ABSTRACT
Causes of Delinquency was interpreted by Hirschi (and by others) as compatible with the life-course perspective. From the beginning, however, there were signs in his work of discomfort with this perspective's emphasis on the malleability of delinquent tendencies, and the conclusions about age effects he worked out with Gottfredson clearly pushed him over the line, so to speak. Here, Hirschi and Gottfredson make no bones about the firmness of their position. This article was answered in the same issue of Studies on Crime & Crime Prevention by Robert J. Sampson and John H. Laub, 1995, “Understanding Variability in Lives Through Time: Contributions of Life-Course Criminology,” 4:143-158. The entire exchange was later summarized and evaluated in the same journal by Lawrence E. Cohen and Bryan J. Vila, 1996, “Self-Control and Social Control: An Exposition of the Gottfredson-Hirschi/Sampson-Laub Debate,” Studies on Crime and Crime Prevention 5:125-150. Note here that Hirschi adopts his common practice of committing/defending fallacies. See also “Procedural Rules” in Chapter 3 and the review essay of Elliott Currie's “Confronting Crime,” Criminal Justice Ethics 6, 1987: 66-71.— JHL/TH
