Power of Context on Bernie Goetz Essay

If the change in behavior of one individual is a natural act results from internal transformation and external influences, then cultural change is an inscrutable mystery. Which factor is influential enough to cause a change in a society composed of individuals with different thoughts? There is no definite answer to this question, because there never exists one solid element that changes an entire society. There is always a combination of reasons behind such changes. However, there is always one solid factor which is present that makes culture change. In “The Power of Context”, Malcolm Gladwell describes how the crime rate suddenly “went into a precipitous decline” (151) due to changes of “the smallest details of the immediate environment” (155). On the contrary, in her text “An Army of One: Me”, Jean Twenge discusses how society systematically built Generation Me, a cultural change that happens gradually over decades. Although Gladwell and Twenge’s arguments concerning cultural change seems contradictory, they both consolidate one essential factor that makes culture change- an active assertion of change made by an individual or a group of individuals. Therefore, active attempt of change is an important cause of cultural change. Such assertiveness helps to introduce the change in the first place and makes it noticeable in the perspective of society, While it influences people’s mentality when behaving and making decisions.

Culture in urban communities, also referred to as inner-cities, are growing increasingly violent. In the article, The Code of the Streets by Elijah Anderson, he begins to take an in-depth look at the root of the evil. He deduces that economic factors, parenting and the troublesome environments largely influence the violent norms within this culture.

Crime and violence is rampant throughout the world. Laws exist to maintain order and peace and provide for the safety and well-being of all members of society. Acts that disrupt and threaten this system of order are deemed criminal in nature and are punishable by law. It is believed that criminal types operate from a self-centered framework that shows little, if any regard, for the safety and well-being of others (Merton, 2006).

Adding to the “ghetto defense”, the author accredits attorney Shellow of claiming that Morgan’s case involves her mental stability. Although proven sane, Shellow argues that Morgan possibly has PTSD, which stems from her enduring exposure to violence and poor living conditions. Many war veterans have PTSD from the shock of war, and after this is made clear, the author questions “Isn’t a ghetto like a battlefield? (2). This shows how the author strengthens her point by comparing a ghetto to a battlefield, which also backs up the possibility that Morgan has PTSD and should have some justification in her crime. Lastly, the author then questions society’s way of addressing classism. The author writes that “because the ghetto defense protects the poor instead of the powerful”, it will most likely not have a bright future.

And on the other hand how “Code of the Streets” shows links to the Differential Association and Social Learning theories of crime. The Differential Association (closely related to Social Disorganization theory), developed by Edwin Sutherland, and Social Learning theory, developed by Ronald Akers, both theories of crime are theories that try to explain, at a micro-level, why individuals rather than groups of individuals commit crime (Feldmeyer, Differential Association and Social Learning, 2015).

Detroit, the largest city in the state of Michigan, unfortunately has been plagued with a high crime rate resulting in synonymous acts of violence, poverty, and urban decay. A multitude of factors are considered when determining accurate explanations of crime within Detroit. These factors include changes in land use, property values, transportation, and retail, as an individual moves further away from the city center. According to Robert Park and Ernest Burgess, Chicago School, a city was similar to a body and consisted of various organs. The theory attempted to analyze criminality from an ecological and social disorganization standpoint. This theory asserted that a city included distinctive concentric circles that radiated from the central business district (CBD). Supposedly, the further one moves away from the concentric zones, the fewer social problems that exist (Williams & McShane, 2009, p. 86).

Seymour M. Lipset2 contends that negative traits that plague the American landscape, such as “high crime and economic inequality”, are fundamental characteristics of and are inherently linked to a capitalistic and openly admirable democratic society. Not only does American history reside in the nature for “disdain of authority”, but current American norms signal that everyone must elevate their own status and rise above the ranks, both economically and socially. In analyzing the trends of high crime, acts such as theft, narcotics production and distribution, fraud, etc. are a means to

A prosecutor looking for real justice, Adam Foss demonstrates just how effective rhetorical devices can be to persuade a population to defend the rights of others. When telling the story of how people end up in the criminal justice system, Foss tells “Even in our ‘worst.’ I saw...childhood trauma, victimization, poverty...interaction with the police…”(3:24) Many people tend to see people convicted of crimes as inhuman or lesser than us. However, Foss begins to humanize them. Moreover, he states that the reason these people commit crimes isn’t because of some violent, unfathomable reason, but rather because of their rough experiences earlier in life. To fix crime, people must step up and fix issues that cause crime, not throw people into a broken

|Crime. Ed. Louise Gerdes. Detroit: Greenhaven Press, 2009. Opposing Viewpoints Resource Center. Gale. Apollo Library. 12 Dec. 2009 |

