Institutional anomie and justification of morally dubious behavior and violence cross-nationally: A multilevel examination

Abstract

This study draws on insights from institutional anomie theory to examine justification of morally dubious behavior and violence cross-nationally. Further, it builds on a burgeoning body of multilevel institutional anomie theory and research on crime-relevant attitudes by considering whether and how individual financial hardship intersects with anomic structural and cultural systems at the national level, acknowledging that individual responses to anomie may be contingent upon experiences with such hardships. Results from multilevel modeling using data from 74,930 World Values Survey respondents in 52 nations, the World Bank, and other organizations provide partial support for the hypotheses. Specifically, conditions of “want amid plenty,” (Bjerregaard & Cochran, 2008a, p. 183) weakened family and education institutions, and monetary fetishism predict justifications cross-nationally. Moreover, economic inequality and individualism moderate the effect of financial hardship on justifications of morally dubious actions and violence, consistent with expectations.

Keywords

Cross-national research institutional anomie theory justification of crime multilevel modeling world values survey

Criminologists have long observed that crime rates vary cross-nationally, leading to the development of macro-level perspectives that emphasize the salience of nation-level structural and cultural characteristics (e.g. Bonger, 1905/1916; Merton, 1938). Institutional anomie theory (IAT) is among the most prominent contemporary macro-level theories of crime causation (Messner, 2012; Messner & Rosenfeld, 1994), positing that high-crime nations are marked by economic institutional dominance and a cultural ethos that celebrates achievement, individualism, universalism, and monetary fetishism, or an “American Dream” ethos. Under such conditions, non-economic institutions (i.e. family, polity, and education) are weakened in their ability to regulate behavior, producing anomie, and crime.

Although IAT is, in Durkheimian tradition, a theory of large-scale variation in crime rates, researchers have recently begun to adapt the theory to explain individual-level crime-relevant attitudes in a cross-national context, such as justification of bribery and other unethical business practices (Cullen, Parboteeah, & Hoegl, 2004; Martin, Cullen, Johnson, & Parboteeah, 2007), youth attitudes towards violence (Groß & Haußmann, 2011), and a “marketized mentality” posited to arise in response to anomic conditions (Hövermann, Groß, & Messner, 2016). Indeed, Messner, Thome, and Rosenfeld (2008) contend that individual-level processes implicit in IAT represent fertile, if underdeveloped, ground for future development and testing of the theory. Moreover, they highlight the need for a multilevel approach to these processes, to “identify the linkages between the level of social systems and level of individual action” (Messner et al., 2008, p. 165). Messner (2012) again articulated the need for criminologists to develop explanations of crime that operate across multiple levels of analysis during his 2011 presidential address to the American Society of Criminology, suggesting specifically that IAT could be integrated with micro-level perspectives on moral decision-making to more fully account for both individual- and national-level variation in crime. Such an approach, Messner (2012) argued, would acknowledge the structurally and culturally embedded nature of individual moral action.

The present research responds to these calls for multilevel IAT research on individual action by considering individual-level and cross-national variation in a key component of moral decision-making—the propensity of the individual to see morally dubious behaviors, or “crimes of everyday life” (Karstedt & Farrall, 2006, p. 1011), and violence as an acceptable courses of action. Using data from the World Values Survey, the World Bank, and other sources, this study investigates the impact of individual financial hardship and nation-level economic dominance, weakened non-economic institutions, and the “American Dream” cultural ethos on justification of crime. It contributes to a growing body of research on cross-national patterns in crime, first, by linking perspectives across multiple levels of explanation, as suggested by Messner (2012), and it uses multilevel methodology to simultaneously address nation-level and individual-level variation, which is necessary when applying IAT to micro-level processes (Messner et al., 2008). Second, it addresses whether and how individual financial hardship intersects with structural anomie and cultural systems that are oriented towards achievement, individualism, universalism, and the fetishism of money at the national level, acknowledging how the expression of personal troubles may be context-dependent, an approach relatively absent in previous examinations of IAT. Third, it examines individual justification of “everyday-life crimes” and violence rather than crime rates, the typical outcome in IAT research, thus filling a gap regarding the impact of anomie on the decision-making process (Karstedt & Farrall, 2006, p. 1013). In doing so, it contributes to a nascent body of research on institutional anomie and crime-relevant attitudes (e.g. Cullen et al., 2004; Groß & Haußmann, 2011; Martin et al., 2007). Furthermore, this research adds to criminological work on attitudes towards ethically suspect but not necessarily serious criminal actions, which may be more representative of the moral condition in society than street crimes, which are more typically examined (Cullen et al., 2004; Karstedt & Farrall, 2006).

IAT

Merton’s (1938) macro-level theory of social structure and anomie, the impetus for IAT, proposed that crime abounds in the United States due to an imbalance between cultural emphasis on goal attainment and the legitimate means to achieve goals. These conditions, combined with a class structure that renders goal attainment through legitimate means problematic for a large proportion of the population, Merton claimed, produce high crime rates as individuals adapt to these anomic conditions by seeking success through the most technically expedient means, which are often criminal. Messner and Rosenfeld (1994) build on and transform Merton’s perspective, offering a macro-level theory—IAT —that also implicates contradictory mainstream cultural systems as well as institutional structure in the Unites States’ disproportionately high level of crime. Although they place less emphasis on the unequal class structure central in Merton’s theory, Messner and Rosenfeld (1994) share Merton’s concern regarding the criminogenic nature of a “by any means necessary” cultural ethos, and they more fully interrogate institutional social organization in capitalist market societies as a source of crime (Bernburg, 2002).

