This working paper proposes a cooperation theory of non-criminal behavior as a meta-theoretical framework for criminology and criminal justice. While many theories explain aspects of criminal behavior, the criminal justice system exists not to produce criminal behavior but to produce its opposite — cooperation with society. A theory of cooperation is therefore needed to guide rehabilitation and criminal justice practice more effectively than existing criminological theories allow. Seven axioms of cooperation are derived from observations of human behavior. Cooperation with society is enhanced: 1) when it is voluntary, 2) as people age due to neurological maturation, 3) with the need for and probability of assistance from others, 4) through an iterative nonlinear learning process that includes imitation and an optimal balance of reward and punishment, 5) when there is the perception of a fair trade, 6) when the person has optimal mental functioning, and 7) when the person believes that he or she is a member of the same group. Criminal behavior is more probable when one or more of these conditions for cooperation are not met. The cooperation theory is tested against a comprehensive list of known facts about criminal behavior proposed by Farrington (2003), and is shown to provide coherent explanations for each fact. Of particular importance is the theory's explanation of the age crime curve — the well documented population level pattern of rising criminal activity in adolescence followed by decline in adulthood. The interaction between the trajectory of cooperative decision making capacity, which increases with neurological maturation over the life course, and the trajectory of the need for cooperation, which varies inversely with physical capacity, produces a propensity for cooperation whose inverse matches the age crime curve with a high degree of accuracy. The cooperation theory draws upon and is compatible with multiple existing criminological theoretical traditions including control theory, social learning theory, the general theory of crime, rational choice theory, life course theory, and collective efficacy theory. Rather than competing with these theories, cooperation theory provides a meta-theoretical foundation that encompasses them, approaching human behavior from the opposite direction — explaining non-criminal behavior rather than criminal behavior. The paper connects directly to the broader theoretical framework of The Physics of Living Systems, which proposes that living systems follow predictable distributional patterns across multiple domains. The nonlinear iterative learning process described in Axiom 4 connects to the micro/macro chaos framework developed more fully in that broader work, in which apparent behavioral stability reflects micro level chaotic processes operating around cooperation thresholds. This paper builds on Arnold (2010), An Assessment of Offender Reassessment, and connects to Arnold (2009), The Nonlinear Dynamics of Criminal Behavior, and Arnold (2016), The Criminological Puzzle. Licensing Note regarding the Copyright Notice in the Document: This paper was originally copyrighted by the author in 2010. The author is uploading this work to Zenodo and licensing it under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International. The copyright notice in the document reflects the original date of authorship.
Thomas K. Arnold (Mon,) studied this question.