Societies define crime as the breach of one or more rules or laws for which some governing authority or force may ultimately prescribe a punishment.
The word crime originates from the Latin crmen reflecting the Latin root cern = "I decide I give judgement" and the Greek = "I judge". Originally the Latin word crmen meant " charge guilt accusation". 1
When society deems informal relationships and sanctions insufficient to establish and maintain a desired social order there may result more formalized systems of social control imposed by a government or by a sovereign state. With institutional and legal machinery at their disposal agents of the State can compel individuals to conform to behavioral codes and can punish those who do not conform.
Authorities employ various mechanisms to regulate behaviour including rules codified into laws policing people to ensure they comply with those laws and other policies and practices designed by whom to prevent crime. In addition authorities provide remedies and sanctions and collectively these constitute a criminal justice system. Not all breaches of the law however are considered crimes for example breaches of contract and other civil law offences.
The label of "crime" and the accompanying social stigma normally confine their scope to those activities seen as injurious to the general population or to the State including some that cause serious loss or damage to individuals. The labellers intend to assert an hegemony of a dominant population or to reflect a consensus of condemnation for the identified behavior and to justify a punishment imposed by the State in the event that standard processing tries and convicts an accused person of a crime. Usually the perpetrator of the crime is a natural person but in some jurisdictions and in some moral environments legal persons are also considered to have the capability of committing crimes.