IAT posits that anomic conditions occur when social institutions are imbalanced such that the economy comes to dominate other institutions that are otherwise responsible for promoting moral behavior and providing social support, including family, education, and polity (Messner & Rosenfeld, 1994). Institutional imbalance, Messner and Rosenfeld (1994) claim, is evident in the devaluation, accommodation, and penetration of non-economic institutions and roles by economic ones. Non-economic social roles garner less respect and collective support than market roles (i.e. devaluation), they are expected to operate in service to pecuniary interests (i.e. accommodation), and they become guided by norms that govern economic activity (i.e. penetration). For example, caregiving roles lack prestige, are unlikely to be publicly subsidized, are seen only as necessary so that employed parents can fulfill workplace roles, and are commodified through paid—but poorly compensated—labor. Non-economic institutions thus become weakened in their ability to regulate and control behavior.

Institutional imbalance produces, and is reproduced by, a marketized cultural system. Market societies—or societies whose cultural systems are dominated by market principles—are characterized by norms that celebrate success at any cost (achievement), emphasize making it entirely one’s own (individualism), entail the expectation that all individuals can make it on their own (universalism), and treat money as the sole indicator of success (monetary fetishism). These value orientations—and individualism in particular—are not inherently criminogenic; as a core democratic value, individualism has the capacity to restrain crime and violence to the extent that it is supported by institutions (Karstedt, 2006; Stamatel, 2016). Institutional imbalance, however, creates the conditions that both produce rampant market individualism and the context in which this cultural system becomes disintegrative. Under conditions of institutional imbalance, there is a tension between the structural and cultural system, ultimately giving rise to crime.

Although Messner and Rosenfeld (1994) describe this as the American Dream ethos, these “disintegrative individualism” value orientations are not unique to the United States, and they are found to predict crime rates in cross-national tests of the theory (Martin et al., 2007; Messner et al., 2008, p. 172). Together, structural conditions (i.e. institutional imbalance) and cultural contexts (i.e. disintegrative individualism) are said to explain why some nations—and the U.S., in particular—have disproportionately high rates of crime. The theory receives support, with institutional anomie linked, at least partially, to violent and property crime rates cross-nationally (Bjerregaard & Cochran, 2008a, 2008b; Cochran & Bjerregaard, 2012; Dolliver, 2015; Hughes, Schaible, & Gibbs, 2015; Pratt & Godsey, 2003) and subnationally across smaller geographic units (Chamlin & Cochran, 1995; Maume & Lee, 2003; Stults & Baumer, 2008).

Institutional anomie and individual-level processes

Nearly all examinations of IAT have focused on nation- or state-level crime rates, consistent with IAT’s macro-level orientation (e.g. Baumer & Gustafson, 2007; Bjerregaard & Cochran, 2008b; Chamlin & Cochran, 1995; Savolainen, 2000). Although the theory, in its original form, has been critiqued as failing to “translate” from macro-level conditions to individual-level processes (Baumer, 2007, p. 85), more recent elaborations suggest that crime flourishes, in part, because individuals’ responses to anomic conditions make them more apt to see crime and unethical actions as viable avenues to goal attainment (Karstedt & Farrall, 2006; Messner et al., 2008). That is, IAT contends that moral decision-making is freer from traditional constraints, and egoistic behaviors may be more readily justified, in anomic societies. Cao (2004) goes as far as using a measure of justification of deviance as an indicator of anomie, though this approach risks conflating structural conditions and responses to those conditions. Recognizing the salience of justifications, Cullen, Parboteeah, and Hoegl (2004) used World Values Survey data to examine managers’ acceptance of unethical business conduct, finding that universalism and monetary fetishism at the national level predict justification of ethically suspect practices, as do economic dominance and weakened family and educational institutions (see also Martin et al., 2007). Hövermann et al. (2016) also used cross-national data to demonstrate that institutional anomie gives rise to a “marketized mentality,” or commitment to the tenets of disintegrative individualism, providing further development of the social psychological implications suggested by IAT (see also Burkatzki, 2008; Hövermann, Messner, & Zick, 2015). In an examination of intentions to engage in morally dubious acts, Karstedt and Farrall (2006, p. 1017) offer that institutional anomie gives rise to a “syndrome of market anomie” at the individual level, producing acceptance of unethical action among law-abiding citizens. Messner et al. (2008) have implored scholars to continue to identify and examine micro-level applications of the theory using a multilevel strategy.

The interplay of personal hardship and institutional anomie represents an under-studied micro-level application of IAT. One major point of departure from Merton’s (1938) perspective, concerns the role of blocked opportunities in IAT. Merton (1938) argued that those on the lowest rungs of the class structure experience the greatest pressures to engage in crime, with individual economic strains interacting with anomic conditions to produce criminal innovation. As such, increasing opportunities for success through legitimate channels would, theoretically, reduce crime. Messner and Rosenfeld (1994), in contrast, reject Merton’s sole focus on the legitimate opportunity structure as a source of—and solution to—crime. They contend, instead, that an open economic opportunity structure, characteristic of capitalist market society, would serve only to amplify a culture of disintegrative individualism (see Bernburg, 2002; Chamlin & Cochran, 2007; Passas, 1997). However, Merton’s anomie perspective and IAT are not entirely comparable in this regard. Messner and Rosenfeld’s argument pertains to opportunities only as a structural feature of societies, reflecting the purely macro-level orientation of the theory in its original form. Merton’s (1938) multilevel approach, in comparison, sought to explain individual adaptions to personal economic barriers within cultural and structural contexts, in addition to large-scale variation across them (Baumer, 2007). Theorizing regarding the individual experience of economic strains that features prominently in Mertonian anomie theory is absent in IAT.

Individual blocked opportunities may provide necessary translation between macro- and micro-level phenomena in IAT, as Messner (2012) calls for. That is, individual responses to institutional imbalance and disintegrative individualism may be contingent upon experiences with hardship. Indeed, discounting the importance of individual blocked opportunities runs counter to extensive research detailing the strength of criminogenic American Dream cultural codes among the most dispossessed in society (e.g. Contreras, 2013; Duck, 2015). For instance, Contreras (2013) recounts how criminally involved young men who came of age during the crack era in the South Bronx adhered to a value system that was not a rejection of mainstream capitalist culture but an exaggeration of it.

