty is imposed upon everyone covered by the CDM Regulations 2006 to co-operate with each other and to seek the co-operation of others involved in any project involving construction work to enable each party to meet their obligations under the Regulations.

Criticisms of the attempt of the HSC to adapt the original Regulations include the argument that the industry’s record in focusing upon the safety rules as opposed to the paper trail has been poor, and that therefore as demonstrated by the ten year record in adopting the CDM Regulations 1994, the record of the industry in reaping the benefits from such changes are not good. It has been argued that despite the fact that implementation of such rules should be simple, as it merely relates to managing projects from concept to completion, ensuring that there are adequate resources and sufficient time, and that health and safety standards are integrated into all levels of project management and the benefits demonstrated to be ensured as a result, the industry has always chosen to focus upon the costs and the unnecessary paperwork, with a view to ignoring these benefits.

Other criticisms include the argument that the CDM Regulations 2006 do not go far enough in addressing the underlying causes of the industry’s health and safety record, argued by some sectors as being unacceptable. It has been argued that merely replacing a paper trail system with a system that focuses upon co-operation and management is not going to change much in the statistics regarding health and safety, as in many cases the designers argue that the contractors do not understand their design solutions, and contractors argue that designers do not understand how buildings are built. It is argued that although it is hoped that the planning supervisor can override these problems by bridging the gap, often they cannot because of inadequate fees, lack of authority or a lack of skill.

Therefore, the system of ‘co-operation’ would not work because the more duties are imposed, the more unclear each individual duty appears to be.

It has been acknowledged that the CDM Regulations 2006 could improve matters to some degree in relation to the need for training and debate to increase health and safety awareness, but an alternative solution has been suggested in which the clients procuring the projects should be made ultimately responsible for health and safety issues, as the client is in the ideal position to do so. In this instance, it has been considered that the duties delegated to the client under the CDM Regulations 2006 are vague and relate to matters such as the provision of information. It is therefore argued that there cannot be a significant change of the improvement and management of risk until clients in at least the public and commercial sectors are given more direct responsibility for ensuring that projects are carried out with regard to the safety standards. In ensuring this, reference is made to the need for civil and criminal sanctions.

In conclusion, the proposals made by the HSC are merely an attempt to address many of the main problems of the current Regulations, but as the HSC is willing to admit, they do not deal with all the issues, and are intended to be a starting point, to encourage and facilitate discussion by means of responses from members of the construction industry. The delay in submitting responses by the prescribed deadline has not in theory affected the fact that the new Regulations are due to be implemented in October 2006.It can be argued that contrary to the criticisms levelled at CDM Regulations2006, the responsibilities of the client have been increased to an appropriate degree, and that in a fair and proportionate manner appropriate obligations have also been placed upon other participants in a project.

It appears that even so the ultimate onus is upon the client to ensure that a planning supervisor is employed with the correct skill and experience to ensure smooth running of the project and to effective address the concerns regarding management and risk.

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Introduction

Computers and computer networks have changed the way in which we live, run our lives, communicate with each other and the way we work and produce what makes every commercial organisation function and reach success within its field, and in the same time, continue on the path of that success.

The computers as stand-alone machines, or as separated ones, are nothing more than advanced computing machines, but what was required in reality is a way to link all the computers with each other and to allow users to have simultaneous access to databases and information; and this is why networks had to be created. Tanenbaum (2003, p.2) explains this fact by stating that “The merging of computers and communications has had a profound influence on the way computer systems are organized. The concept of the ‘computer centre’ as a room with a large computer to which users bring their work for processing is now totally obsolete. The old model of a single computer serving all of the organization’s computational needs has been replaced by one in which a large number of separate but interconnected computers do the job. These systems are called computer networks.”

The main principle behind Computer networking is the communication between two or more computer systems. Computers within a network might be close to one another (such as the case with Bluetooth for example) or hundreds of kilometres away from each other (through the Internet).

The first important step in this field came in 1984, when a completely digitalised, circuit-switched telephony system was introduced; this system was called ISDN; which stands for Integrated Services Digital Network for voice and non-voice data. After that, BellCore started developing the standard for the Synchronous Optical Network (SONET), and by the end of the 1980’s, Local Area Networks (LAN) appeared as effective method of transferring data between a number of local computers, which led telephone companies replaces all its analogue multiplexing with digital multiplexing.

