Exploring the Racial Discrimination and Competition Processes of Race-Specific Violence in the Urban Context

Abstract

There has been increasing effort devoted to examining the linkages between urban disadvantage and race-specifi c violence in the sociological literature. Much of this literature has either focused on identifying the consequences of urban disadvantage on different racial groups, particularly as it relates to offending rates, or documenting the impact of labor market factors on intra-racial and inter-racial violence. While this literature advances our understanding of the interconnections between race, economic disadvantage and violence in the urban context, our exploration into this literature has only begun. In this paper, we outline the contributions of the racial stratifi cation literature to the study of urban violence and argue that this literature plays an essential role in moving the study of race and urban violence forward. We offer ways (avenues) to incorporate the racial competition and exploitation literature into the study of violence within and between racial groups. In doing so, we emphasize the importance of “process” by delineating the interconnections between labor market exploitation, competition, and violence.