Ecological theories of crime and deviance developed mainly from the work of "Chicago School" of Human Ecology. They are collection of criminologists/ human ecologists who work at the university of Chicago in the 1920's and 1930's. They had many influential forerunners paving the way for their research. Ferdinand Tonnies influenced their work especially by the concepts ‘Gemeinschaft’ and ‘Gesellschaft’.
“ Gemeinschaft is a concept is used to theorise the nature of social relationships in small-scale, "community-type" rural areas.”
“ Gesellschaft is used to theorise the nature of social relationships in larger-scale, "association-type" urban areas.”
Others such as Darwin and Durkheim were also a great deal of help. Firstly Durkheim’s ideas about the way informal social bonds tended to be weakened once societies began to develop in both size and number. Darwin’s central focus was on animalistic behaviour and the struggle for space in relation to evolution.
Shaw and McKay elaborate on an attempt by ecological theorists to apply Social Darwinist ideas to the explanation of criminal behaviour via "Social Disorganisation theory". Shaw and McKay make a strong linkage between that of the "area" to human behaviour, especially criminal behaviour. They focus on effects such as occupation, stability and community life in reference to people's behaviour and how other people’s behaviour has an impact on individuals. So if someone is conditioned by non-criminality this will effect the individual’s behaviour, most likely resulting in a law abiding, obedient individual.
Shaw and McKay applied these ideas through an analysis of what they termed "Concentric Zones". In basic terms they said that any city in their case Chicago, could be divided into diverse concentric zones starting from the centre of the city.
Shaw and McKay observed the crime rates in each zone and found that zone to in particular had higher rates of crime than any other zone. The zone of transition has cheap housing inhabited by numerous immigrants - Irish, Italian and so forth. As a result they argued that something about the fact of living in a particular zone was the root cause of the high levels of crime. This was why according to Shaw and McKay, no settled community could establish itself. In effect this zone resulted in the idea of "social disorganisation".
“Social disorganisation- the idea that a lack of clear, moral, guide-lines in a community structure results in a lack of informal social controls and hence a high rate of crime.”
There are two major problems with can be defined. Firstly with social disorganisation it is difficult to see how the idea of "disorganised human behaviour" can be sustained as no human behaviour can be disorganised. Secondly social disorganisation is both a cause and an effect, which is logically impossible. Social disorganisation creates high rates of crime. High rates of crime create social disorganisation, which comes first?