But it is also essential to point out the element of the Internet; this international linked network, composed of servers and clients all over the world, encouraged the changes in both information technology and mobile computing, and this is why we find most of the indications, whenever we face a new product or application, referring to its characteristics in what concerns wireless connection, Bluetooth link, infrared, and much more. Raidl (2003, p.199) states that “mobile cellular networks are by far the most common of all public wireless communication systems. One of the basic principles is to re-use radio resources after a certain distance.”

Walters and Kritzinger (2004) refer to the fact that mobile technology has turned to become one of the fastest, if not the fastest, growing field in the telecommunications industry.

To give a clearer idea about the change brought to the world and to every one of us, we can refer to the comments of Furht and Ilyas (2003), as they state that “just a few years ago, the only way to access the Internet and the Web was by using wireline desktop and laptop computers. Today, however, users are traveling between corporate offices and customer sites, and there is a great need to access the Internet through wireless devices. The wireless revolution started with wireless phones and continued with Web phones and wireless handheld devices that can access the Internet”

Types of network

Computer networks can vary according to the purpose for which they were created and depending on the area they are supposed to cover geographically. Computer networks can be one of the following:

1) LAN (Local Area Network) is “a small interconnection infrastructure that typically uses a shared transmission medium. Because of such factors as the volume of traffic, the level of security, and cost, the network structure in a local area network can be significantly different from that for a wide area network.” And “LAN is used for communications in a small community in which resources, such as printers, software, and servers, are shared. Each device connected to a LAN has a unique address. Two or more LANs of the same type can also be connected to forward data frames among multiple users of other local area networks” (Mir, 2007, p.102).

2) WAN (Wide Area Network) is “spans a large geographical area, often a country or continent. It contains a collection of machines intended for running user (i.e., application) programs” (Tanenbaum, 2003, p.19).

3) CAN (Campus Area Networks) “are the enterprise networks that serve number of related structure, as in a large company or a college campus.” Lehtinen, Gangemi, Gangemi Sr, and Russel, 2006, p.182).

4) MAN (Metropolitan Area Network) which “covers a city. The best-known example of a MAN is the cable television network available in many cities” (Tanenbaum, p.18).

5) HAN (Home Area Network) is “the connection of a number of devices and terminals in the home on to one or more networks which are themselves connected in such a way that digital information and content can be passed between devices and any access ‘pipe’ to the home” (Turnbull & Garrett, 2003, p.46).

Cellular networks

In their description of the first cellular radio networks in history, Walters and Kritzinger (2004) state that “in 1946, the first car-based telephone was set up in St. Louis, Missouri, USA. The system used a single radio transmitter on top of a tall building. A single channel was used, therefore requiring a button to be pushed to talk, and released to listen. This half duplex system is still used by modern day CB radio systems utilized by police and taxi operators. In the 1960s, the system was improved to a two-channel system, called the improved mobile telephone system (IMTS)… Cellular radio systems, implemented for the first time in the advanced mobile phone system (AMPS), support more users by allowing reuse of frequencies. AMPS is an analogue system, and is part of first generation cellular radio systems.”

Even though it has become one of the most common and popular means of communication between people in the last years, cellular networks still have no specific definition; “Cellular communications has experienced explosive growth in the past two decades. Today millions of people around the world use cellular phones. Cellular phones allow a person to make or receive a call from almost anywhere. Likewise, a person is allowed to continue the phone conversation while on the move. Cellular communications is supported by an infrastructure called a cellular network, which integrates cellular phones into the public switched telephone network” (Zhang and Stojmenovic, 2005, p.654).

This difficulty in finding a definition is due to the fact that there are different technologies and networking methods used within the frame of cellular networks. Frantz and Carley (2005, p.5) explain that “cellular networks are a distinct and important network topology. Although there is a growing body of work referring to cellular networks, there is no complete formal definition. However, there are several papers that seek to describe characteristics of cellular networks. Cellular networks are a critical topology to formally characterize, in part, as they are thought to be a common form for covert networks.”

Yet, it is possible to find some kind of an explanation of such networks and how they operate:

“Cellular networks use a networked array of transceiver base stations, each located in a cell to cover the networking services in a certain area. Each cell is assigned a small frequency band and is served by a base station. Neighbouring cells are assigned different frequencies to avoid interference. However, the transmitted power is low, and frequencies can be reused over cells separated by large distances” (Mir, 2006 p.42).

