NCJ Number
201498
Journal
Journal of Contemporary Criminal Justice Volume: 19 Issue: 3 Dated: August 2003 Pages: 270-292
Date Published
August 2003
Length
23 pages
Annotation
This article discusses the link of African-American processes of criminalization with the spread of HIV/AIDS among African-Americans.
Abstract
The latest AIDS statistics show a high toll of HIV/AIDS on people of African descent in the United States. Although Blacks represent around 12 percent of the total population, they account for 37.7 percent of the accumulated AIDS cases, and more than 50 percent of new AIDS cases. African-Americans are criminalized in ways that Whites are not. During the escalating Black HIV/AIDS prevalence period, the criminal justice system was exponentially increasing Black incarceration. This resulted mostly from the war on drugs. A racialized social system conceptual framework for understanding links between the criminalization of Blacks and the spread of HIV/AIDS is presented. The term racialized social system means a society in which part of the stratification system is designed to rank people based on their racial classification. In such societies, there are ways that people are hierarchically ranked, including ranking by gender, class, and sexual orientation. The primary ranking is racialized and even when these other rankings are taken into consideration, they do not explain away the racialized hierarchy. The most important function of the racialized ranking system is the domination of the groups that are subordinated. Data are presented from a focus group and in-depth interviews that collaborate this conceptual framework. The accounts from the data support the conceptual framework of a racialized social system that manufactures both the Black criminalized profile and the spread of AIDS. The distrust of authority and lack of faith in institutional order is a legitimation crisis for the society coming from the men in this sample that express a profound lack of trust in public health. The men believe that Whiteness is out to annihilate them and have made a commitment to fight back. The only way to make a difference among these populations is to empower them. This would be the greatest accomplishment of the AIDS service industry. 1 figure, 1 table, 57 references