James A. Densley

It’s Gang Life, But Not As We Know It The Evolution of Gang Business

Based on fieldwork with gangs and interviews with gang members in London, United Kingdom, this article illustrates how recreation, crime, enterprise, and extralegal governance represent sequential actualization stages in the evolutionary cycle of street gangs. Gangs evolve from adolescent peer groups and the normal features of street life in their respective neighborhoods. In response to external threats and financial commitments, they grow into drug-distribution enterprises. In some cases, gangs then acquire the necessary special resources of violence, territory, secrecy, and intelligence that enable them to successfully regulate and control the production and distribution of one or more given commodities or services unlawfully. Territory is first claimed then controlled. Likewise, violence is first expressive then instrumental. With each step, gangs move further away from “crime that is organized” and closer to “organized crime.”

The organisation of London's street gangs

This article examines a grossly neglected area of the street gang literature: the nature and extent of gang organisation. Based upon fieldwork with gangs in London, UK, this article illustrates how recreation, crime, and enterprise are not specific gang ‘types’, but rather represent sequential stages in the evolutionary cycle of gangs. This article demonstrates not only how gangs typically begin life as neighbourhood-based peer groups, but also how, in response to external threats and financial commitments, gangs grow to incorporate street-level drug distribution businesses that very much resemble the multi-level marketing structure of direct-selling companies. Gang organisation, in turn, becomes a function of gang business. Gang organisation is conceptualised here on three levels: internal, external, and symbolic. This article examines, respectively, the presence of subgroups, hierarchy and leadership, incentives, rules, responsibilities, and punishments within gangs; how gangs interact with the local and larger community; and how gangs associate with symbolic elements of popular culture in order to convey reputation and achieve intimidation.

‘Going viral’ and ‘Going country’: the expressive and instrumental activities of street gangs on social media

ABSTRACT Based on social media content analysis and focus groups with young people, the current study explores expressive and instrumental uses of the internet among street gangs. ‘Trap rap’ videos posted on YouTube and orientated around life as a drug dealer are identified as the ultimate cultural artefact for denoting London, UK, gang culture. These videos serve an expressive purpose in terms of reputation building, but also shed light on the instrumental business of gangs – specifically, illicit drugs sales via ‘country lines’. Looking beyond the artefact toward how these videos are created, disseminated, and consumed, reveals the instrumental organisation of gangs and how social rules and behaviours within them are monitored and enforced. The current study thus contributes to gang research from the UK, and the growing body of literature on gang and gang member use of the Internet, with implications for research and practice.

Ethnic heterogeneity in the activity and structure of a Black street gang

Despite acknowledgment of ‘hybrid’ street gangs in the literature, there is little systematic research into ethnic heterogeneity within gangs. This research aims at moving beyond the broad categorization of the Black street gang. For this purpose, we examine an all-Black London-based gang in detail, using fieldwork and police arrest data, and investigate the role of ethnic heterogeneity for the workings of the gang. Our findings suggest that ethnic heterogeneity within this gang is crucial for its criminal operation. Although there is no evidence for ethnicity-related specialization of crime, the structural co-offending pattern of the gang’s activities is dominated by ethnicity. Ethnicity matters for who offends with whom.

Ethnic Homophily and Triad Closure Mapping Internal Gang Structure Using Exponential Random Graph Models

Previous studies indicate the importance of similarities between street gang members in terms of ethnicity for mapping the patterns of co-offending relationships within gangs. Individual members are more likely to co-offend with other members who are from the same ethnicity. Past studies, however, do not appropriately account for the fact that correlation between attributes of co-offending gang members may be driven by alternative mechanisms. Most importantly, the presence of clustering in networks can dramatically affect the assessment and make us believe that homophily—the deliberate choice to co-offend with others from the same ethnic group—is important while in fact it is not. In this article, we recreate the internal structure of a London-based street gang with exponential random graph (ERG) models. Our results refine the role of ethnicity for co-offending within gangs. While homophily is still prevalent, the effect diminishes when triad closure—the tendency for two individuals to offend with each other when they also offend with a common third person—is considered. Furthermore, we extend existing ERG specifications and investigate the interaction between ethnic homophily and triad closure. Findings indicate that ethnic homophily is even stronger when it is embedded in co-offending triads.

‘We’ll show you gang’: The subterranean structuration of gang life in London

This article uses data from interviews with 69 self-described members and associates of street gangs in London to explore how young people choose their actions and construct their identities from the material and cultural resources they find in their locales. It explores ‘drift’ as a potential explanation of actions of gang members and finds it wanting. It suggests that Giddens’ concept of structuration, when combined with Matza and Sykes’ notion of subterranean traditions, offers a powerful tool for the explanation of how and why some young people in socio-economically deprived urban areas seek association with gangs through the performance of violence.

The Routine of Mass Murder in China

Using data obtained from 165 mass murders in China, this research examines the crime of mass murder through a routine activities perspective as it relates to the location of where they occur (rural areas), while taking into consideration the motivation (revenge and profit), and most common weapon (knife) used. This adds to the literature on mass murders and routine activities theory from an area (China) where little academic research has been published regarding this crime.

Social dominance orientation and trust propensity in street gangs

The present research demonstrates that social dominance orientation (SDO) and trust propensity provide a valuable theoretical framework and methodological toolkit with which to both assess the concept of “defiant individualism,” Sánchez-Jankowski’s trait theory of gang membership, and understand social-psychological gang processes. The research samples 95 gang members in London, UK, while looking at the effects of age, contact with the gang, and position in the gang on the presence of SDO and trust propensity. Using path analysis, the research demonstrates gang tenure and rank are strong predictors of high SDO and low trust propensity, independent of time spent in the gang, which also significantly predicts high SDO and low trust propensity. High SDO and low trust propensity in gangs are also positively correlated. Gang members, it seems, exhibit a “defiant individualist” social character and both selection and group socialization processes are accountable. Such, in turn, may help explain intergang relations.

Gangs and Society

Not long after the 2011 UK riots, I co-wrote a paper for Policing Today questioning the role of gangs in urban disorder (Densley and Mason, 2011). I argued that by attributing the riots to gangs, the government had conflated the actions of gang members as individuals (‘gang member’ activity) with the actions of gangs as organizations (‘gang-related’ activity); a subject to which I shall return in Chapter 3. Gangs were present at the riots but not controlling them, I said, in part because gang identities ceased to be relevant in such a context. If anything, the riots actually disrupted conventional gang activity because gangs lost control of their markets. The perceived suspension of normal rules instead presented gang members with an unprecedented opportunity to acquire consumer products for ‘free’. In the words of Philip Zimbardo (2008, p. 8), author of the infamous Stanford Prison Experiment, ‘You are not the same person working alone as you are in a group.’

Cops in College: Police Officers’ Perceptions on Formal Education

There is no consensus regarding the benefits of a minimum education level of a four-year college degree for law enforcement officers. No state requires this for entry into policing and Minnesota is the only state to require an associate’s degree. This study examines the unique perceptions of a random sample of 627 Minnesota police officers relative to higher education degree requirements and their level of support for increasing the requirement to a four-year degree. Approximately, 30% of officers think the four-year degree should be required and 70% of officers would have still entered the profession if this were the requirement. Multinomial logistic regression analysis reveals factors that shape one or both of these opinions which include age, position in the department, education level, and agency support. Implications and suggestions for future research are provided.