A cellular network, for it to be considered a functional type of communication network, relies “on relatively short-range transmitter/ receiver (transceiver) base stations that serve small sections (or cells) of a larger service area. Mobile telephone users communicate by acquiring a frequency or time slot in the cell in which they are located. A master switching centre called the ‘mobile transport serving office’ (MTSO) links calls between users in different cells and acts as a gateway to the PSTN” (Muller, 2003, p.50)

Each cellular network is composed of what is can be referred to as Cells; which are defined by Frantz, and Carley, (2005) as “a distinct subgroup of actors within a larger cellular network. The presence of at least one cell is fundamental to a network’s distinction of being cellular—without at least one cell, a network is not cellular. Empirically, a cell often consists of relatively few actors and has a distinct topology that is effortless to identify visually. The actors in a cell can be partitioned into two distinct but intertwined subgroups, namely the cell-core and the cell-periphery.” Muller (2003) explains that there are no specific sizes for cells within a cellular network, this is due to the fact that there are many factors that interfere in this element and according to the surrounding environment and obstacles can the cell’s size be determined: “Cell boundaries are neither uniform nor constant. The usage density in the area, as well as the landscape, the presence of major sources of interference (e.g., power lines, buildings), and the location of competing carrier cells, contributes to the definition of cell size. Cellular boundaries change continuously, with no limit to the number of frequencies available for transmission of cellular calls in an area. As the density of cellular usage increases, individual cells are split to expand capacity. By dividing a service area into small cells with limited-range transceivers, each cellular system can reuse the same frequencies many times.”

According to Muller (2003), a cellular network is composed also of a Master Switching Centre which “operates similar to a telephone central office and provides links to other offices. The switching centre supports trunk lines to the base stations that establish the cells in the service area.” Another component is the transmission channels which are, in most cases, two kinds of channels; a control channel and a traffic channel. And, of course, to close the circle within this network, a cellular phone is needed; “cellular telephones incorporate a combination of multi-access digital communications technology and traditional telephone technology and are designed to appear to the user as familiar residential or business telephone equipment.”

During their evolution and continuing enhancement, cellular networks went through consecutive levels of development; each of them added more power and functionality to the previous one. Zhang and Stojmenovic (2005, p.654) explain that cellular networks have had three stages that are called generations. The first of those generations is analogue in nature. Then, when more cellular phone subscribers needed to be connected and function simultaneously, digital TDMA (time division multiple access) and CDMA (code division multiple access) technologies appeared and were put to work; and this was the second stage or what is known as the second generation (2G) which was necessary in order to increase the capacity of the cellular network.

“With digital technologies, digitized voice can be coded and encrypted. Therefore, the 2G cellular network is also more secure.” With the high importance of applications related to the Internet and their continuous growth, many users required more of the their cellular devices. Then the third generation (3G) arrived. 3G “integrates cellular phones into the Internet world by providing high speed packet-switching data transmission in addition to circuit-switching voice transmission. The 3G cellular networks have been deployed in some parts of Asia, Europe, and the United States since 2002 and will be widely deployed in the coming years.” There are some expectations regarding the future for what concerns the fourth generation wireless networks: “These will evolve towards an integrated system, which will produce a common packet-switched (possibly IP-based) platform for wireless systems, offering support for high-speed data applications and transparent integration with the wired networks” (Nicopolitidis, Obaidat, Papadimitriou and Pomportsis, 2003).

Cellular networks make use of certain protocols in order to make communication easier between various entities within the limits of the network. A protocol of communication can be defined as a group of rules which correspond to messages that two or more entities communicate between each other within a network. Protocols used for cellular networks are included within the standard which is covering the service. The first and most popular standard for mobile phones is GSM (Global System for Mobile communications). Other standards are CDMA and TDMA.

Another important point concerning cellular networks is what can be called Location Management, which is essential for the network to monitor every registered mobile station’s location so that the mobile station can be able to connect to the network upon request.

It is important to note the similarities between cellular networks and Wireless LANs, but it is also worthwhile noticing the differences between the two: “Goals for third-generation wireless communication, enunciated in the early 1990s by the International Telecommunications Union Task Group IMT-2000, focused on the first two criteria, bit rate and mobility. Third-generation systems should deliver 2 Mbps to stationary or slowly moving terminals, and at least 144 kbps to terminals moving at vehicular speeds. Meanwhile, WLAN development has confined itself to communications with low-mobility (stationary or slowly moving) terminals, and focused on high-speed data transmission. The relationship of bit rate to mobility in cellular and WLAN systems has been commonly represented in two dimensions” (Furht and Ilyas, 2003, p.33).

