Introduction
The drug market is the most violent among the sectors in the illegal economy. Understanding this economy is complex because they happen in distinct social contexts, like how some elements of the crack cocaine market accelerated violence in poor communities. It happened between the late 1980s and mid-1990s, when there was a rise in drug market violence, especially in New York City. Dr.
Randol Contreras gives a gripping ethnographic account of the violence in this particular period in history through decade-long field research on the “stickup kids,” Dominican nationals who lived in South Bronx. The stickup kids were brutal robbers specializing in torturing drug dealers who stored large amounts of cash and drugs (Contreras, 2013). Contreras applied a complex multilevel analysis linking biographical, historical, social-structural, and situational factors surrounding drug gangs and the development of robberies. The book is in three parts explaining specific vital and pivotal details that demonstrate how the participants became “stickup kids” and executed their violent drug robbery.
Historical context helps the reader grasp the social, political, and structural factors that lead to the 1980s New York crack cocaine epidemic. In the first part, Contreras (2013) situates the participants in the historical context of New York and the South Bronx, the epicenter of the rise of the crack-cocaine trade. The structural factors are varied and include political marginalization, rising unemployment, inadequate educational and economic resources, and the disenfranchisement of the residents of South Bronk due to neglect by the local government. Contreras managed to infuse the biographies of the participants into the particular historical moment and the rapid structural shifts to show how they became crack -cocaine dealers, just like the other disenfranchised youth across the nation from the urban ethnic and racial minorities.
Next, the author showed how the declining fortunes of the crack-cocaine trade spelled economic doom to the participants who had become very successful as crack-cocaine dealers. At this point, the study participants felt an economic “strain” and morphed into violent “stickup kids,” creating an economic niche entailing robbing drug dealers of their drugs and cash. They began to commit brutality and violence that surpassed their days as drug dealers. In this section, the author lays out the structure of the drug robberies using theoretical concepts like Goffman’s Systemic Violence. The last part of the book focuses on the effects of the crack epidemic on Dominican participants.
One of the book’s strengths is the participant-observer perspective that gives the reader a vivid description of the events, making it feel like one is seated with the author listening to the stories of the drug dealers. The author achieved this feat by maintaining extensive tape recordings and field notes of the stories shared by his childhood buddies and other stickup kids called the joloperos. Also, the author maintained the rich conversations he had with the Spanish participants in Spanish throughout the book, as well as those his childhood friends shared with other drug dealers. The author also writes about how the information led to self-discoveries from facts he received throughout the exercise.
One shortcoming of the book is that the author presents it as if it conveys the activities and lifestyles of all drug robbers, while in a real sense, it only focuses on the very close childhood friends. The author has covered chapters devoting them to childhood friends and their life stories, making the book read as a case study about them, yet it is supposed to be ethnographic research about violent drug robbers. There is no evidence that the author expanded his research to cover many study participants’ stories and perspectives. Therefore, it limits the part that other drug robbers play and renders the stories shared in the author’s research ungeneralizable because the lifestyle explained in the book are from a particular ethnic group of violent drug robbers, Dominicans.
Theoretical Analysis
The first theory that can be tied to the text is the theory of structural violence. According to Weigert (2008), social structure can perpetuate inequity and preventable suffering, leading to desperation and crime. In the case of the Stickup kids, the economic, political, legal, and medical structures do not seem to favor the minorities like the Dominican community in which the Stickup kids belong. Because of institutionalized discrimination, political marginalization, rising unemployment, inadequate educational and economic resources, neglect by the local government, and disenfranchisement, most minorities end up in crime. Drug violence can, therefore, be attributed to systemic racism and discrimination.
Another theory that could be applied to the stories of the robbers is the anomie theory by Emile Durkheim. It refers to human anguish resulting from a sudden personal or social crisis that weakens the person’s moral grip. Due to limited moral order, one may feel lost concerning their proper needs and desires. Consequently, their passions run amok, become uncontrollable, and lead to despair and suicidal ideation, as some kill themselves due to a lack of moral guidance (Downes et al., 2016). The anomy theory helps in explaining why the study participants engaged in violent drug robbery. It is vital to note that the theory explains why social norms and guidance break down.
While some people may decide to use institutionalized means to reach their societal goals, others, like the study participants, can explore un-institutionalized means to achieve their societal objectives. The means that a person chooses to reach their goal depends on the situation they find themselves in and their personal beliefs. According to Emile Durkheim, if a person cannot attain success through institutionalized means like employment, they resort to un-institutionalized means like drug dealing and drug robbery (Downes et al., 2016). The situational, historical, and political climate set in the book gives a glimpse of how a whole society can be forced into engaging in un-institutionalized means to attain societal goals. The context of the rise of the Stickup Kids entails political marginalization, rising unemployment, inadequate educational and economic resources, neglect by the local government, and disenfranchisement, the factors that often lead to an increase in crime in most of the areas occupied by ethnic and racial minorities.
The theory of anomy is exemplified in the life of the author’s two childhood friends Gus and Pablo, whom he metaphorically refers to as the “fallen stars.” Gus started as a professional drug dealer who prospered in producing and selling drugs and making a profit, with which he lived an extravagant lifestyle until the crack market began to dry up. He became so broke that he resorted to violently robbing drug dealers in addition to abusing marijuana to a level he never did before, maybe as a coping mechanism for the dwindling fortunes and the consequent social crisis of not being able to sustain his former extravagant lifestyle. Pablo’s life followed a similar trajectory, and he resorted to violent drug robbery for survival. The same trend was evident in the lives of many other Dominican men who fell from grace to grass and became disoriented because of poverty, with some contemplating suicide and turning to violence as the means of survival.
Another critical theory is the rational choice theory which posits that criminal behavior is voluntary. According to Loughran et al. (2016), the choice to commit a crime is not determined by environmental factors, meaning that a person chooses to become a criminal willfully. It means, therefore, that the study participants acted as if they had free will over the choice to engage in robbing other people of their drugs and cash. If this theory is true, why did the study participants only choose to become violent when the drug market dried up and could no longer sustain their lifestyles? The answer is that they chose to engage in the violent robbery after considering the costs and benefits of doing it and the costs and benefits of staying without money. Not engaging in robbery meant that they would stay without money, meaning they could not survive, but they would be safe from the risks of robbery, like being wounded or killed. On the other hand, robbery would help them get some money to use but would expose them to gunfights’ dangers, leading to even death.
Conclusion
The story of the Stickup kids is a vivid portrayal of drug crime among the racial and ethnic minorities in the United States. Structural violence theory, rational choice theory, and Emile Durkheim’s theory of anomie clearly explain how and why a society can precipitate such levels of criminal activities. When individuals are denied the right to attain societal goals legitimately, they resort to un-institutionalized methods, including drug robbery.
References
Contreras, R. (2013). The stickup kids. University of California Press.
Downes, D., Rock, P., & McLaughlin, E. (2016). 5. Anomie and Strain Theory.Understanding Deviance, 89-122. Web.
Loughran, T., Paternoster, R., Chalfin, A., & Wilson, T. (2016). Can Rational Choice Be Considered a General Theory of Crime? Evidence From Individual-Level Panel Data.Criminology, 54(1), 86-112. Web.
Weigert, K. (2008). Structural Violence.Encyclopedia Of Violence, Peace, & Conflict, 2004-2011. Web.