Black Criminality and Terrorist Threat - Essay Example

193913 INTRODUCTION There have been assumptions that the social, economic and political inequality is related to black criminality and terrorism.It could work in two ways, either before the criminal deeds or as a result of it. This essay probes into the assumption and the degree of its reality. There are conflicting views about the argument that social, economic and political inequalities in the society have led to the black criminality and terrorism. Out of two, this work feels that black terrorism might have a higher claim over terrorism. There are two ways of approaching any community; here Black community, while finding out the crime rates due to some reason or other that has made the community a stereotype victim. "The study of communities and crime can be approached by viewing the community as either a unit of stratification or a unit of social control. The stratification framework considers the effects on aggregate crime rates of socioeconomic status variables such as poverty, unemployment and income inequality," (Shihadeh, 1994, 730). This study has tried to do it both the ways, so that it could cover a wider perspective. There are many researches that have already been conducted in this area and the studies show diverse results. BLACK CRIMINALITY Drawing conclusions, one of the studies opine: "First is that the effects of inequality on crime will vary by type of inequality measure. The second is that the UCR arrest data appear to have reasonable validity for comparative research on the difference between the violent crime rates of blacks and whites," (Harer, 1992, 1040). So for the sake of comparison, it is necessary to focus on both black and white offending rates, and somehow most of the researchers have arrived at the conclusion that black criminality is comparatively more in the West and naturally, it should have some contributing factor that retains the criminality in the community. Sociologists and criminologists have come to the conclusion that one of the factors has to be the inequality that prevails in all the fields including the lack of opportunity. Some writers are of the opinion that the cause is the culture and not the poverty. Because the black culture had been a criminality condoning culture, the youngsters get the impression that if they have to do well in life, they have to get the results fast and the means do not matter. "Criminal violence in black ghettos has also been interpreted as an expression of a subculture that condones and legitimates violence because life is tough and success depends on the ability to fight and strike fast," p.115). The author argues that these people are usually from broken homes and this fact reduces the 'strong identification with societal norms' and this cannot be entirely right because broken homes do not exclusively belong only to the black community and can belong to anybody. The connection between criminality and social inequality was probed first by recent researchers. "French and Belgian researchers A.M. Guerry and Adolphe Quetelet are credited with being among the first to posit a relationship between general economic conditions and antisocial conduct ..In response, other researchers sought to show that poverty and other structural factors are more important than cultural values as causes or correlates of interpersonal violence". http://content.healthaffairs.org/cgi/reprint/12/4/80.pdf The black criminality has become so accepted in the society that people have started believing that nothing could be done about it. This is because of the conviction that blacks, equality or no equality, will always remain at the fringe and the criminality will not vary much. "Because the relationship between blacks and robberies seems statistically so fixed, people start believing that little can be done to change it". http://83.137.212.42/siteArchive/catalystmagazine/Default.aspx.LocID-0hgnew0ov.RefLocID-0hg01b00100k.Lang-EN.htm It is interesting to find out why such continuation of criminality exists in this community. Even though they live in Western countries, somehow, somewhere they find it difficult to assimilate complete, because they feel a strong tie for their own culture, that is, black culture. Perhaps the trauma of slavery and loss of their own habitat might have induced such a feeling. Instead of building up their own individuality, they are seen many times copying their peers and become stereotyped. "Peers are important because they serve as the specific other with whom individuals can gain and maintain respect. To be recognized as a member of a particular group, individuals often tailor their behaviors to parallel the attitudes and actions of the designated group". http://www.sciencedirect.com/science_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6W5Y-42GDGWP-3&_user=121723&_coverDate=12%2F31%2F2000&_rdoc=1&_fmt=&_orig=search&_sort=d&view=c&_acct=C000009999&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=121723&md5=8de5a0f0f5f51b47e6ac921b75e2671a Some scholars have called this kind of