Inequalities in Arrest Rates of Minorities: Focused Upon African Americans - Research Paper Example

Download file to see previous pages This paper argues that in most American correctional facilities, the highest number of inmates composes of young African Americans. Documented evidence associates this influx with poor development of social skills within the African American community, school dropout or failure, and inadequate support from both the school and the community (Skogan & Frydl, 2004). This prospectus established that frequent arrests, baseless detentions, unwanted prosecution, and unruly detention commitment among the law enforcers of white origin contribute largely to inequalities in arrest rates of minorities in the United States of America. Finally, this prospectus used different tools of data collection that included social construction tools and Marxism Background information The introduction of “war on drugs” by the government has had a negative effect on the minority especially African American. Due to this policy, the representation of African American in penitentiary facilities is alarmingly disproportionate. According to Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS), Hispanics and African Americans constitute close to 90 percent of offenders sentenced in state correctional facilities on drug related offences. ...
Western & Pettit (2010) suggests that a country’s rate of incarceration is an important indicator of the criminal justice system and more importantly, the country’s social policies. High numbers of people under incarceration could be an indication of high rates of crime or harsh sentencing system. Contrary, it could be an indicator of society’s reluctance to deal with bias and corrupt social policies, which support and encourage high detention rates for African Americans as compared to Anglo-Americans (Western & Pettit, 2010). A social policy system considers use of drugs among Anglo-Americans as sick but considers the same among Africa-Americas as criminal. Methodology Research conducted for this prospectus relied on books, articles and journals published on the issue of disproportion incarceration of African-Americans. The library was the main source for these journals coupled with online journals which the library subscribes to. The internet is also a rich source of information with numerous books, articles, websites, and journals available. Books on sociology, specifically on the African American society, were used for this research. Results and statistics The African American community comprises 13 percent of total American population yet they are 9.6 times more likely to be incarcerated compared to Anglo-American. In addition, African Americans comprise 13 percent of drug users but represent 39 percent of drug arrests. Between 1986 and 1991, the number of African American in incarceration quadrupled from 14,000-80,000. In 1993, 45.7 percent of arrests made regarding violent crimes were of African American meaning that Anglo-Americans comprised 54.3 percent. However, the rate of African ...Download file to see next pagesRead More