In addition, micro-level strain theories, which are compatible with IAT (Agnew, 2006), propose that the personal experience of economic barriers is an important precursor to criminal coping, particularly in the absence of social supports and controls, a proposition that receives empirical support (Agnew, 2007; Baron, 2008; Langton & Piquero, 2007). Nonetheless, cross-national and non-U.S. applications of micro-level strain perspectives produce mixed results, with individual hardships more criminogenic in some nations than others (Bao, Haas, Chen, & Pi, 2014; Botchkovar, Tittle, & Antonaccio, 2009; Sigfusdottir, Kristjansson, & Agnew, 2012). Byongook and Morash (2004) posit that strains and responses to them are culturally specific at the national level. IAT, with its emphasis on institutional and cultural contexts, may aid in explaining why the link between personal troubles and crime varies across nations. Specifically, economic strains may only matter for criminal dispositions and behavior in market societies with enfeebled non-economic institutions and a “by any means necessary” cultural ethos. The present study investigates this possibility by examining the main and interactive effects of institutional imbalance, disintegrative individualism, and individual financial hardship on the justification of morally dubious behavior and violence.

Hypotheses

IAT, like Merton’s perspective before it, is largely about dysregulation of moral behavior in anomic settings. Acceptance, or justification, of crime/violence is a necessary precursor to considering crime and violence as possible courses of action and, therefore, criminal conduct. And even if those with crime-supportive attitudes do not, in fact, engage in criminal or ethically suspect behaviors, their attitudes, collectively, shape the moral landscape in ways that erode effective normative regulation. On the micro level, individual experiences with financial hardship may increase the belief that rule-breaking and violence are acceptable, though only under conditions of anomie. That is, dysregulation brought about by enfeebled non-economic institutions and disintegrative individualism provides the necessary backdrop for personal troubles to transform into crime-supportive attitudes.

This study builds on prior cross-national research that employs IAT to address both nation-level and individual-level variation in crime-relevant attitudes (e.g. Cullen et al., 2004; Groß & Haußmann, 2011; Hövermann et al., 2016; Martin et al., 2007), hypothesizing, first, that there is variation in levels of justification of morally dubious behavior and violence cross-nationally (H₁). Such variation may result from two processes. First, individual financial hardship is hypothesized to increase justification of crime, both serious (i.e. violence) and mundane (i.e. everyday-life crimes), at the micro level, partially explaining cross-national variation in crime-supportive attitudes (H₂). Second, economic dominance and, thus, weakened non-economic institutions are hypothesized to heighten justification (H₃), as are cultural environments marked by emphasis on achievement, individualism, universalism, and monetary fetishism (H₄). Finally, anomic institutional and cultural contexts are hypothesized to moderate the effect of financial hardship on crime-supportive attitudes, with justification greatest among dispossessed individuals residing in anomic nations (H₅).

Data and sample

Data for this study include individual-level survey data as well as nation-level data. Data on justification of morally dubious behavior and violence, disintegrative individualism, select non-economic institutions (i.e. family, religion, and social participation), financial hardship, and demographic controls come from Wave 6 of the World Values Survey (WVS). Wave 6 WVS data, collected between 2010 and 2014, include 85,070 survey respondents, ages 18 and older, residing in 59 nations (World Values Survey Association, 2016). The WVS includes nationally representative time-series surveys that use a shared questionnaire. Selected nations represent regions throughout the world, including South America (Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Chile, Ecuador, Peru, Trinidad and Tobago, Uruguay), North America (Mexico, United States), Asia (Armenia, China, Hong Kong, India, Japan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Malaysia, Pakistan, Philippines, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, Uzbekistan), Africa (Algeria, Ghana, Morocco, Nigeria, Rwanda, South Africa, Tunisia, Zimbabwe), the Middle East (Egypt, Jordan, Qatar, Turkey, Yemen), Europe (Belarus, Cyprus, Estonia, Georgia, Germany, Netherlands, Poland, Romania, Russia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Ukraine), and Oceania (Australia, New Zealand). The minimum sample size, obtained by national teams using either full probability or stratified sampling, for inclusion in Wave 6 of WVS is 1000 respondents. Respondents completed face-to-face questionnaires (paper or CAPI) at their place of residence; phone interviews were used for respondents residing in remote areas.

Nation-level data on economic inequality, gross domestic product (GDP) per capita, and educational expenditures as a percentage of GDP come from the World Bank. Nation-level economic freedom data come from the Heritage Foundation’s Economic Freedom Index. Voter turnout data were retrieved from the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance. Nations missing data on economic indicators were excluded from the sample (Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Iraq, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, and Palestine), yielding a final Level 2 sample size of 52 nations; analyses for Model 3 rely on a sample of 49 nations, as three were missing data on educational expenditures (Taiwan, South Korea, and Nigeria). In addition, analyses were restricted to respondents providing data on individual demographics, financial hardship, and the dependent variables, yielding a Level 1 n of 74,930 for justification of everyday-life crimes and a Level 1 n of 74,539 for violence justification.

Measures

Justification of morally dubious behavior and violence

Respondents were presented with a series of topics and circumstances that they were asked to evaluate using a scale of 1 (“never justifiable”) to 10 (“always justifiable”). Justification of morally dubious behavior is measured using the mean value of the respondent’s scores for the following: “Stealing property,” “Claiming government benefits to which you are not entitled,” “Avoiding a fare on public transport,” “Cheating on taxes if you have a chance,” and “Someone accepting a bribe in the course of their duties.” The mean scale has high internal reliability, with a Cronbach’s alpha of 0.835. Justification of violence is measured using the respondent’s score for “Violence against other people.”

Micro-level independent variables

A mean scale for financial hardship was obtained using self-reports of the respondent or their family experiencing the following in the previous 12 months: going without enough food to eat, going without medicine or medical treatment that they needed, and going without a cash income (ranged from “often” to “never”). In addition, respondents were asked whether, in the past 12 months, they had saved money, just gotten by, spent savings, or spent savings and borrowed money. All scores were standardized and combined into a financial hardship scale (Cronbach’s α = 0.726). Other individual-level variables included self-reported age in years, sex (coded 1 if female and 0 if male), and marital status (coded 1 if married and 0 if not married).

