NCJ Number
168923
Date Published
1993
Length
40 pages
Annotation
This chapter reviews the history of the black experience in America and how the racism that has been manifested toward blacks has fostered criminogenic conditions that have contributed to blacks being both disproportionately criminals and victims.
Abstract
Blacks and whites have in recent years avoided debating the plight of blacks in America because of the fear of justifying white supremacists' claims that blacks are intellectually and socially inferior to whites. An analysis of the African-American status in America shows appalling failures in the areas of education, jobs, family stability, crime incidence, and other indices of social and economic failure; these facts must be faced, regardless of how white supremacists may interpret them for their own ends. No American problem has ever been effectively addressed without a full and informed debate about its origins and possible cures. Since the early sixties, there has been an explosive growth of the homeless; a widening disparity between the rich and the poor; worsening conditions for blacks; no abatement of racism; and rising crime levels and incarceration rates. The seventies and eighties have also seen the rise of black political power in the cities and the elimination of legal barriers to full participation in America's life. Generally, however, the plight of the largely black underclass has worsened on all fronts. Despite clear evidence that blacks are responsible for most street crimes, there is no move by white policy-makers and politicians to expend material and intellectual resources on the problem, such as were assigned to the Myrdal and Civil Disorder Commission studies. The mindset of the dominant white public and the politicians who represent them is to ignore the black experience and attempt to contain its unwelcome symptoms with more oppressive measures.