Over the past several years, the United States has experienced a significant decline in homicide rates. For the most part, analyses of this decline have focused on homicide trends in large cities and metropolitan areas. Unfortunately, few people have noticed that smaller cities have not seen a comparable decline in homicide rates. This article examines the relationship between deteriorated economic conditions and homicide rates in 85 midsized cities in the industrial Northeast and Midwest, or “Rustbelt” region of the United States. The authors find that unemployment, inelasticity (i.e., population density), and population change are either directly or indirectly (via socioeconomic deprivation) associated with homicide rates in these cities. Implications for homicide studies of urban locales are discussed.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.
References
1.
Anderson, E.
(1990). Streetwise: Race, class and change in an urban community. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
2.
Barnett, A.
, & Schwartz, E. (1989). Urban homicide: Still the same. Journal of Quantitative Criminology, 5, 83-100.
3.
Bernard, T. J.
(1990). Angry aggression among the “truly disadvantaged.”Criminology, 28, 73-96.
4.
Blau, J.
, & Blau, P. (1982). The cost of inequality: Metropolitan structure and violent crime. American Sociological Review, 47, 114-129.
5.
Bluestone, B.
(1987a). Deindustrialization and unemployment in America. In P. D. Staudohar & H. E. Brown (Eds.), Deindustrialization and plant closure (pp. 3-16). Lexington, MA: Lexington Books.
6.
Bluestone, B.
(1987b). In support of the deindustrialization thesis. In P. D. Staudohar & H. E. Brown (Eds.), Deindustrialization and plant closure (pp. 41-52). Lexington, MA: Lexington Books.
7.
Bluestone, B.
, & Harrison, B. (1982). The deindustrialization of America. New York: Basic Books.
8.
Blumstein, A.
, & Rosenfeld, R. (1998). Explaining recent trends in U.S. homicide rates. Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology, 88, 1175-1216.
9.
Bonger, W.
(1916). Criminality and economic conditions. Boston: Little, Brown.
10.
Brenner, H.
(1976). Estimating the social cost of national economic policy: Implications for mental and physical health and criminal aggression (Report to the Joint Committee of the House and Senate). Washington, DC: Congressional Research Service.
11.
Brewer, V. E.
, & Smith, M. D. (1995). Gender inequality and rates of female homicide victimization across U.S. cities. Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency, 32, 175-190.
12.
Bursik, R. J., Jr.
(1986). Delinquency rates as sources of ecological change. In J. M. Byrne & R. J. Sampson (Eds.), The social ecology of crime (pp. 63-74). New York: Springer-Verlag.
13.
Bursik, R. J., Jr.
, & Webb, J. (1982). Community change and patterns of delinquency. American Journal of Sociology, 88, 24-42.
14.
Cantor, D.
, & Land, K. (1985). Unemployment and crime rates in the post-World War II United States: A theoretical and empirical analysis. American Sociological Review, 50, 317-332.
15.
Carlson, S. M.
, & Michalowski, R. J. (1997). Crime, unemployment, and social structures of accumulation: An inquiry into historical contingency. Justice Quarterly, 14, 209-241.
16.
Chambliss, W. J.
(1975). Toward a political economy of crime. Theory and Society, 2, 149-170.
17.
Chambliss, W. J.
(1988). On the take: From petty crooks to presidents. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.
18.
Chambliss, W. J.
(1993). The creation of criminal law and crime control in Britain and America. In W. J. Chambliss & M. S. Zatz (Eds.), Making law: The state, the law and structural contradictions (pp. 36-64). Bloomington: University of Indiana Press.
19.
Chambliss, W.
, & Seidman, R. (1971). Law, order and power. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley.
20.
Chiricos, T. G.
(1987). Rates of crime and unemployment: An analysis of aggregate research evidence. Social Problems, 34, 187-211.
21.
Cohen, L. E.
, & Felson, M. (1979). Social change and crime rate trends: A routine activity approach. American Sociological Review, 44, 588-608.
22.
Corman, H.
, & Joyce, T. (1990). Urban crime control: Violent crimes in New York City. Social Science Quarterly, 71, 567-584.
23.
Cracking down on crime
. (1997, June 9). Newsweek, p. 5.
24.
Crutchfield, R. D.
, Geerken, M. R., & Gove, W. R. (1982). Crime rate and social integration: The impact of metropolitan mobility. Criminology, 20, 467-478.
25.
Crutchfield, R. D.
, Glusker, A., & Bridges, G. S. (1999). A tale of three cities: Labor markets and homicide. Sociological Focus, 32, 65-83.
26.
Currie, E.
(1985). Confronting crime. New York: Pantheon.
27.
Currie, E.
(1993). Reckoning: Drugs, the cities and the American future. New York: Hill and Wang.
28.
Currie, E.
(1997). Market society and social disorder. In B. MacLean & D. Milovanovic (Eds.), Thinking critically about crime (pp. 37-42). Vancouver, Canada: Collective Press.
29.
Currie, E.
(1998). Crime and punishment in America. New York: Holt.
30.
DeFronzo, J.
(1997). Welfare and homicide. Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency, 34, 395-406.