Nation-level independent variables

One of the greatest challenges for empirical assessments of IAT is the measurement of institutional anomie. The theory posits that crime flourishes most when a culture of disintegrative individualism operates “under conditions of open, individual competition” (Messner and Rosenfeld, 1994, p. 6). Bjerregaard and Cochran (2008a) identify three dimensions of these conditions: the extent of economic freedom or regulation, the robustness of the economy to support wealth acquisition, and the degree to which opportunities for wealth acquisition are available to all, or “want amid plenty” (Bjerregaard & Cochran, 2008a, p. 183). This study includes measures of nation-level economic freedom, economic robustness, and economic inequality, examined individually and interactively. As with prior IAT studies (e.g. Cochran & Bjerregaard, 2012; Hövermann et al., 2016, Hughes, et al., 2015), the measure of economic freedom came from the Heritage Foundation’s 2010 Economic Freedom Index, which assigns nation-level scores based on 12 indicators of market openness (i.e. trade, investment, and financial freedom), regulatory efficiency (i.e. business, labor, and monetary freedom), size of government (i.e. fiscal health, taxation, and public spending), and rule of law (i.e. effectiveness and integrity of government). The 2010 GDP per capita is measured in tens of thousands of US dollars. The GINI coefficient is used to obtain a measure of economic inequality.

This study examines the effects of nation-level non-economic institutions, including education, polity, family, and religion, as well as the strength of social participation. Educational expenditures as a percentage of GDP in 2010 indicated the strength of education. Polity was measured using voter turnout percentage averaged across major election cycles occurring between 2008 and 2014; the mean was used, when appropriate, to account for election-to-election fluctuation. Following others (e.g. Hövermann et al., 2016; Hughes et al., 2015), the strength of family, religion, and social participation were measured using survey items aggregated at the national level. Family was measured using nation-level mean scores on a WVS item asking respondents to rate the importance of family in their lives. Nation-level mean scores on religion were calculated using a mean scale of standardized scores on three WVS items: frequency of attendance at religious services not including weddings and funerals, frequency of prayer, and the importance of religion in the respondent’s life (Cronbach’s α = 0.802). Social network inclusion, or social participation, was measured using self-reported participation in multiple voluntary groups, including sport/recreational organizations; art, music, or educational organizations; humanitarian and charitable organizations; self-help groups; and other social organizations. Nation-level means were derived from individual-level, summed binary indicators of participation.

Defining culture and identifying indicators of the cultural ethos of disintegrative individualism has proven particularly challenging for IAT researchers (see Bernburg, 2002; Dolliver, 2015), with some omitting the cultural dimensions of the theory from their analyses entirely (e.g. Bjerregaard & Cochran, 2008b; Cao, 2004; Maume & Lee, 2003; Pratt & Godsey, 2003). When included, survey responses aggregated from the individual to national level are typically used (Hirtenlehner, Farrall, & Bacher, 2013; Hughes et al., 2015; Stults & Baumer, 2008). This strategy is employed here. Indicators of achievement, individualism, and monetary fetishism are drawn from Schwartz’s (1994) human value orientation items in the WVS (see Held, Mueller, Deutsch, Grzechnik, & Welzel, 2009). These items offer the best cross-national data on the cultural components central in IAT, but cautious interpretation is warranted as the measures are being used outside of their original context. Nation-level achievement values came from aggregated scores on the WVS item “Being very successful is important to this person; to have people recognise one’s achievements.” This is also an achievement item in Schwartz’s (1994) theory of human values. Individualism values came from aggregated scale scores based on responses on five WVS items measuring how important it is to the respondent to “think up new ideas and be creative; to do things one’s own way,” “have a good time; to ‘spoil’ oneself,” “do something for the good of society,” “always behave properly; to avoid doing anything people would say is wrong,” and “follow the customs handed down by one’s religion or family” (Cronbach’s α = 0.604). The individualism measures include Schwartz’s (1994) self-direction and hedonism items as well as reverse-coded tradition and conformity items. Respondents were asked to report their opinion on a continuum from “In the long run, hard work usually brings a better life” to “Hard work doesn’t usually bring success; it’s more a matter of luck and connections”; responses were aggregated to measure nation-level universalism. This measure indicates the extent to which respondents believe their society is meritocratic (i.e. success results from individual hard work), an indirect indicator of universalism, or the belief in equal opportunity for success. Monetary fetishism was measured using aggregated responses to “It is important to this person to be rich; to have a lot of money and expensive things,” which is a power (materialism) item in Schwartz’s theory of human values. All individual-level and nation-level independent variables were grand mean centered, and centered variables were used in the calculation of all product terms.

Methodology

IAT, when applied to individual-level processes, requires a multilevel approach (Messner et al., 2008). As such, this study employs multilevel analysis using xtmixed in Stata 14. This maximum-likelihood estimation method allows for simultaneous estimation of within- (Level 1) and between-nation (Level 2) variance in justification of crime using nested data. Unlike OLS regression, which treats observations as independent, multilevel modeling acknowledges the hierarchical nature of nested data, and partitions residuals at each level such that variables operating at the individual and national levels are mathematically discrete (Bickel, 2007). This increases the accuracy of inferences, as error estimates are less likely to be underestimated. As a result, multilevel modeling reduces the risk of an ecological fallacy, which is of particular concern when working with clustered data (Hövermann et al., 2016). In addition, multilevel modeling facilitates estimation permits appropriate examination of cross-level interactions (Bickel, 2007).

Initial tests were conducted to establish whether justifications varied cross-nationally, as well as to determine if predictors should be included as fixed or random effects. Results from likelihood ratio (LR) tests comparing the null models to single-level null models indicate significant nation-level effects warranting multilevel analysis (morally dubious behavior $χ^{2}$ = 15,351.54, p < .001; violence $χ^{2}$ = 11,564.34, p < .001). Further LR tests comparing random intercept/fixed-slope models to random-slope models demonstrate that the effects of financial hardship vary across nations (morally dubious behavior $χ^{2}$ = 14,079.14, p < .001; violence $χ^{2}$ = 11,271.64, p < .001), as do other individual-level predictors, and so random-effects models were used.

