A Survey on Kant's Influence on the Development of the Concept of "Crime" in Durkheim's Thought

Durkheim has considered crime as a "social reality". In Durkheim's thought, crime is a matter arising from the collective conscience changing with the passage of time and space with a special mechanism. Therefore, in his view, changing the realm of criminal behavior is a "normal" issue, and not their inherent characteristic. Simultaneously, in this approach, crime is an independent entity beyond the individual wills in case of members of the society that finds meaning under "social categories". This view guarantees the determination and stability of social reality that however, has some characteristics in terms of moral content and investigation method deeply rooted in Kant in the approach of Durkheim. Therefore, the lack of attention toward such foundations has provided the case for misinterpretations of sociologist's ideas, accordingly, incorrect analysis of his opinions,
has necessitated a reconsideration in this regard. This research, in order to investigate Durkheim's special perception, as a neo-Kantian sociologist regarding social realities, especially crime, with the analytical method, is presenting the most relevant manifestations of Kant's thought in Durkheim's and the way of evolution and manifestation of his thought in Durkheim's views has been investigated. The outcome indicated that Durkheim, inspired by Kant's, tried to propose a new model for the study of ethics in modern societies by applying some reforms. Contrary to Kant, Durkheim never considers issues to be part of the structure of human nature as fixed and unchanging, but considered in the form and structure of people's thoughts arising from the content by the spirit of society. Considering the issues as social in Durkheim's thought, on the one hand, guarantees the stability of morality and the preservation of its totality, on the other hand, justifies the moral differences of societies throughout history and in all over the world. Therefore, in Durkheim's view, morality emerges from the collective conscience of society, which really exists, but may undergo alterations in the collective conscience. The condition of morality in Kant's thought, which was the existence of the absolute ideas of God and the immortality of the soul, was reduced to more abstract matters such as the collective will in Durkheim's regards, as the rule of recognition of the state. According to Durkheim, by identifying the social and moral realities, the state presents a single narrative of acceptable behaviors and considers them contrary to the cases as crimes. Philosophically speaking, this approach is encountered with the challenge not providing a criterion for judging the behavior of citizens and considering them as crimes. Consequent theories of criminology, on one side, doubt the function of the state in identifying collective realities due to the existence of different moral and behavioral attitudes in society, on the other side accept Durkheim's social reality approach as a basis for marginalizing different tendencies as criminals which are contrary to the social reality determined by the state.