Ethnic heterogeneity in the activity and structure of a Black street gang
| Published date | 01 July 2012 |
| Author | James A. Densley,Thomas U. Grund |
| DOI | 10.1177/1477370812447738 |
| Date | 01 July 2012 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
European Journal of Criminology
9(4) 388 –406
© The Author(s) 2012
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DOI: 10.1177/1477370812447738
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Ethnic heterogeneity in
the activity and structure
of a Black street gang
Thomas U. Grund
Swiss Federal Institute, Switzerland
James A. Densley
Metropolitan State University, USA
Abstract
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.
Keywords
ethnicity, heterogeneity, homophily, social networks, street gangs
Introduction
In the words of Klein and Maxson (2006: 221), ‘[e]thnicity is one of the most widely
discussed, and little studied, aspects of gangs’. Ethnic groups, defined as groups of
people who identify with each other through a common heritage and distinctive culture,
often consisting of a common language, religion or country of birth (Smith, 1987), are
important for understanding gangs. It is a longstanding theme in the American gang
literature that gangs have a tendency to coalesce around ethnicity (Asbury, 1927;
Corresponding author:
Thomas U. Grund, Swiss Federal Institute, Clausiusstrasse 50, Zurich, 8092, Switzerland.
Email: thomas.u.grund@gmail.com
447738EUC9410.1177/1477370812447738Grund and DensleyEuropean Journal of Criminology
2012
Article
Grund and Densley 389
Esbensen and Winfree, 1998; Klein, 1995; Sánchez-Jankowski, 1991; Spergel, 1995;
Thrasher, 1927; Valdez, 2007; Vigil, 2002). Additionally, research demonstrates how
ethnicity plays a central role in gang formation and membership (Adamson, 2000;
Alonso, 2004; Bankston, 1998; Cureton, 2009; Davis, 2006; Freng and Esbensen, 2007;
Moore, 1991; Perkins, 1987; Vigil, 1988, 2002). Although ethnic heterogeneity has
proven to be an important factor within community contexts (Pyrooz et al., 2010;
Sampson and Groves, 1989; Shaw and McKay, 1942; Suttles, 1968), little is known
about how it relates to the activity and structure of gangs (Howell et al., 2002; Starbuck
et al., 2001).
The present study moves beyond the broad categorization of a ‘Black street gang’ to
explore how ethnic heterogeneity matters within such a context. We studied a London-
based gang with members regarded as Black by the census, the police and the host
society. Empirical research on London gangs is scarce (Densley, 2012a, 2012b; Gunter,
2008; Pitts, 2008) and remains contentious, in part because the concept holds racial
connotations. There is potential for labelling already vulnerable children and young
people as ‘gang members’ and this could have adverse criminal justice implications
(Alexander, 2008; Hallsworth and Young, 2008; White, 2008). When looking at crimi-
nal activity, we found little evidence of ethnic specialization within the gang. Ethnicity
seems unrelated to the type of offences that individual gang members commit. Further,
we found an association between ethnicity and the organization of the gang. There is a
tendency for gang members to associate and co-offend with other gang members from
the same ethnic group.
In this article, we present an investigation of the role of ethnic heterogeneity within
gangs. Our research opens avenues for further studies that take within-gang heteroge-
neity into account and illustrate how gang organization and activity are orthogonal to
each other concerning individual gang members’ attributes. Furthermore, the research
presented here emphasizes the need to investigate shared identities (often related to
cultural heritage and ancestry) within gangs more closely.
We begin by reviewing the literature on the role of ethnicity in gangs. Upon identi-
fying the empirical and theoretical gaps, we describe our data. Next, we present our
quantitative results, together with an explanation of the social network analysis and
other analytical techniques we have used. This is followed by a discussion in which we
relate our findings to broader qualitative evidence and the extant literature. We con-
clude with suggestions for future research.
Literature review
In the United States, the majority of gangs appear ethnically homogeneous and thus
reflect the segregated ghettos and barrios from which they originate (Vigil, 2002). Often,
gangs are labelled according to one ethnic (or racial) category (‘Asian’, ‘Black’ or
‘Hispanic’), with groupings employed to differentiate gangs from one another and to
explain relative variances in involvement in aspects of gang activity and behaviour
(Chin, 1996; Hagedorn, 1988; Moore, 1991; Sánchez-Jankowski, 1991; Spergel, 1995;
Vigil, 1988, 2002). Despite such categorizations, however, studies indicate that there are
few gangs that share a single ethnic identity (Hagedorn, 2008; Howell et al., 2002;
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