Results

Descriptive results

Table 1 presents the means, standard deviations, minimums, and maximums. The mean level of justification of morally dubious behavior was 2.295; for justification of violence, it was 1.99. These means are low, given that the scales range from 1 to 10, and they reflect the low levels of justification observed in many nations. The data include individual- (Level 1) and nation-level (Level 2) predictors. At the individual level, the mean age was 42.5 years, 52.9% of respondents were female, 54.9% were married, and the mean score on the financial hardship scale was 1.77. At the national level, the mean GDP per capita (in $10,000s) was 1.65, the mean GINI coefficient was 39.12, and the mean score on the economic freedom index was 63.33. The nation-level mean on the polity scale was 0.011 and for the religion scale it was 0.004; both comprised standardized scores. The mean for strength of family was 3.901, and for social participation, it was 0.704. The mean educational expenditure as a percentage of GDP was 4.676.

Table 1.

Descriptive statistics: Percentages and means (standard deviations).

	Percentage/mean (standard deviation)	Minimum	Maximum
Justification of morally dubious behavior	2.295 (1.686)	1.00	10.00
Justification of violence	1.992 (1.935)	1.00	10.00
Individual level (Level 1)
Age	42.477 (16.755)	18.00	85.00
Female sex	52.9%	0.00	1.00
Married status	54.9%	0.00	1.00
Financial hardship	1.768 (0.688)	1.00	4.00
National level (Level 2)
GDP per capita (in $10,000s)	1.645 (1.790)	0.06	7.09
Economic inequality (GINI)	39.116 (9.504)	24.55	63.38
Economic freedom (EFI)	63.326 (11.591)	21.40	89.70
Non-economic institutions
Polity	0.011 (0.657)	−1.45	1.39
Family	3.901 (0.075)	3.53	3.99
Education	4.676 (1.393)	1.90	8.20
Social participation	0.704 (0.509)	0.02	1.82
Religion	0.004 (0.500)	−1.20	0.87
Cultural ethos
Achievement	4.030 (0.604)	2.56	5.43
Individualism	3.143 (0.229)	2.51	3.60
Universalism	6.842 (0.682)	5.30	8.88
Monetary fetishism	3.188 (0.720)	2.07	4.65

Notes: Level 1 n = 74,930 respondents; level 2 n = 52 nations (except educational expenditures as a percentage of GDP, which is provided for 49 nations, and justification of violence, which has a Level 1 n of 74,539). Polity and religion are scales comprising standardized scores. Table presents means and standard deviations for continuous variables and percentages for categorical variables.

GDP: gross domestic product.

Multilevel modeling results

Hypothesis 1 states that justification of morally dubious behavior and violence varies across nations. The unconditional intercept-only model in Table 2 shows that justification of everyday-life crimes (γ₀₀ = 2.226, τ₀₀ = 0.403, p < .001) and justification of violence (γ₀₀ = 1.904, τ₀₀ = 0.412, p < .001) varies significantly across nations, supporting H₁. The intra-class correlation (ICC) for justification of morally dubious behavior is 0.147, indicating that 14.7% of the variation in the outcome is explained by the grouping structure of the multilevel model, or nation-level effects. For justification of violence, the ICC is 0.114, with 11.4% of variation due to nation-level differences.

Table 2.

Results from intercept-only random effects model.

	Justification of morally dubious behavior	Justification of violence
Intercept	2.226 (0.088)***	1.904 (0.089)***
Variance components
Level 1 (within nations; σ²)	2.334	3.194
Level 2 (between nations; τ₀₀)	0.403	0.412
Intra-class correlation	0.147	0.114
Model fit
AIC	276448.4	298362.0
Log likelihood	−138,223.21	−149,179.98

Note: Justification of morally dubious behavior Level 1 n = 74,930 respondents; level 2 n = 52 nations. Justification of violence Level 1 n = 74,930 respondents; level 2 n = 52 nations.

Table 3 presents the results of the multilevel analysis of justification of morally dubious actions. The first model in the table includes individual-level and economic institution predictors. Consistent with the second hypothesis, net of age, sex, marital status, and nation-level economic indicators, individual financial hardship increases the justification of everyday-life crimes (β = 0.266, p < .001). The three-way anomie interaction of economic robustness, inequality, and freedom, developed by Bjerregaard and Cochran (2008a) was non-significant (not shown), although the two-way interaction between economic inequality and economic freedom was significant (β = 0.003, p < .001) such that economic inequality has a stronger effect on justification in nations with greater economic freedom (Table 3, Model 1).

Table 3.

Results from multilevel analyses of justification of morally dubious behavior (Level 1 n = 74,930, Level 2 n = 52).

