STICK-UP,STREET CULTURE,AND OFFENDER MOTIVATION*

Motivation is the central, yet arguably the most assumed, causal variable in the etiology of criminal behavior. Criminology's incomplete and imprecise understanding of this construct can be traced to the discipline's strong emphasis on background risk factors, open to the exclusion of subjective foreground conditions. In this article, we attempt to remedy this by exploring the decision-making processes of active armed robbers in real-life settings and circumstances. Our aim is to understand how and why these offenders move from an unmotivated state to one in which they are determined to commit robbery. Drawing from semistructured interviews with 86 active armed robbers, we argue that while the decision to commit robbery stems most directly from a perceived need for fast cash, this decision is activated, mediated, and shaped by participation in street culture. Street culture, and its constituent conduct norms, represents an essential intervening variable linking criminal motivation to background risk factors and subjective foreground conditions.     

Electoral Choice

Britain will hold its first election in five years on May 6.And unlike any since the early 1990s, it is very hard to see who might win. Current Prime Minister Gordon Brown of the Labor Party is unpopular and, despite work-ing hard to keep the recession from turning into a depression, is blamed for the huge lev-els of debt Britain has.     

Directing the Diplomats

Europe’s foreign affairs head faces knotty problem of developing new structure     

G8 Struggles for Relevance

<正>The world’s most powerful countries assess their dwindling influence The first meeting of the Group of Eight(G8)countries,then the G7,was convend by French president Valéry Giscard d’Estaingin the 1970s.     

More Harm than Good? The Language of Public Protection

Abstract: Issues of risk and public protection are currently a critical, and politically sensitive, area of practice for probation and youth justice services in England and Wales. The language of public protection shapes practice in significant ways, yet this use of terminology is an issue which has received relatively little attention. This article examines the current debate between policy makers and independent inspectors concerning the use of the terms 'harm' and 'serious harm' to illustrate how linguistic confusion can hinder practice. The article concludes with suggestions for an alternative vocabulary that could bring greater clarity to risk assessment and risk management processes.     

Japan's Crucial Moment

<正>Hopes for the Japanese economy remain high despite the severe blow it has suffered The tragic impact of the massive March 11 earth-quake on the northeast coast of Japan has filled the newswires across the world.Those     

The Color of Their Skin or the Content of Their Behavior? Race and Perceptions of African American Legislators

Abstract: Previous studies have shown that, because of their race, African American candidates for public office are often evaluated less favorably than their colleagues by voters. Does this dynamic continue when black candidates become elected officials? Using data on the North Carolina General Assembly, I address this question by examining the effects of race on perceptions of legislative effectiveness. When the dependent variable is the average effectiveness rating given by three groups—lobbyists, journalists, and other legislators—there is evidence that African American representatives are evaluated negatively because of their race. When the dependent variable is disaggregated into the separate effectiveness ratings given by each of the respondent groups individually, these negative perceptions of blacks on account of race remain on the part of lobbyists and other legislators, but not for journalists. Moreover, the negative perceptions of black representatives are not mitigated by these representatives possessing certain characteristics (e.g., seniority and leadership positions) that previous studies have found to be correlated with positive effectiveness evaluations. The presence of an African American Speaker in one legislative session did, however, seem to attenuate the negative perceptions.     

RACIAL THREAT,PARTISAN POLITICS,AND RACIAL DISPARITIES IN PRISON ADMISSIONS: A PANEL ANALYSIS*

Why are racial disparities in imprisonment so pronounced? Studies of alternative outcomes in the criminal justice system find positive relationships between minority presence and punitive outcomes. Therefore, it is puzzling that the studies of racial incarceration ratios find negative relationships between this presence and such discrepancies. We use a pooled time‐series design to resolve this dilemma. Successful Republican attempts to link crime with public concerns about a dangerous racial underclass also suggest that where these racial appeals are successful, African Americans should face higher incarceration rates than whites. In contrast to prior research, our results are consistent with findings about other criminal justice outcomes. They show that an inverted, U‐shaped, nonlinear relationship is present between African‐American presence and racial disparities in imprisonments. Additional results indicate that the presence of African Americans in deep southern states and greater support for Republican presidential candidates together with increases in the most menacing crime (which often is blamed on African Americans) also help to explain these discrepant racial prison admission rates.     

MINORITY THREAT AND POLICE STRENGTH FROM 1980 TO 2000: A FIXED‐EFFECTS ANALYSIS OF NONLINEAR AND INTERACTIVE EFFECTS IN LARGE U.S. CITIES*

Many studies have assessed threat theory by investigating the relationships between the size of minority populations and police strength. Yet these investigations analyzed older data with cross‐sectional designs. This study uses a fixed‐effects panel design to detect nonlinear and interactive relationships between minority presence and the per capita number of police in large U.S. cities in the last three census years. The findings show that the relationship between racial threat and the population‐corrected number of police officers has recently become considerably stronger. In accord with theoretically based expectations, tests for interactions show that segregated cities with larger African American populations have smaller departments. The coefficients on another interaction effect suggest that racial segregation leads to reductions in police strength in the South perhaps because officers are less likely to intervene in residentially isolated black neighborhoods in this region.