Wireless data applications

With the continuous growth of mobile devices, different services were created in order to widen the range of the functionality of those devices. For such devices to be able to use the newly offered services, specific types of applications had to be created and deployed or installed on the mobile device, may it be a cell-phone, PDA, or a notebook computer. “Wireless data services use a mix of terrestrial and satellite-based technologies to meet a wide variety of local (in building or campus settings), metropolitan, regional, national, and international communication needs… A number of wireless data applications, in fact, are being designed with fixed users in mind” (Office of Technology Assessment, 1995).

To be able to understand how wireless data applications work, it is necessary to have a comprehensive view concerning their delivery methods; as a matter of fact, there are two main delivery methods: “There are two fundamental information delivery methods for wireless data applications: point-to-point access and broadcast. In point-to-point access, a logical channel is established between the client and the server. Queries are submitted to the server and results are returned to the client in much the same way as in a wired network. In broadcast, data are sent simultaneously to all users residing in the broadcast area. It is up to the client to select the data it wants” (Zomaya, 2002)

Wireless data applications can be divided into two main groups: Messaging and Remote Access. “Messaging applications can generally tolerate low throughput and long transmission delays. Electronic mail (e-mail) often fits this category, but not always, messages with attached files may strain the capacity of wireless messaging networks,” then there is Remote access which is required to allow access to the resources and services of a network from outside the geographical barriers of the physical establishment of that network (Brodsky, 1997).

Conclusion

Throughout this paper, understanding the information presented within it fully, it is accurate to state that a cellular network is definable correctly by presenting the following: “We define a cellular network as a single-component and undirected network of actors and their relationships, strictly consisting entirely of actors who are members of a specific cell, as previously defined; thus a network in which all actors are a member of a cell. For a network to be considered cellular, these conditions must be met: (a) the ties making up the relations in the network may only be undirected, (b) the network consists of a single component, e.g., there are no isolate actors, and (c) the network consists solely of cell subgroups that are connected via spanning ties, e.g., there are no actor in the network who is not a member of a cell subgroup” (Frantz and Carley, 2005, p.10)

As for wireless data applications, in 1997 Brodsky stated that if such application are to become widespread and popular exactly as the simple mobile phones were in the end of the 1990s, users should become “readily and reliably send and receive data over paging, cellular and PCs”. And as we can see today, that phase is exactly what we experience today; ten years after the author wrote those words.

Reference List

Brodsky, I. (1997). Wireless Computing: A Manager’s Guide To Wireless Networking. New York, New York: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

Furht, B. and Ilyas, M. (2003) Wireless Internet Handbook—Technologies, Standards, and Applications, Boca Raton, Florida: CRC Press LLC.

Frantz, T. and Carley, K. (2005) A Formal Characterization of Cellular Networks, CASOS Report, [Online] September.

Available at: http://cos.cs.cmu.edu/publications/papers/CMU-ISRI-05-109.pdf

Lehtinen, R., Gangemi, G. Gangemi, G Sr., and Russel, D. (2006) Computer Security Basics, Sebastopol, California: O’Reilly & Associates.

Mir, N. (2007) Computer and Communication Networks, Saddle River, New Jersey: Pearson Education, Inc.

Muller, N. (2003) Wireless A to Z, New York, New York: The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.

Nicopolitidis, P., Obaidat, M., Papadimitriou, G. and Pomportsis, A. (2003) Wireless Networks, West Sussex, England: John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

Office of Technology Assessment – Congress of the United States. (1995) Wireless technologies and the national information infrastructure. Washington, DC: DIANE Publishing.

Raidl, G. (2003) Applications of Evolutionary Computing, Berlin, Germany: Springer.

Tanenbaum, A. (2003) Computer Networks, Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Pearson

Education, Inc.

Turnbull, J. and Garrett, S. (2003) Broadband Applications and the Digital Home. Stevenage, United Kingdom: The Institution of Electrical Engineers.

Walters, L. and Kritzinger, P. (2004) ‘Cellular Networks: Past, Present, and Future’, Association for Computing Machinery [Online]

Available at: http://www.acm.org/crossroads/xrds7-2/cellular.html

Zhang, J. and Stojmenovic, I. (2005) Cellular networks, Handbook on Security (H. Bidgoli, ed.), Vol. I, Part 2, chapter 45, pp.654-663.

Zomaya, A. (2002). Handbook of Wireless Networks and Mobile Computing. New York, New York: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

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Illustrate the importance of the themes of self-control, shame and desire in Euripides’ Hippolytus. How does Euripides connect these themes to the world of the Athenian audience?