	Model 1	Model 2	Model 3	Model 4	Model 5
Individual level (Level 1)
Age	−0.009 (0.001)***	−0.009 (0.001)***	−0.009 (0.001)***	−0.009 (0.001)***	−0.009 (0.001)***
Sex (1 = female; 0 = male)	−0.078 (0.026)**	−0.078 (0.026)**	−0.084 (0.027)**	−0.078 (0.026)**	−0.078 (0.026)**
Marital status (1 = married; 0 = non-married)	−0.097 (0.019)***	−0.097 (0.019)***	−0.104 (0.019)***	−0.097 (0.019)***	−0.098 (0.019)***
Financial hardship	0.266 (0.030)***	0.274 (0.027)***	0.280 (0.029)***	0.266 (0.030)***	−0.822 (0.606)
National level (Level 2)
GDP per capita (in $10,000s)	−0.054 (0.081)	−0.010 (0.006)
Economic inequality	−1.927 (1.253)	−0.010 (0.009)
Economic freedom	0.681 (0.880)	−0.006 (0.009)
Economic inequality × economic freedom	0.003 (0.001)***
Non-economic institutions
Polity			0.066 (0.132)
Family			−3.460 (1.224)**
Education			−0.123 (0.055)*
Social participation			0.317 (0.204)
Religion			0.308 (0.198)
Cultural ethos
Achievement				−0.109 (0.184)	−0.146 (0.194)
Individualism				0.226 (0.391)	−0.090 (0.411)
Universalism				−0.061 (0.117)	−0.068 (0.123)
Monetary fetishism				0.353 (0.151)*	0.371 (0.159)*
Cross-level interactions
Financial hardship × GDP per capita		0.004 (0.002)*
Financial hardship × economic inequality		0.006 (0.003)*
Financial hardship × individualism					0.306 (0.125)*
Intercept	−6.450 (13.230)	2.364 (0.110)***	16.230 (4.787)***	1.407 (1.902)	2.534 (1.999)
Variance components
Level 1 variance (σ²)	2.240	2.240	2.261	2.240	2.240
Level 2 variance (τ₀₀)	0.509	0.584	0.500	0.517	0.522
Intra-class correlation	0.185	0.207	0.181	0.188	0.189
Model fit values
AIC	273,697.0	273,696.8	258,060.6	273,703.4	273,705.3
Log likelihood	−136,837.48	−136,837.38	−129,020.32	−136,842.7	−136,839.6

Notes: Level 1 n = 74,930 respondents; level 2 n = 52 nations (except Model 3, which includes 70,469 respondents in 49 nations due to limited nation-level data on educational expenditures). Table presents unstandardized coefficients with standard errors in parentheses. Models include all relevant interactions, including cross-level interactions, though only statistically significant interactions are presented. *p < .05; **p < .01; *** p < .001.

GDP: gross domestic product.

The third hypothesis (H₃) receives additional support in that the strength of some non-economic institutions at the national level—family and education—predict justification of morally dubious behavior (β = −3.382, p < .001 and β = −0.125, p < .05) in the direction anticipated (Table 3, Model 3). Polity, social participation, and religion did not achieve significance. Nations with compulsory voting laws were omitted for sensitivity analyses; the pattern of results—including the failure of polity to predict justification—was the same.

The fourth hypothesis (H₄) concerns the impact of the culture of disintegrative individualism on justifications. Of the four elements of this cultural ethos (i.e. achievement, individualism, universalism, and monetary fetishism), only monetary fetishism statistically significantly predicts justification of everyday-life crimes (β = 0.353, p < .05). Thus, H₄ receives only partial support.

One contribution of this study is its consideration of the moderating effect of nation-level anomic institutional and cultural contexts on the relationship between individual financial hardship and justifications. The investigation of cross-level effects reveals a nuanced effect of cultural impacts on the justification of ethically suspect behavior. Consistent with H₅, justifications were greatest among dispossessed individuals residing in anomic nations, at least as pertains to a culture of individualism, economic inequality, and economic robustness. The positive effect of financial hardship on justifications is stronger in nations marked by individualism, as seen in the significant interaction term in Model 5 of Tables 3 (β = 0.306, p < .05). The greater the economic inequality in a nation, as measured by the GINI coefficient, the stronger the effect of financial hardship on justification of morally dubious behavior (β = 0.006, p < .05; Table 3, Model 3). Economic robustness, as indicated by GDP per capita, also moderates the positive effect of financial hardship on justification of everyday-life crimes (β = 0.004, p < .05). The cross-level interaction between financial hardship and individualism can be seen in Panel 1 of Figure 1; the interaction between financial hardship and economic inequality is displayed in Panel 2 of the figure.

Other indicators of anomic institutional (i.e. economic freedom and non-economic institutions) and cultural environments (e.g. achievement, universalism, and monetary fetishism) failed to moderate the impact of financial hardship on justification of morally dubious behavior.

The results for the justification of violence are displayed in Table 4. As with justification of ethically suspect behavior, financial hardship increases the justification of violence controlling for age, sex, marital status, and nation-level economic indicators (β = 0.197, p < .001). The two-way interaction between economic robustness (GDP per capita) and economic freedom was significant, with economic freedom exerting a stronger effect on violence justification in wealthier nations (Table 4, Model 1). The interactive results for both sets of justifications correspond to the “want amid plenty” effect detailed in IAT (Bjerregaard & Cochran, 2008a, p. 183; Messner & Rosenfeld, 1994), and partially support the third hypothesis. Considering the results for both sets of justification together, H₃ receives support in that (1) economic inequality conditions the influence of economic freedom on justification of morally dubious actions, (2) economic robustness conditions the effect of economic freedom on justification of violence, and (3) the non-economic institutions most responsible for promoting moral behavior and providing social support—family and education—predict justifications, as well.

Table 4.

Results from multilevel analyses of justification of violence (Level 1, n = 74,539, Level 2, n = 52).

