Liberation Movements and Robbery: A Comparative Analysis of Uganda and the United States

Both Uganda and the United States experienced precipitous increases in robbery in the middle and late 60's. In Uganda the change came within two years after formal independence from Britain and for the United States the rise came in the period after the passage of the 1964 Civil Rights Act. In both cases, the offenders were poor, young black males. A major analysis of the phenomenon in the United States suggested relative economic deprivation as the principal explanatory factor. This paper contends that such an analysis both limits the meaning freedom movements may have for their participants and cannot account adequately for the similar trend in Uganda. Data suggest that violence receives a general legitimization in post-war periods and similar dynamics may apply to the participants in independence struggles. Further, studies suggest that the urban robber is characterized by a high degree of alienation that includes in Seeman's terminology—isolation, meaninglessness, and powerlessness. The movements may have mitigated somewhat this aspect of the lives of the urban poor and helped to account for the lack of change in robbery during the struggles. Their termination through symbolic success may have left a vacuum devoid of meaning and purpose, especially for unskilled, poor blacks, which generated new heights of anger and alienation and which, in turn, led to rapid increases in rebellious behavior such as armed robbery. Such a reality would pose a serious problem for leaders who successfully directed a popular revolution and must now stabilize an economy.