Euripides’ Hippolytus (1972) is a paradoxical play that, at its heart, deals with the outcomes of conflicting human emotion. As Charles Segal suggests in his study Euripides and the Poetics of Sorrow (1993) commensurate with a great many of the playwright’s other works – Alcestis, Hecuba etc., Hippolytus examines the divisions and conflicts of male and female experience (and) all three also experiment with the limits of the tragic form (Segel, 1993: 3).

There are no clear cut moral demarcations in Hippolytus,the ethical sense and movement of the piece is symbolised by the figures of Aphrodite and Artemis who straddle the drama both symbolically and physically being as they are present in both the first and last scenes. As we shall see,the outcomes of the narrative veer more towards a psychological questioning of what it is to be human than any moral proselytizing and the characters show both weakness and strength in their dealing with the Gods and their quixotic natures. With this in mind, in this essay I would like to look at this concept in Hippolytus but more specifically how it relates to the notions of self control, shame and desire, all subjects that form an integral part of the drama’s ultimate socio-ethical meaning.

Firstly, I will look at the drama itself, attempting to illustrate and draw out instances of moral thinking within it, then I will move on to examine the ways in which these are blurred and made complicated by Euripides before going to suggest ways in which this might have been specifically tailored as both a critique and a lesson to the contemporary Athenian audience.

Aristotle, in his Poetics(1965) calls Euripides our most tragic of poets (1965: 49) chiefly through the misfortune that befalls many of his leading characters at the conclusions of his dramas. However, Aristotle also criticises Euripides for the faulty management of other aspects of the plot, and the moral and ethical position of his characters must be one of these. Let us, for instance, consider the character of Hippolytus himself. On the surface, he seems to fulfil the rubric set by Aristotle that states a tragic hero must be better than average (Aristotle,1965: 52) in terms of morality and humanity; Hippolytus is a follower of Artemis, the Greek goddess of constancy and self control, as is stated by Aphrodite in the opening passages:

that son of Theseus born of the Amazon, Hippolytus, who holy Pitteus taught, alone of the all the dwellers in this land of Rroezen, calls me the vilest of the deities. Love he scorns, and , as for marriage, will none of it. (Euripides, 1972: 225)

It is this self control that is the main focus of the play, as Hippolytus is shown to be, as Aristotle states of better than average moral worth. However, there are subtle psychological suggestions that beneath the external veneer of moral constancy, Hippolytus is as weak and as human as his audience. We can witness, for example his misogynistic tirade after the Nurse reveals Phaedra’s actions:

Great Zeus, why didst thou, to man’s sorrow, put woman, evil and counterfeit, to dwell where shines the sun? If thou wert minded that the human race should multiply, it was not from women they should have drawn their stock (Euripides, 1972: 230)

This scene could be interpreted, as indeed Barnes and Sutherland do in Hippolytus in Drama and Myth (1960:82)as the reaction of an overtly moral consciousness to the very object he sees as threatening it. However, this scene could also be indicative of what Melanie Klein called projection (Klein, 1991; 1997) in which the subject attributes traits and failings of their own self to another. With this in mind, it is easy to see that what one witnesses in Hippolytus’ misogyny is much deeper than a mere hatred of women and the projection of his own self hatred, brought about by the constant repression of his desire.

This, at once, adds a psychological layer of complexity to Euripides’ characters and also distinguishes them from the, relatively, simplistic tenants of Aristotle.

What then are the outcomes of Hippolytus’ moral conflicts? What are the tragic results? According to Aristotle, the tragedy is characterised by a change in fortune from prosperity to misery (Aristotle, 1965: 48) and we can see this is certainly the case with a number of the characters. Theseus makes this journey in what we could think of as a typically Attic manner. We can note his initial moral position as being one of conviction as he defends the honour of his wife against the perceived laxity of his son, as in this passage:

Behold this man; he, my own son, hath outraged mine honour, his guilt most clearly proved by my dead wife (Euripides, 1972: 232)

We can also see, however, that this is short lived, as we become witness to what Aristotle called the anagnores is,or the discovery; the goddess Artemis being the facilitator of this action. In the character of Phaedra, however, this situation is, to an extent, reversed. She begins the play as an innocent victim of Aphrodite’s wish to reap revenge on Hippolytus:

Aphrodite: So Phaedra is to die, an honoured death t’is true., but still to die; for I will not let her suffering outweigh the payment of such a forfeit by my foes as shall satisfy my honour. (Aristotle, 1972: 225)