	Model 1	Model 2	Model 3	Model 4	Model 5
Individual level (Level 1)
Age	−0.007 (0.001)***	−0.007 (0.001)***	−0.007 (0.001)***	−0.007 (0.001)***	−0.007 (0.001)***
Sex (1 = female; 0 = male)	−0.190 (0.031)***	−0.190 (0.031)***	−0.196 (0.033)***	−0.190 (0.031)***	−0.189 (0.031)***
Marital status (1 = married; 0 = non-married)	−0.041 (0.017)*	−0.041 (0.018)*	−0.045 (0.018)*	−0.041 (0.018)*	−0.041 (0.018)*
Financial hardship	0.197 (0.025)***	0.204 (0.023)***	0.209 (0.025)***	0.197 (0.025)***	−0.615 (0.517)
National level (Level 2)
GDP per capita (in $10,000s)	−0.007 (0.009)	−0.001 (0.007)
Economic inequality	−0.947 (1.389)	0.012 (0.010)
Economic freedom	2.049 (0.978)*	−0.011 (0.010)
GDP per capita × economic freedom	0.013 (0.006)*
Non-economic institutions
Polity			0.225 (0.114)
Family			−3.515 (1.048)***
Education			−0.110 (0.048)*
Social participation			0.495 (0.176)**
Religion			0.339 (0.172)*
Cultural ethos
Achievement				−0.053 (0.186)	−0.132 (0.203)
Individualism				0.624 (0.396)	0.185 (0.432)
Universalism				0.064 (0.118)	0.101 (0.130)
Monetary fetishism				0.416 (0.152)**	0.460 (0.166)**
Cross-level interactions
Financial hardship × economic inequality		0.006 (0.002)**
Financial hardship × individualism					0.273 (0.107)**
Intercept	2.023 (0.143)***	2.197 (0.121)***	16.478 (4.101)***	1.290 (1.924)	0.005 (2.099)
Variance components
Level 1 variance	3.123	3.123	3.151	3.123	3.123
Level 2 variance	0.568	0.691	0.509	0.641	0.668
Intra-class correlation	0.154	0.181	0.139	0.170	0.176
Model fit values
AIC	296,945.4	296,940.8	279,838.2	296,942.5	296,942.2
Log likelihood	−148,461.68	−148,459.41	−139,909.1	−148,462.23	−148,458.09

Notes: Level 1 n = 74,539 respondents; level 2 n = 52 nations (except Model 3, which includes 70,469 respondents in 49 nations due to limited nation-level data on educational expenditures). Table presents unstandardized coefficients with standard errors in parentheses. Models include all relevant interactions, including cross-level interactions, though only statistically significant interactions are presented. *p < .05; **p < .01; *** p < .001.

GDP: gross domestic product.

Also in line with results for justification of everyday-life crimes, non-economic institutions at the national level—family and education—predict justification of violence, as offered in the third hypothesis (β = −3.550, p < .001 and β = −0.113; Table 4, Model 3). Religion had a positive but weak effect on justification of violence, and social participation had an unexpectedly positive effect on justification of violence. Polity did not achieve significance; sensitivity analyses omitting nations with compulsory voting laws yielded the same pattern of results. Of the four elements of the criminogenic cultural ethos proposed in IAT (i.e. achievement, individualism, universalism, and monetary fetishism), only monetary fetishism statistically significantly predicts justification of violence (β = 0.416, p < .01). The fourth hypothesis, then, receives only partial support for both sets of justifications.

The examination of cross-level effects shows that the positive effect of financial hardship on justification of violence is stronger in individualistic nations, (Table 4, Model 5; β = 0.273, p < .01). In addition, the greater the economic inequality in a nation, as indicated by the GINI coefficient, the stronger the effect of financial hardship on justification of violence (β = 0.006, p < .01; Table 4, Model 3). Panel 1 of Figure 2 presents the cross-level interaction between financial hardship and individualism; panel 2 displays the interaction between financial hardship and economic inequality. All other cross-level interactions were non-significant.

Discussion

The primary goal of this study was to examine whether variation in crime-relevant attitudes (i.e. justification of morally dubious behavior and violence) is attributable to anomic institutional and cultural conditions. A secondary goal was to address whether the attitudinal consequences of individual hardship are contingent on national contexts of anomie. These goals respond to calls to bridge levels of analysis from an institutional anomie perspective and to identify the social psychological implications of the theory (Messner et al., 2008; Messner, 2012, p. 8). As such, this study speaks to broader questions regarding the institutionally and culturally rooted nature of moral beliefs and behaviors, and it builds on recent multilevel research on cross-national patterns in anomie and crime-relevant attitudes.

The constellation of economic features highlighted in IAT—robust market societies with high degrees of both economic freedom and economic inequality—matter for justifications of everyday-life crimes and violence. Importantly, these characteristics do not, independently, predict justifications; rather, it is specifically unfettered pursuit of wealth in the context of economic strength (for violence) and unequal access to wealth (for morally dubious behavior) that matters. This suggests that anomic market societies support cultural environments in which rule-violating behaviors are more readily accepted.

In addition, the monetary fetishism said to characterize market societies also predicted justifications cross-nationally, whereas the other value orientations—achievement, individualism, and universalism—did not. Unlike monetary fetishism, which, by definition, is an extreme value orientation particular to market-dominated societies, cultural emphasis on achievement, individualism, and universalism is not specific to anomic societies. Rather, these democratic value orientations may become disintegrative to the extent that they are accompanied by social inequality or weakened non-economic institutions, thereby producing criminogenic tensions between structural and cultural systems. They may, in fact, have a preventative effect when structural systems support individual achievement under egalitarian conditions (see Karstedt, 2006; Stamatel, 2016). Supplementary analyses investigating interactions between value orientations and institutional features of nations, however, did not yield significant results. Nonetheless, the present study did find that individual financial hardship is especially likely to produce crime-supportive attitudes in highly individualistic nations, a finding somewhat consistent with prior theorizing on the contingent effects of individualistic values. Future IAT analyses would benefit from attention to the nuanced, contextualized effects of individualism on crime and related dispositions. It bears noting, too, that measuring the value orientations central to IAT poses a significant methodological challenge given the dearth of measures in cross-national data sources designed for this purpose. Efforts to develop and collect data on valid and cross-culturally reliable indicators of disintegrative individualism are needed for comprehensive investigation of the theory’s core propositions in the future.

Family and education emerged as the most important non-economic institutions linked to justifications, likely because—relative to other institutions—they serve greater social control and support functions. It is possible, however, that the failure of nation-level polity, religion, and social participation to influence justifications in the direction expected is due to measures that fail to adequately tap into the health of these institutions. For instance, the degree of participation in social organizations at the national level may be a stronger indicator of leisure time than the density of supportive social ties. In addition, cultural variation in the significance of political participation, religious ritual, and recreational social activity may render these factors irrelevant in cross-national study.

