Correlates of war? Towards an understanding of nativity-based variation in immigrant offending
| Published date | 01 July 2013 |
| Author | Amber L. Beckley |
| Date | 01 July 2013 |
| DOI | 10.1177/1477370812470902 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
2013
Article
European Journal of Criminology
10(4) 408 –423
Correlates of war? Towards
© The Author(s) 2013
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an understanding of nativity-
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DOI: 10.1177/1477370812470902
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based variation in immigrant
offending
Amber L. Beckley
Stockholm University, Sweden
Abstract
This study uses Swedish register data to assess the impact of war in the home country on the
individual likelihood of registered violent crime among young male immigrants in Stockholm,
Sweden. War in the home country during a migrant’s residence is significantly related to a higher
likelihood of registration for a violent crime. However, these results were not sustained in a
sensitivity analysis, which considered serious property crime. Analysis of the history of war in the
home country produces effects opposite to those predicted, with more years of war reducing the
likelihood of violent crime. These findings indicate that war is capturing other factors, within the
home or the receiving country, that may be related to violent crime.
Keywords
Correlates of war, immigrant crime, nativity effect
Whereas some immigrant groups are touted as ‘model minorities’ owing to their rela-
tively low rates of offending, others seem to offend at especially high rates. Where avail-
able, crime statistics from West European countries show a conspicuous overrepresentation
of people from war-torn regions (Albrecht, 1997; Martens and Holmberg, 2005;
Skardhamar et al., 2011). This pattern has not gone unnoticed by the media and criminal
justice officials.1 An article from the BBC (BBC News, 2007) headlined ‘Young immi-
grants from violent and war-torn countries are fuelling mayhem and murder on London’s
streets’ implied a conditioning towards violence as a result of being from countries run
by warlords. The Telegraph (Hope and Edwards, 2008) reported that refugees were
Corresponding author:
Amber L. Beckley, Department of Criminology, Stockholm University, SE-106 91 Stockholm, Sweden.
Email: amber.beckley@criminology.su.se
Beckley
409
traumatized in their home country and resorting to crime in Britain. Research from
Sweden’s National Council of Crime Prevention also notes that traumatic experiences in
the home country may result in adjustment problems that lead to crime (Martens and
Holmberg, 2005).
Some research evidence connects war exposure to aggression, which, in turn, may be
connected to violent offending (Farrington, 1978, 1991; Moffitt, 1993; Nagin and
Tremblay, 1999; Sampson and Laub, 1993; Tremblay et al., 2004). Other research has
implied a connection between a history of war in the native country and a violent culture
that immigrants bring with them. Yet it is questionable whether generalizing that simply
coming from a country where there is, or has been, war is related to an increased likeli-
hood of committing crime. Individuals may differ in their experiences of and exposure to
war in their home country, which would make such generalizations inappropriate. Since
countries generally contain many cultures, assuming a country-wide culture of violence
is presumptuous as well. Indeed, the idea of violence as a cultural trait has also been
questioned by researchers.
This research provides empirical evidence on whether generalizations about a pro-
clivity towards violent offending among immigrants from war-torn countries are justifi-
able. It broadens research evidence on immigrant offending by considering the effect of
the home country using a large, population-based dataset from Stockholm, Sweden.
Stockholm is an excellent location for this research because of its many immigrants from
a wide variety of countries. Moreover, research has indicated a relatively high rate of
crime among immigrants (Martens, 1997; Martens and Holmberg, 2005). Sweden also
provides fairly generous general and specific assistance to immigrants, which may help
mitigate nativity-based patterns of poverty found in other countries.
The war–aggression link
There are two primary factors connecting war in the home country to an aggression-
based higher likelihood of offending. The first is the likelihood that a migrant was
exposed to war trauma. International research and theory note that direct exposure to war
plays an important role in levels of aggression and negative outcomes (Macksoud et al.,
1993: 628–9; Sagi-Schwartz et al., 2008; Shaw, 2003). The second key factor is the like-
lihood of the war trauma exposure actually leading to negative outcomes. Although
adverse psychological outcomes appear to be the most common (Barenbaum et al., 2004:
44), resilience can also result (Cairns, 1996; King et al., 1999; Punamäki, 1996; Yule,
2000). Some research from Sweden provides an indication of the prevalence of these
factors.
