Norms, laws and the provision of social control

Abstract

A society can use two kinds of controls to ensure that individuals comply with its rules. They are legal control and normative control. Legal control refers to punishment of deviant behavior by a legal institution that is supported by taxes. Normative control refers to punishment by individuals themselves who personally take action against a deviant. This research investigates the relationship between these two types of control--specifically, how change in the strength of one control institution affects the strength of the other. A theoretical argument is developed, suggesting two conclusions: (1) cohesive communities with strong normative controls facilitate the growth of strong legal systems; and (2) investment in the legal system, for example, in police and prisons, will weaken normative controls and thus the ability of communities to address social problems like crime in more informal ways. In other words, strong communities contribute to the growth of the legal system which in turn weakens the communities on which it depends. An experiment is conducted to test these and subsidiary hypotheses. In the experiment, subjects interact with each other using computers. They make decisions about sanctioning and about responding to the sanctioning decisions of others. Resulting changes in the strengths of the two types of control are measured.