From the “atavistic” to the “inferior” criminal type: The impact of the lombrosian theory of the born criminal on German psychiatry

Hermogenes: For my part, Socrates, I have often talked with Cratylus and many others, and cannot come to the conclusion that there is any correctness of names other than convention and agreement. For it seems to me that whatever name you give to a thing is its right name; and if you give up that name and change it for another, the later name is no less correct than the earlier, just as we change the names of our servants; for I think no name belongs to any particular thing by nature, but only by the habit and custom of those who employ it and who established the usage. But if this is not the case, I am ready to hear and to learn from Cratylus or anyone else. Socrates: It may be that you are right, Hermogenes; but let us see. - (Plato, Cratylus) defining the offender Different meanings and interpretations of “reality” are implied in scientific definitions. Definitions are limiting through their labeling role, especially when the reality in question is not an inanimate object but a deviant individual. They function as useful conventions only if we are conscious of how dangerously static they are. Theoretical systems that scientifically explain forms of criminality are therefore connected with hermeneutic, terminological, and definitional problems. Concepts such as those of the “born criminal” or “atavism,” which were introduced by Cesare Lombroso and his followers and became common in the criminological debates at the end of the nineteenth century, became more popular and seemed to acquire increasing autonomy from the theories that gave rise to them.