Control Deficits and Mass Harm: Revisiting Control Balance Theory.

Tittle's (1995) control balance theory proposes that both control deficits and control surpluses increase the likelihood of deviant behavior. The theory breaks new ground as a truly general explanation of deviance. Yet, it does not provide a satisfying explanation of the heightened motivation toward deviance among persons with control surpluses. Power corrupts, but how? This paper considers control as relational and provisional, and the discursive construction of reality as consequential to both storytellers and others. Accordingly, I offer two addenda to control balance theory. First, control surpluses create a sense of vulnerability about one's power, and thus lead to perceived control deficits, which increase the likelihood of deviance. Second, narrating oneself as having a control deficit increases the likelihood of deviance. These propositions are clarified through accounts of genocide. I conclude that control balance theory might better explain the sorts of mass harm that criminology has neglected by shifting from an emphasis on actual control to perceived and narrated control. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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