In AQA A-level Sociology, human rights and state crimes sit within the Crime and Deviance topic, especially alongside globalisation, power, social control and the role of the state. A useful starting definition is Green and Ward’s view that state crime involves illegal or deviant activities carried out by, or with the involvement of, state agencies. This matters because states often have the power to make laws, control police/military institutions, restrict information and present their actions as legitimate.

Explanation	Key sociologists / research	How it explains the prevalence of state crime	Evaluation
1. The power of the state	Green and Ward, Chambliss, McLaughlin	State crime is common because states have unusual levels of power. They control law-making, policing, security services, borders, prisons and military force. This gives states the opportunity to commit harm and the ability to hide or redefine it. McLaughlin’s categories include crimes by police/security forces, economic crimes, social/cultural crimes and political crimes, showing that state crime can take many forms.	Strong for showing why state crime can be larger in scale than ordinary crime. However, it can become too broad if every harmful state action is labelled a crime.
2. Integrated theory: motivation, opportunity and weak controls	Green and Ward	State crime becomes more likely when governments have a motive, such as protecting national security, keeping power, controlling opposition or advancing economic interests. It also requires opportunities, such as secrecy or emergency powers, and weak controls, such as limited international enforcement. This explains why state crime may happen even in states that publicly claim to support human rights.	Useful because it links individual, organisational and political factors. However, it is more of a framework than a simple single-cause explanation.
3. Crimes of obedience	Kelman and Hamilton	Kelman and Hamilton argue that ordinary people may commit state crimes when they are acting under authority. Their work on crimes of obedience focuses on why individuals follow orders even when those orders are immoral or illegal. They link this to cases such as My Lai, Watergate and Iran-Contra.	This is very useful for explaining torture, genocide, war crimes and police/military abuses. However, it may explain the behaviour of lower-level officials better than the decisions of political leaders.
4. Authorisation, routinisation and dehumanisation	Kelman and Hamilton	State crime becomes easier when three processes occur. Authorisation means the action is approved by authority, so individuals feel less personally responsible. Routinisation means harmful acts become part of a normal job role. Dehumanisation means victims are described as enemies, terrorists, traitors or sub-human, making harm seem acceptable.	Excellent for explaining how “ordinary” officials can become involved in extreme acts. A limitation is that it may underplay wider political ideology, racism, nationalism or economic interests.
5. The spiral of denial	Stan Cohen	Cohen argues that states often respond to accusations of human rights abuse through a spiral of denial: first denying the event happened, then claiming it is not what it looks like, then justifying it as necessary. This helps state crime continue because the public may be confused, evidence may be hidden, and victims may struggle to gain recognition.	Very useful for explaining concealment and justification. However, it explains how states respond after accusations, rather than fully explaining why the crime happened in the first place.
6. Techniques of neutralisation	Sykes and Matza, applied by Cohen	States may use the same kinds of excuses as individual criminals: denial of responsibility, denial of injury, denial of the victim, condemning the condemners, and appeal to higher loyalties. For example, a state might claim that victims were dangerous, that critics are biased, or that the action was necessary to protect national security.	Helpful for linking state crime to wider theories of deviance. However, it may make state crime sound like a matter of excuses, when it is also about power and institutional structures.
7. Modernity and bureaucracy	Bauman	Bauman argues that the Holocaust was not simply a breakdown of civilisation but was made possible by features of modern society: bureaucracy, division of labour, technical efficiency and instrumental rationality. State crime becomes more likely when people carry out small administrative tasks without seeing the full human consequences.	Powerful for explaining large-scale organised harm, especially genocide. However, it can underplay the role of ideology, racism and active hatred.
8. Human rights and social harm approaches	Schwendinger, Green and Ward, Michalowski	These approaches argue that state crime should not only be judged by domestic law, because states often write their own laws. Instead, sociologists should examine whether states violate human rights or cause serious social harm. This helps explain prevalence because many harmful actions may be legal within a country but still abusive or unjust.	Useful because it avoids letting powerful states define their own behaviour as lawful. However, critics argue that human rights definitions can be difficult to enforce and may be accused of reflecting Western values.
9. State-corporate crime	Kramer and Michalowski, Green and Ward	State crime may be connected to corporate power. Governments may protect corporations, ignore regulation, cover up harms or support policies that benefit powerful economic groups. This links well to Marxist ideas about the state serving capitalist interests.	Good for linking state crime to globalisation and capitalism. However, not all state crimes are directly about profit; some are about nationalism, war, repression or ideology.

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