NCJ Number
200262
Journal
Theoretical Criminology Volume: 7 Issue: 2 Dated: May 2003 Pages: 139-162
Date Published
May 2003
Length
24 pages
Annotation
This article argues that some currently influential liberal-culturalist discourses tend to minimize the direct tie between violent street crime, economic marginalization, and the more ruthless adaptive aspects of advanced capitalist culture.
Abstract
Levels of drug-related crime, intimidation, and serious violence in specific places in western nations since the 1980's have risen and remained unacceptably high at the same time that economies have moved toward the "pure" competitive market. Much production has moved abroad to places where labor is cheap and government regulations on business are few. This has been coupled with the increasing mobility of finance capital, the decline of state-centered labor politics, and the absence of effective government at the international level. This has made the return of tenured jobs and stable local economies unlikely. The consistently low levels of educational and electoral engagement that accompany high crime rates in the excluded portions of the former working class make it likely that a Darwinian form of predatory economic and psychological survival will be manifested in violent behaviors. As government has become more dependent on and subservient to business interests, there has been a tendency to misrepresent the relative and moderate success that government institutions have had in reducing street violence by using their political mandate to help maintain comprehensive economic stability above the required threshold. Under the current global neo-liberal project there has been collusion in the political neutralization of populations and the delegitimization of the potentially democratic state and its crucial role in socioeconomic stabilization and the reduction of violence. 104 references