“We’ll go grafting, yeah?” – Neglect, survival and crime in vulnerable inner city areas

Patel, T

Abstract

This paper reports on a study undertaken within a vulnerable residential area of an inner city in the UK. As a location, it has been marked as vulnerable due to its abnormally high crime rate. As such, it continues to attract police and local authority concern, who commissioned research to examine the motivations, opportunities of, and technical knowledge for undertaking one of its common crimes in the locale (i.e. theft from or of a motor vehicle). In using qualitative research methods with a sample of ex-offenders, victims of theft, and users of the stolen goods market, several key factors were identified as relevant. Here, the role of the built environment in urban disorganisation, the lack of community cohesion between the varying residential groups, problematic police-community relationships and attitudes, and the marked income inequalities within such a residential population, were all highlighted as significant. These factors intertwined with one another to create a space where the occurrence of a particular type of crime was viewed as necessary and for some, an acceptable response to their State allocated position of neglect and marginalisation. This paper uses direct narratives to offer a criminological commentary on the experiences of crime in such vulnerable areas. In doing so it highlights that they are often associated with financial survival, the need to support substance dependency, and frustration born of a lack of opportunities and access to resources, and from dissatisfaction with formal State agencies and experienced abuses of power.

Citation

Patel, T. “We’ll go grafting, yeah?” – Neglect, survival and crime in vulnerable inner city areas. Presented at British Society of Criminology, Northumbria University, Newcastle, England

• Presentation Conference Type: Other
• Conference Name: British Society of Criminology
• Conference Location: Northumbria University, Newcastle, England
• Deposit Date: Oct 27, 2011
• Publisher URL: http://www.britsoccrim.org/annualconference.htm
• Additional Information: Event Type : Conference