In exploring the mechanisms of the code of the street, questions of why this code exists in the first place naturally arise. One answer to this question is legal cynicism, the belief that “the law and the agents of its enforcement, such as the police and courts, are…illegitimate, unresponsive, and ill equipped to ensure public safety.” (“Code of the Street” 8) To this end, Anderson notes, “In many working-class and impoverished black communities today, particularly as faith in the criminal justice system erodes, social behavior in public is organized around the code of the streets. Feeling they cannot depend on the police and other civil authorities to protect them from danger, residents often take personal responsibility for their security.” (257). Residents of inner cities see police officers less as public servants and more as agents of militant disruption. For example, in the fourth episode of The Wire, Herc and Carver aggressively enter the home of Bodie’s grandmother in search of the young Barksdale member, swearing, with guns drawn. Earlier on the first season, Detective Prez is observed by residents of “the towers” brutally punching a young black teen in the eye, leaving him blinded, simply for making a smart comment to the officers. Considering scenes like these, in conjunction with real cases like the death of

In his essay, “Code of the Streets”, Anderson defines the code of the streets as “[amounting] to a set of informal rules interpersonal public behavior, including violence” (Anderson) within lower income and poor communities especially African-American neighborhoods within the inner-city. Anderson proves that the income gap leading to lacking upward mobility and unemployment with the lack of the government or law enforcement’s presence within these communities by saying an “inclination of violence springs from the circumstances of life among the ghetto poor— the lack of jobs that pay a living wage, stigma of race, the fallout from rampant drug use and drug trafficking, and the resulting national alienation, slandering from the media, and lack of hope for the future”. Lack of jobs due to the higher class’ conservation of low income and inequality which equates to lack of higher education which in today’s job market is crucial. The stigma of race from the media keeps the national and federal attention away from these communities thus perpetuating the code of the streets and overall lower class crime. The government and corporations prolonging of the income gap creates in the lower class the “Code of the Streets” which causes more crime to use as a scapegoat to distract America from the income gap and tax inequality. They do this by not giving these communities attention they need and taking their jobs away to render them uneducated and poor thus leading them to lives of

Aker’s social learning theory is evident in Anderson’s research in Code of the Street. Aker explains that the social learning theory attributes learning criminal behavior through the engagement of peers. This theory can be practical in understanding the “code of the streets” of minorities in urban communities. Modern society has put a label on crime in that it is inappropriate and that people should not participate in it. However, those in disadvantaged communities who abide by the code of the street allow the denotation of crime to change in their attempts to survive in such conditions. Anderson states, “Children growing up in these circumstances learn early in life that this [criminal activities] is the way things are” (Anderson 134). This mindset is common to those in minority urban communities that portray the code of the street in terms of crime in the eyes of the

This is highly evident in the city of Chicago and its suburbs because in the inner city in some places the homicide rate is 116/100,000 but in suburbs like Naperville the homicide rate is 1/100,000. So there must be something about the ecological differences in which people live that shapes their choices in the first place. One reason there is a great difference in the rates of crime in places that are so proximal to each other is the norms and beliefs that are upheld in that community. For example, in the inner city many people commit crimes due to the “street culture” that in a way provides an incentive to commit the crime if they want to have the lavish styles that their peers are part of. So in reality, it is difficult to determine a single force that drives a criminal to commit a certain crime. Hence, it has been difficult for the criminal justice system to implement programs and control methods in order to control crime. For example, if the criminal did act on rationality than implementing harsher punishments would deter the criminal from committing the crime. However, this control method has provided mix results and in some cases crime has even gone up more when harsher penalties were implemented. This is partially because some criminals don’t act on just rationality but on uncontrollable forces as well. Finally, there is some criminals that don’t even care about the consequences of committing the crime and only think about the

Murder is a form of violence that does more harm than just destruction of property but leads to a loss of life in the process, and that makes it more severe than other forms of violence that may just end at injuries to people or destruction of property (Staples 2014). The sociological approach to issues of murder in the city highlights how the society or the environment increases the cases of death or reduces them in a case where there are few cases of murder and how the revelation would relatively contribute in mitigating the cases of violence (Pratt and Godsey 2003). The trend in deaths across different cities including Philadelphia is a motivation that results from how the city operations are set and are functioning, the level of security

The hypothesis claims that “changes in routine activity patterns can influence crime rates by affecting the convergence in space and time of the three minimal elements of direct-contact predatory violations” and that “the absence of any one of these elements [motivated offenders, suitable targets, and the absence of suitable guardians against a violation] is sufficient to prevent the successful completion of a direct-contact predatory crime.” (1) The authors claim that controls for routine activities, therefore, are essential to maintaining order and keeping the crime rate down. They also note that and understanding of temporal and spatial relationships are key to understanding the changing crime rates. Illegal acts are events that occur in space and time and involve specific persons and/or objects. The spatio-temporal organization of everyday activities is what allows criminals to turn their criminal ideas into reality. Dispersion of activities away from the household has led to a change in the spatio-temporal relationship that increases the opportunity for crime, which in turn increases the crime rate itself.