Of course, because of this it is Phaedre’s desire that is the motivating force behind the tragedy. She is, in many ways, the human manifestation of the drives of Aphrodite as Hippolytus is of Artemis. Like Hippolytus, also however, she is caught between the two poles of desire and self control by, firstly, not acting upon her sexual drives and,secondly, by committing suicide. It is only in her letter that, ultimately,damns Hippolytus, that she shows her true nature:

I can no longer keep the cursed tale within the portal of my lips, cruel though its utterance be. Ah me! Hippolytus hath dared by brutal force to violate my honour, recking naught of Zeus, whose awful eye is all over. (Euripides, 1972: 232)

Phaedre’s character here alters from one of innocent victim of the gods to one of false accuser. Interpreted in a contemporary light, however, could we not suggest that her actions are not the products of an innate maliciousness but of her own shame? Trapped between the desires instilled in her by Aphrodite and that which she knows is socially correct she not only chooses to take her own life but, in a psychological sense, refuses to acknowledge her sin. Again Euripides displays the concept of projection only this time it is Phaedre’s self loathing and shame that is projected onto Hippolytus.

The enormity of this act, the sexual longing of an older woman for a younger man and the suggestion of an incestuous relationship is stressed by James Morwood in his essay on Euripides:

The Athenian legal speeches attest to the domestic conflicts to which this could lead. But it could also cause sexual confusion, and the canonical Greek articulation of the illicit love of a married woman for a single man, the famous love of Phaedra for Hippolytus, is compounded by the quasi-incestuous connotations of the step parent-stepchild bond. (Morwood, 1997)

In this, the play must have had a definite political subtext to it; Euripides serving as a guardian of public morality, suggesting that tragedy arises out of illicit love between near family members.

There is, however, another deeper meaning to play, I think, and one that would be just as relevant to an Athenian audience as a warning against incest. What we see in the play’s structure, in its very narrative form, are circles within circles. Each character, ultimately suffers and they suffer not only from their individual desires, shames and lack of self control but through each other’s. Phaedre suffers through her desire for Hippolytus and through the actions of the Nurse, Hippolytus suffers through the actions of his father and stepmother and Theseus suffers through the actions of his wife and son. Through structuring his narrative in such an interconnected way Euripides suggests that personal desire and lack of self control affects not only the individual but those around them; we are, in a sense, connected and our actions resonant outwards to those around us.

As Sophie Mills suggests in her study Theseus, Tragedy and the Athenian Empire (1997: 19) there is a further thread to the play, one that concerns the relationship man has to the Gods. It must not be forgotten that the tragedy in Hippolytus ultimately emanates from the Goddess Aphrodite, it is her actions after all that sets in motion the entire drama. The two Goddess, as I stated in the earlier parts of this paper, form a binary that entraps the main characters of the play and forces them along predestined paths. Euripides’ ultimate philosophical subtext is, then, one of man’s position to the Gods and to the fate that they represent and he achieves this by not only the psychological polarity that the characters find themselves in but also a physical polarity of the two Goddesses.

As Mills suggests, the character of Theseus, in many ways, represents the very populace of Athens:

Where he is the representative of Athens in tragedy, Theseus embodies Athenian civilization in all its manifestations, so that he is usually less an individual character with his own fate than a symbol of Athenian virtue. He is consistently given characteristics which are considered as especially commendable in Athenian (and often Greek) thought, and such characteristics are usually marked as uniquely Athenian, (Mills, 1997: 57)

Could Euripides be offering a warning to his Athenian audience concerning their own desires and self control?After all, the sexual desire and control of Hippolytus and Phaedre pails into insignificance when compared to those of Theseus who loses control and loses as on. Could Euripides also be warning his audience about the vagaries of the Gods and gently reminding them of their humanity both in terms of their self restraint and in their mutability?

As we have seen, Euripides’ drama is a complex and, surprisingly, contemporary play suggesting as it does a wide variety of critical and psychological areas; from Melanie Klein’s notions on projection of one’s own frustrations and self hatred, to Aristotle’s concepts of anagnoresis and tragic heroes; from issues concerning Athenian politics to their moral and ethical systems. It is, however, in the combination of the set hings that, I think, Euripides achieves the play’s true meaning. The complexity of life is mirrored in Hippolytus by the complexity of the character’s interconnected lives and finely wrought psychologies that must have been as affecting to an Athenian audience as a modern one.