ABSTRACT
Defiance can be 'direct' – a crime committed against a sanctioning agent – or 'indirect' – 'the displaced just deserts committed against a target vicariously representing the sanctioning agents' that provoked the reaction. To understand how defiance relates to and differs from other mechanisms by which sanctions may (or may not) affect crime, it is necessary to situate defiance theory within a brief intellectual history of criminological thought. Lawrence Sherman's defiance theory seeks to explain the conditions under which punishment reduces, increases or has no effect on crime, and he begins by asserting that the common question in criminology and public policy – 'Does punishment control crime?' – should be replaced by a more useful one. Sherman's defiance theory predicts three reactions to a punishment perceived as unfair – irrelevance, deterrence or defiance. In sum, defiance theory integrates differential effects of sanctions and is closely related to both deterrence and labelling perspectives.