Individual-level strain theories posit that personal hardship increases the likelihood of criminal coping (Agnew, 2007), an idea put forth by Merton (1938) but largely outside of the scope of the institutional anomie perspective. This study takes seriously the position that hardships influence crime-relevant attitudes and merges this notion with IAT principles to posit that the effect of economic difficulties is contingent upon anomic conditions. This hypothesis, also in line with Baumer’s (2007) interpretation of Merton’s (1938) multilevel perspective, is supported in that financial hardship has a significantly stronger effect on justifications in economically unequal, high-GDP, and individualistic nations. Deprivation, thus, bends the moral lens particularly in environments marked by theoretical access to wealth and an “every man for himself” value system. Passas’s (1997) extension of anomie theory offers one explanation. His perspective locates the source of individual reference group comparisons to stratification systems marked by social mobility and cultural conditions of the American Dream ideology. Under such conditions, according to Passas (1997), relative deprivation may be especially acute due to comparisons to non-membership (i.e. cross-stratum) referents. A focus on the rigidity of stratification systems represents an area for further examination of macro-micro criminogenic processes cross-nationally. Although general strain theory receives support even outside the U.S. context, the impact of strain is not uniform cross-nationally (e.g. Bao et al., 2014; Botchkovar, Antonaccio, & Hughes, 2018; Botchkovar et al., 2009; Sigfusdottir et al., 2012). Byongook and Morash (2004) argue that strains and responses to them are sensitive to national cultures. It may follow that strains and responses are institutionally specific, as well. More research is needed to determine whether the effects of non-economic strains are similarly conditioned by anomic structural and cultural systems. Such studies ought also to identify the social-psychological processes at work in the nexus between macro-level anomie and individual-level strains, including whether the experience of anger, the central emotion in general strain theory, is a more likely response to strains in anomic societies.

The question of why only some individuals respond to hardship with criminal adaptations (e.g. innovation rather than retreatism) has long been a point of critique of Merton’s theory (see Baumer, 2007). Cloward and Ohlin’s (1960) strain perspective, which was heavily influenced by Merton, answers this question by focusing on individual experiences of alienation in the labor market in combination with the structure of illegitimate opportunities (see also Cullen, 1988). IAT, also influenced by Merton, in contrast, offers no straightforward answer to this question given its primary focus on nation-level variation; without theoretical integration, it offers guidance only as to why some nations have more innovation than others. The present research, in focusing on crime-relevant attitudes and micro-macro linkages, permits an examination of why financial hardships may lead individuals to embrace or at least tolerate innovation. However, it cannot speak to why individuals exposed to the same anomic conditions and experiencing the same strains develop radically different orientations towards criminal conduct. One area for further development in multilevel applications of IAT is identifying further sources of individual variation in responses to institutional anomie.

The individual, structural, and cultural predictors of the justification of morally dubious actions involving financial gain were largely the same as those predicting justification of violence. The parallel results for each type of justification point to a generalized unraveling of the moral fabric in anomic societies, wherein loosened attitudes towards deviance are at least somewhat indiscriminate, ranging from violence to legal but unethical “crimes of everyday life” (Karstedt & Farrell, 2006, p. 1011). Most examinations of IAT focus on homicide or robbery (e.g. Hughes et al., 2015; Pratt & Godsey, 2003; Stults & Baumer, 2008), although some address other offense types, such as white-collar offending (e.g. Martin et al., 2007). One area for development is the extent to which institutional imbalance and its attendant cultural ethos matter more for some domains of criminal action and attitudes than others, as well as their relevance for moral behaviors and dispositions that exist entirely outside of the scope of law.

Future research might also benefit from greater attention to the intricacies of criminal justifications. The measures of justification in the WVS, used here, lacked nuance that might have revealed a more complicated story. Ideally, respondents would be presented with, and asked to respond to, detailed vignettes of individuals engaging in morally questionable behaviors, which may elicit more thoughtful responses (Schoenberg & Ravdal, 2000). Nonetheless, broad categories avoid the pitfalls of culturally specific vignettes in cross-national research, and they provide insight into general attitudes regarding hard and fast moral rules.

This study examined justification of crime, not criminal action. Thus, although it draws extensively on IAT propositions, it is not a true test of the theory applied at the individual level. Instead, it speaks to the institutional and cultural roots of widespread crime-supportive attitudes, regardless of whether those holding favorable attitudes engage in crime. Hirtenlehner et al. (2013) offer a more direct test of the theory as it applies to individual criminal behavior cross-nationally among European nations, failing to find support for IAT. The misalignment between Hirtenlehner et al.’s (2013) results and those from studies of IAT and justification of crime suggests that anomie may matter less for individual behavior than for attitudes. The route from acceptance of criminal action to action itself may be more sensitive to individual-level push and pull factors as well as foreground factors. Further research is needed to more fully explore the institutionally and culturally embedded character of moral beliefs, moral action, and the link between beliefs and action.

Conclusion

IAT offers one of the most comprehensive explanations of global variation in crime rates in contemporary criminology, but its contributions to understanding individual-level processes, including crime-related moral dispositions, have not yet been fully realized. The results presented here suggest that institutional anomie, in part, accounts for cross-national variation in willingness to justify criminal conduct. Specifically, the combination of economic inequality and economic freedom, two of the nation-level characteristics of what Bjerregaard & Cochran (2008a, p. 183) term “want amid plenty,” increase justifications, as do weakened family and education institutions and cultures of disintegrative individualism. As such, anomic conditions contribute not just to criminal action, as suggested by IAT, but also to the moral dispositions that support criminal innovation. The research suggests further that, at the individual level, moral expression of individual economic troubles is contingent on aspects of nation-level anomie, with the relationship between financial difficulties and justifications strongest under conditions of disintegrative individualism and economic inequality. Thus, a key finding of this study is that the moral expression of individual hardship is shaped by anomic conditions, consistent with IAT principles. Greater attention to multilevel processes in the production of criminal attitudes is warranted as researchers continue to develop IAT and address the sociocultural contexts in which moral action is situated.

Footnotes

Declaration of conflicting interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: Research reported in this publication was supported by the Elon University Faculty Research & Development Summer Fellowship.

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