NCJ Number
223001
Journal
Journal of Scandinavian Studies in Criminology and Crime Prevention Volume: 9 Issue: 1 Dated: 2008 Pages: 65-84
Date Published
2008
Length
20 pages
Annotation
This paper analyzes the role of ethnicity in a heroin dealer and consumer network of young men of Chilean descent in Sweden.
Abstract
This research reveals that the role ethnicity played in the young Chilean men’s involvement in the heroin network was a complicated one. Ethnicity only explains a small part of the process of becoming a heroin user and/or dealer. In short, the interviews and analyses indicate that the young men’s involvement in the heroin network was not a result of their ethnic origin, but rather the outcome of interplay between numbers of different social identities. Importantly, this study has revealed that the ‘old’, essentialistic perspective on ethnicity fails to adequately explain how the informants became heroin dealers. Before 1995, Norrkoping in Sweden had no local heroin market and only four to five heroin users. By 2000, however, the authorities had identified 248 heroin users, most of them between the ages of 18 and 24. Starting in 1995, a few large-scale dealers began to successfully establish a local market, importing and distribution heroin locally within Norrkoping. These large-scale dealers built up a small-scale dealer network of young people who were responsible for direct transactions with the consumer. In 1998, a group of young Chileans between the ages of 14 and 22 became active members of this network and in the heroin market, both as street dealers and consumers. This study examined the role of ethnicity in a heroin dealer and consumer network of young men of Chilean descent in Norrkoping. References