TOPIC 9: Ethnicity and crime

• 86% of White people in UK, 14% non-White
• 85,000 men in prison - 74% White, 15% Afro-Caribbean, 7% Asian, 3% mixed race, 1% other
• Afro-Caribbeans not more likely to offend - victims of racism/discrimination
• Left realists/Marxists view = Afro-Caribbeans more likely to offend
• Statistical artefact approach = official stats mislead us to believe ethnic minorities more likely to offend, not the case

• British Crime Survey = majority of crime: intra-racial
• Intra-racial = within particular ethnic group
• 88% of White victims state White offenders involved, 3% Black, 1% Asian, 5% mixed
• 42% of crimes against Black victims identified as committed by Black offenders, 19% against Asians by Asians, 50% White

Limitations:

• Only 20% of survey-recorded crimes = personal crimes
• Bowling and Phillips (2002) = victims influenced by stereotypes
• White people more likely to ascribe crime to African-Caribbean origin

• Graham and Bowling =
  • Home Office study of 14-25 year olds
  • Self-reported offending rates more or less same for White/Black/Asian respondents
  • Black British = 3.6 times more likely to be arrested

Those of African-Caribbean background more likely to:

• Be held in custody - charged with more serious offences
• Plead/found not guilty
• Receive harsher sentences - 17% higher chance of imprisonment than Whites

Asian background:

• Plead not guilty - more likely than average to be found guilty
• Less likely to be imprisoned - 18% lesser chance

• Mayhew et al (1993) = most important factor: youth
• Official stats are accurate reflection of reality - offending greater among A-C communities, greater proportion of young men
• Philips and Brown (1998) = those of A-C origin accounted for disproportionately higher number of arrests --> 60% of Black and White, 55% Asians

Reflection of society approach

• Police drawn from wider society --> some racist officers
• Police not institutionally racist

Canteen culture

• Enormous pressures = e.g. working long hours, facing hostility/potential danger
• Culture developed to deal with pressures
• Reiner (1992) = thirst for action, cynicism, conservativism, suspicion, macho values, racism
• Graef (1989) = officers held stereotypical views --> led to stop and searches
• A-C people 6 times more likely than Whites to be stopped and searched

Institutional racism

• Macpherson Inquiry (Stephen Lawrence case) = police have 'procedures, practices, culture that excludes/disadvantages non-White people'
• Normal day-to-day activities of police based upon racist ideas
• Make assumptions about young Black males and likeliness of offending

Left realist approach

• Lea and Young (1993) = racist practices by police
• Stats show higher crime rate for street robberies/associated 'personal' crimes by A-C youths
• Racist British society - young ethnic-minority males economically/socially marginalised
• Lesser chances of success - sense of relative deprivation
• Creation of subcultures - lead to higher crime levels, coping with marginalisation/relative deprivation

Capitalism in crisis

• Hall (1978) = capitalism in crisis - muggins used as scapegoat to divert attention away from real economic problems
• Media contributed to moral panic, used to justify increasing number of police acting in repressive manner
• Hall criticised for not making effort to research motiviations/thinking of young A-C males
• Association between 'criminality and Black youth' continued for over 25 years

Cultures of resistance

• Scraton (1987) = policing/media coverage/political debates centre around issue of 'race' being problem
• Minority ethnic groups left in significantly worse economic position than white majority since first migrants arrived
• Cultures of resistance emerged --> crime: form of organised resistance
• Committing crimes as political act

Exclusion and alternative economies

• Bourgeois (2002) = ethnographic study of ethnic minority community in New York:
  • Economic exclusion of groups combined with negative social attitudes --> forced to develop 'alternative economy', includes illegal activities (e.g. drug dealing)
  • Dealers become addicted themselves - behaviour destroys families
  • Chaotic violent community = search for dignity in distinctive culture leads to worsening of situation

Statistical artefact approach

• Statistics are misleading
• Fitzgerald et al (2003) =
  • Street crime related to levels of deprivation/lack of community cohesion - measured by rapid population turnover
  • The higher the levels of deprivation, the higher the levels of crime
  • High rates of ethnic-minority offending directly linked to numbers of young ethnic-minority males - particularly in London
  • Statistic link between higher crime levels and lone-parent families - A-C households more likely to be leaded by lone parent
  • Subculture developed = closely linked with school failure/alienation from school - similar views held by White school-age students doing poorly at school
  • Disproportionate amount of all crime performed by young/educationally disaffected children of all backgrounds