INDUSTRIAL SHIFT,POLARIZED LABOR MARKETS AND URBAN VIOLENCE: MODELING THE DYNAMICS BETWEEN THE ECONOMIC TRANSFORMATION AND DISAGGREGATED HOMICIDE*

Industrial restructuring marks the removal of a manufacturing and production‐based economy in urban areas, which had served as a catalyst in concentrating disadvantage and polarizing labor markets since the 1970s. Although scholars have established a relationship between concentrated disadvantage — poverty, joblessness, racial residential segregation — and urban violence in cross‐sectional studies, this literature has yet to estimate whether economic restructuring contributed to the change in urban homicide over time. Modeling this relationship requires an analytical strategy that incorporates specific indicators of (race and gender) polarized labor markets, separate from indicators of urban disadvantage, on disaggregated homicides while taking into account the growing dependency of urban cities on formal social control (via police presence and rise in incarceration). In this study I provide a theoretical rationale for linking industrial restructuring to urban homicide. Using a multivariate strategy to capture the shift in labor market forces and disaggregated homicides from 1980 to 1990, I also estimate the impact of this relationship. The results provide evidence of the industrial ship and documents both the decline in Manufacturing jobs for black males and black females and a growth in the service sector opportunities for white males only. I also find that industrial restructuring had a unique impact on disaggregated homicide beyond what has previously been established in cross‐sectional studies.     

A REPLY TO WAETERS AND WHITE: “HEREDITY AND CRIME”*

This paper is written in response to the Walters and white (1989) review article “Heredity and Crime: Bad Genes or Bad Research?” Walters and white's criticisms are often global statements of disapproval or name-calling rather than useful, analytic statements. Unfortunately, when they become specific, they are usually in error.     

Children Exposed to Domestic Violence: Making Trauma‐Informed Custody and Visitation Decisions

This article explores the risks for young children and the challenges for courts that emerge when parents who are victims or perpetrators of intimate partner violence seek court decisions on child visitation or custody matters. We focus particularly on children age five and younger, a group that is disproportionately represented in families affected by intimate partner violence, and especially vulnerable to its traumatic impact. We examine the literature on children's response to violence between their parents and the literature on parental alienation, a counter‐charge that may arise when one parent alleges violence as a reason to limit the other parent's access to the children. We look at challenges faced by both mental health professionals and courts involved in custody determinations and make policy recommendations to help courts make trauma‐informed decisions that best serve children.     

DRIVING WHILE BLACK: BIAS PROCESSES AND RACIAL DISPARITY IN POLICE STOPS*

We estimate the degree of racial disparity in police vehicular stops separately for local and state police in North Carolina in the year 2000. We introduce four mechanisms that might produce racial disparities in police stops—racial profiling, race sensitive police deployment, cognitive bias and stereotyping, and prejudice. We then model the relative odds of police vehicle stops as a function of race, driving behavior, and other demographic statuses separately by police organization type, with controls for omitted variable bias at both the driver and spatial level. We find only weak evidence of racial disparity in stops by officers of the state highway patrol but stronger evidence in those made by local police officers.     

CONCENTRATED DISADVANTAGE,TRADITIONAL MALE ROLE MODELS,AND AFRICAN‐AMERICAN JUVENILE VIOLENCE*

In a stagnating urban economy, Elijah Anderson's (1999) Code of the Street depicts a disadvantaged environment where residents face high levels of joblessness, poverty, racial residential isolation, and family disruption. Anderson argues that the loss of job opportunities for African‐American men deprived younger generations of traditional male role models. That is, in a disadvantaged urban setting with a lack of male role models participating in legitimate labor market activity, many young people may turn to violence. Drawing on insights from Anderson's ethnographic work, we assess the generality of Anderson's claims more broadly and explore the potential connection between his work and the macrolevel research on urban violence. Specifically, we explore the influence of male role models (older, employed black males) and the concentration of urban disadvantage on black juvenile arrests for violence across multiple cities in 2000. Overall, we find empirical support for Anderson's concerns over the removal of traditional male role models from urban areas as a result of concentrated disadvantage. Specifically, we find that the presence of traditional male role models reduces the rates of African‐American youth violence. Additionally, our measure of traditional male role models mediates the relationship between structural disadvantage and juvenile violence. We discuss the contributions of Anderson's work to the macrolevel study of urban violence.     

THE DEMISE OF THE DISPARATE IMPACT THEORY

Books reviewed in this article: Book Reviewed in this article: Shortly after this article was completed and accepted for publication, Congress passed the 1991 Civil Rights Act. In order to understand and appreciate the significant implications of the new legislation, it is first necessary to review the legislative and litigation history of disparate impact discussed here. Immediately following is a legislative update entitled “The Resurrection of the Disparate Impact Theory?”