peer-fixation a cultural style and somehow generation after generation, they are compelled to retain some of this style due to the long history of injustice and inequality. "This attentiveness to the lived experience of inequality and injustice moves criminology past the old antinomies of structure and agency, society and small group. It also points, time and again, back to style. For kids, criminals, and legal authorities, caught up in a process, symbolic meaning and official reaction, and for criminologists who work to unravel the lived politics of this process, style matters," (Ferrell, 2004, 63). TERRORISM In the same way, the ongoing terrorism is being connected with the lack of equality and opportunity. In the fifty fifth General Assembly meeting in 2001, immediately after 9/11, South Korea presented the view that terrorism should be addressed parallel with poverty and inequality. "The broad consensus on addressing terrorism went hand in hand with a recognition of the need to deal in parallel with the many concerns that had already been on the United Nations agenda, he continued, including the fight against poverty, underdevelopment, inequality, disease, and other economic and social problems. It was widely agreed that the international community should proceed expeditiously with implementing the Millennium Declaration" http://www.un.org/News/Press/docs/2001/ga9971.doc.htm The INCTAD chief agreed that inequality is at the root of violence and terrorism. "It is inequality, rather than absolute poverty, that breeds social unrest, violence and even terrorism', Carlos Fontin, Officer-in-charge of UNCTAD, told the UN's Economic and Social Council last week. "By and large, the destitute do not revolt. It is those who see a seemingly unbridgeable gap between their education and their aspirations and the insufficient opportunities for advancement offered by an unequal society who take the path of violence. in turn, it is the combination of inequality and poverty that makes violence a mass phenomenon," he said. http://www.unctad.org/Templates/webflyer.aspdocid=6018&intItemID=3369&lang=1 Rightly or wrongly, terrorism is connected with the issues of inequality and rightly so. Even the statesmen, leaders and politicians are firmly convinced that it so. "Some world leaders have rightly drawn connections between the recent acts of terrorism, the rise in violent extremism, and the global crisis of poverty, inequality and persistent humanitarian need. While there clearly is not a direct link between entrenched poverty, gross inequality and terrorism, the events of the past year have shown the world that widespread poverty and suffering can create an environment conducive to breeding social instability and violent extremism. Achieving human security - focused on the achievement of the basic rights of people - is one critical element to achieving global security. http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asparticle=1525 This had been a definite reality for other terrorisms; but it is difficult to admit that it had been a major factor behind terrorism too. One of the ways of tackling terrorism is wiping out the factors that contribute to it and arguably, social, economic and political inequalities are some of them. It might not always be the case, because it is seen that people with high qualifications, adequate means and good social background too are opting for terrorism. It is difficult to say that all the terrorists are socially, economically and politically ignored. It could be true to some extent, perhaps in cases like Srilankan Tamils, although the LTTE took ample advantage of the situation. Actually terrorists have always been astute in using the poverty or difficulties of people to their own advantage. "First, although rarely drawn from the poorest of the poor, terrorists can use poor peoples' grievances to legitimate terrorist actions and to raise funds as part of their proclaimed efforts at combating poverty or providing relief and welfare programs to communities that are neither reached by economic growth nor helped by government programs. Genuine, redistributive development can weaken the ability of terrorists to claim the mantle of legitimacy and can thereby serve to weaken their cause". http://uspw.org/index.phptitle=Poverty_and_inequality This also shows that all the terrorists are not selfless people ready to sacrifice themselves. But the ordinary crowd usually becomes the 'gun fodder' and they pay with their lives and suffer in the prison. Usually they come from the disadvantaged sections of the society. Because of their disadvantage, hero worship and desire to gain importance, they are usually brainwashed and utilised by their crafty leaders. Due to the inequality they have gone through, or they have presumed having gone through, they do not mind being the sacrificial lambs. This mentality of being used and ready to be used is at the heart of all the terrorist activities. If we take only this tendency into consideration, the social inequalities and injustices definitely have a say in