RACIAL THREAT,CONCENTRATED DISADVANTAGE AND SOCIAL CONTROL: CONSIDERING THE MACRO‐LEVEL SOURCES OF VARIATION IN ARRESTS*

Several studies have examined the relationship between racial threat (measured by the size of black population) and social control imposed on blacks, but evidence of this hypothesis has been mixed. Although dependency on percent black as the main indicator of racial threat in many studies has contributed to the inconsistency in findings, we argue that this literature has also neglected to consider other important conceptual and methodological issues. Using 2000 census and arrest data, we estimate the impact of multiple measures of racial economic threat, such as the size of the black population, racial inequality and black immigration patterns on black arrest rates. Furthermore, by integrating racial competition and race‐relations arguments, we examine how the concentration of black disadvantage may temper the extent to which blacks pose a threat to white interests. Our findings reveal important and conceptually distinct relationships between racial threat, concentrated disadvantage and the use of social control against blacks, particularly when compared to white arrests.     

Companies Making a Killing—New UK Proposals for Corporate Killing

After more than a decade of major public and media outcries for an effective corporate liability regime in relation to workplace deaths the Home Secretary finally confirmed in May 2003, endorsed by the Cabinet in November 2003, that he will prepare a bill during this Parliament Session introducinga new offence of “Corporate Killing”. The call for such an offence as well as individual offences directed at directors and other senior officers arose out of the failures in the current corporate manslaughter law of the UK to convict any middle or large size companies. Specifically, after public disasters such as the capsizing of the Herald of Free Enterprise in 1987 (193 deaths), the Kings Cross Station fire (37 deaths), the Piper Alpha Oil Platform explosion (167 deaths) and a host of recent rail crashes have led to wide public calls to ensure corporations be held responsible for management failings resulting in fatalities. This paper looks briefly at the current law of corporate manslaughter and its failure to deliver the general public's desire for corporate liability as well as the development and evolution of the new proposals.