In a series of Swedish studies by Almqvist and colleagues (Almqvist and Brandell-
Forsberg, 1997; Almqvist and Broberg, 1999; Almqvist and Hwang, 1999), approxi-
mately 84 percent of a small group (n = 42) of Iranian refugee children had been directly
exposed to violence. The children were between 10 months and 4 years of age when they
experienced war trauma and were initially assessed one year after their arrival in Sweden;
40 percent of the children were reported by parents to display aggressive behaviour in the
initial investigation. In the follow-up study, conducted two-and-a-half years after the
initial assessment, aggressiveness was the symptom most frequently reported by parents,
with 38 percent of the remaining children (n = 34) reported to display such behaviour.
410
European Journal of Criminology 10(4)
Another series of Swedish studies (Hjern and Angel, 2000; Hjern et al., 1991; Hjern
et al., 1998) considered a sample of 63 children aged 2 to 15 who came to Stockholm
from Chile, Lebanon, Turkey and Iran between 1986 and 1987. Approximately two-
thirds of the children had been exposed to war or persecution prior to migration. Parents’
reports of defiance and aggression and teachers’ reports of deviant behaviour in the
classroom were most prevalent (approximately 32 percent of 50 children) at the sec-
ond follow-up, 17 to 19 months after arrival. The six-year follow-up, which included
49 respondents, showed marked decreases in these measures, with 18 percent of
the remaining 30 school-aged children still being reported as being deviant in the
classroom.
Some research shows a moderate strength correlation between post-traumatic stress
disorder (PTSD) and aggression, and war as a significant source of PTSD (Orth and
Wieland, 2006). There seems to be little research, however, connecting all three of these
factors. In a study on a sample of 98 displaced adult Kosovar Albanians who arrived in
Sweden in 1999, 51 percent were reported to have experienced torture (Ekblad et al.,
2002). Their scores on an aggression index fell in the middle range between approxi-
mately 50 and 58 percent. The authors also noted that mass displacement, which may not
be experienced by all immigrants from war-torn countries, may have been an additional
source of trauma.
Altogether these studies indicate a moderate to high level of exposure to trauma and
a low to moderate prevalence of aggression among Swedish immigrants. Yet the samples
were relatively small and it is difficult to say whether these same figures would be found
in larger samples more representative of the immigrant population. There is also some
indication that post-war aggression dissipates with time. In summary, it may be an over-
generalization to assert that immigrants from a war-torn country will be aggressive and,
therefore, likely to commit violent crime.
War and a culture of violence
War in the home country could lead to, or even be generated by, commonly held attitudes
and values favourable to violence. Archer and Gartner (1976) found support for the idea
that war redefines violence as an acceptable means of individual-level problem solving.
Sipes (1973), on the other hand, argues that aggression is a socially learned behaviour of
which war and individual-level violence are both symptoms. There are no clear roots to
this aggression and, as Sampson and Bean (2006: 23) note, the violent culture appears to
have a ‘life of its own’. Regardless of whether war precedes individual violence or is a
symptom of a greater predisposition towards aggression, the use of violence becomes
inherent to the individual and will persist in new environments. The view of a persistent,
portable immigrant culture is not new to immigration studies, though the immigrant cul-
ture is usually viewed as a positive influence (Morenoff and Astor, 2006; Portes and
Zhou, 1993; Thomas and Znaniecki, 1918).
Miguel and colleagues (2008) assessed the connection between war and violence as a
cultural value through a novel approach of looking at on-field violence by soccer players.
They operationalized the player’s birth country as his team country. The authors argued
that this weakness was unproblematic because many players from countries with a long
Beckley
411
history of war played on the teams of relatively peaceful countries, resulting in a potential
underestimation of the effect of a history of war. They estimated the relationship between
the number of years of civil war in the player’s team country, up to 45 years in the past,
and his number of violent incidents while on field. The results showed...
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