terrorism. But, the current Muslim terrorism cannot be attributed to inequality factor, because only one factor that works there is the religion. No doubt there could be a very small contributing factor where inequality could figure and that is the contribution created by less education and lesser opportunities that might make the person more susceptible to brainwash and self-glorification. One such study clearly says: "Although findings of this study found relation between some inequalities and terrorist incidents, fewer indicators of inequalities are found related than this study was expecting to find," http://etd.vcu.edu/theses/available/etd-08102006-134519/unrestricted/koselim.phd.pdf Along with ethnicity, nationalism, separatism causes of terrorism could be traced as the reasons of conflict. History shows us that no struggle had been successful without strife and bloodshed, other than only one example of India, where Mahatma Gandhi and his followers led the nation into independence with peaceful means. It has not been practiced ever since. This once again takes us to the belief that one man's terrorist is another man's hero. Under these circumstances, it is difficult to say that inequality breeds terrorism. Even if it does, its role is highly negligible. Usually the person feels a psychological impulse to follow the footsteps of the peer community. There is an inherent weakness in adapting a similar style; but the fascination cannot be ruled out. "Among the multitude of causes that may lead a person to resort to terrorism, there is none that conclusively links a sole cause to the act. Ethnicity, nationalism/separatism, poverty and economic disadvantage, globalisation, (non)democracy, Western society, disaffected intelligentsia, dehumanisation, and religion all have arguments confirming a possible existing link, as well reservations against a causal relation" http://www.meteck.org/causesTerrorism.html CONCLUSION There is no doubt that social, economic and political inequality contributes quite a lot into the black criminality. Nevertheless, it is necessary to admit that these are not the only causes of black criminality. There are many more causes like not being focussed, not pursuing education, getting into gangs to find a place in the peer groups, and having an easy going life. With this kind of life style, it might become necessary to steal or grab money from others and such petty crimes can lead to much bigger criminal offences. To some extent, black criminality is a self-grown plant because the black youth is uninterested in taking advantage of the opportunities provided to him on a platter. Terrorism is a self-chosen path of intense focus and ferocity. Terrorism cannot claim the inequality as one of the roots, as easily as the black criminology can. The factors leading to terrorism are much more serious than social injustice. As mentioned earlier, it might have been the case to some extent in the earlier terrorism; but definitely not so any more in the present terrorism that has its own paradigm and agenda. Hence, social inequality and injustice could contribute a small portion of it, in the form of lost opportunities, resentments etc. But it cannot be a common ground for all kinds of terrorism. Social inequalities have to be reduced in some way or other, even though wiping out complete social and economic inequalities is not possible in any form of ideology. BIBLIOGRAPHY 1. Blau, Judith R. and Blau, Peter M., 'The Cost of Inequality, 'Metropolitan structure and Violent Crime', American Sociological Review, Vol. 47, No. 1. (Feb., 1982), pp. 114-129. 2. Ferrell, Jeff (2004), Cultural Criminology Unleashed, Routledge Cavendish, London. 3. Harer, Miles D. Steffensmeier, Darrell, The Differing Effects of Economic Inequality on Black and White Rates of Violence, Social Forces, Vol. 70, No. 4. (Jun., 1992), pp. 1035-1054. 4. Shihadeh, Edward S. and Steffensmeier, Darrell, 'Economic Inequality, Family Disruption, and Urban Black Voilence; Cities as Units of Stratification and Social Control', Social Forces, Vol. 73, No. 2. (Dec., 1994), pp. 729-751 ONLINE SOURCES 1. http://www.un.org/News/Press/docs/2001/ga9971.doc.htm 2. http://etd.vcu.edu/theses/available/etd-08102006-134519/unrestricted/koselim.phd.pdf 3. http://content.healthaffairs.org/cgi/reprint/12/4/80.pdf 4. http://www.unctad.org/Templates/webflyer.aspdocid=6018&intItemID=3369&lang=1 5. http://www.unctad.org/Templates/webflyer.aspdocid=6018&intItemID=3369&lang=1 6. http://83.137.212.42/siteArchive/catalystmagazine/Default.aspx.LocID-0hgnew0ov.RefLocID-0hg01b00100k.Lang-EN.htm 7. http://www.sciencedirect.com/science_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6W5Y-42GDGWP-3&_user=121723&_coverDate=12%2F31%2F2000&_rdoc=1&_fmt=&_orig=search&_sort=d&view=c&_acct=C000009999&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=121723&md5=8de5a0f0f5f51b47e6ac921b75e2671a 8. http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asparticle=1525 9. http://uspw.org/index.phptitle=Poverty_and_inequality 10. http://www.meteck.org/causesTerrorism.html 11. Read More