31.
Devine, J. A.
, Sheley, J. F., & Smith, M. D. (1988). Macroeconomic and social-control policy influences on crime rate changes, 1948-1985. American Sociological Review, 53, 407-420.
32.
Farley, J.
(1987). Suburbanization and central-city crime rates: New evidence and a reinterpretation. American Journal of Sociology, 93, 688-700.
33.
Federal Bureau of Investigation
. (1980). Crime in the United States 1979. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.
34.
Federal Bureau of Investigation
. (1981). Crime in the United States 1980. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.
35.
Federal Bureau of Investigation
. (1982). Crime in the United States 1981. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.
36.
Federal Bureau of Investigation
. (1985). Crime in the United States 1984. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.
37.
Federal Bureau of Investigation
. (1986). Crime in the United States 1985. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.
38.
Federal Bureau of Investigation
. (1987). Crime in the United States 1986. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.
39.
Federal Bureau of Investigation
. (1990). Crime in the United States 1989. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.
40.
Federal Bureau of Investigation
. (1991). Crime in the United States 1990. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.
41.
Federal Bureau of Investigation
. (1992). Crime in the United States 1991. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.
42.
Federal Bureau of Investigation
. (1995). Crime in the United States 1994. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.
43.
Federal Bureau of Investigation
. (1996). Crime in the United States 1995. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.
44.
Federal Bureau of Investigation
. (1997). Crime in the United States 1996. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.
45.
Gergen, D.
(1997, June 16). A war we've begun to win. U.S. News & World Report, p. 72.
46.
Gest, T.
(1997, June 9). Violence takes another beating. U.S. News & World Report, p. 41.
47.
Kovandzic, T.
, Vieraitis, L., & Yeisley, M. (1998). The structural covariates of urban homicide: Reassessing the impact of income inequality and poverty in the post-Reagan era. Criminology, 36, 569-599.
48.
Kposowa, A. J.
, Breault, K. D., & Harrison, B. M. (1995). Reassessing the structural covariates of violent and property crimes in the U.S.A.: A county level analysis. British Journal of Sociology, 46, 79-105.
49.
Krivo, L. J.
, & Peterson, R. (1996). Extremely disadvantaged neighborhoods and urban crime. Social Forces, 75, 619-650.
50.
Land, K. C.
, McCall, P. L., & Cohen, L. E. (1990). Structural covariates of homicide rates: Are there any invariances across time and social space?American Journal of Sociology, 95, 922-963.
51.
Leo, J.
(1996, November 4). You might even want to live there. U.S. News & World Report, p. 19.
52.
Markusen, A.
, & Carlson, V. (1989). Deindustrialization in the American Midwest: Causes and responses. In L. Rodwin & P. Sazanami (Eds.), Deindustrialization and regional economic transformation (pp. 29-59). Winchester, MA: Unwin Hyman.
53.
McCarthy, J. D.
, Galle, O. R., & Zimmerman, W. (1975). Population density, social structure, and interpersonal violence. American Behavioral Scientist, 18, 771-791.
54.
Merton, R.
(1938). Social structure and anomie. American Sociological Review, 3, 672-682.
55.
Messner, S.
(1989). Economic discrimination and societal homicide rates: Further evidence on the cost of inequality. American Sociological Review, 54, 597-611.
56.
Miller, A.
(1998, December 28). Crime rates fall again, survey says. The Columbus Dispatch, pp. 1A, 2A.
57.
Morenoff, J. D.
, & Sampson, R. J. (1998). Violent crime and the spatial dynamics of neighborhood transition: Chicago, 1970-1990. Social Forces, 76, 31-64.
58.
Morganthau, T.
(1995, December 4). The lull before the storm?Newsweek, p. 40.
59.
Morganthau, T.
, & Miller, M. (1997, July 21). Don't ignore your fear. Newsweek, p. 78.
60.
Mosher, C.
, Rotolo, T., & Phillips, D. (1999, August). Don't forget the small places: Exploring structural covariates of homicide rates across cities of varying population sizes. Paper presented at the annual meetings of the American Sociological Association, Chicago.
61.
Niemark, C.
(1992). The hidden dimensions of annual reports: Sixty years of social conflict at General Motors. Princeton, NJ: Markus Wiener.
62.
Parker, K. F.
, McCall, P. L., & Land, K. C. (1999). Determining social structural predictors of homicide: Unit of analysis and related methodological concerns. In M. D. Smith & M. A. Zahn (Eds.), Homicide: A sourcebook of social research (pp. 107-124). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
63.
Pepinsky, H.
(1991). The geometry of violence and democracy. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.
64.
Perrucci, C.
, Perrucci, R., Targ, D., & Targ, H. (1988). Plant closings: International context and social costs. New York: Aldine De Gruyter.
65.
Perry, D. C.
(1987). The politics of dependency in deindustrializing America: The case of Buffalo, New York. In M. P. Smith & J. R. Feagin (Eds.), The capitalist city: Global restructuring and community politics (pp. 113-137). New York: Basil Blackwell.
66.
Quinney, R.
(1973). Crime control in capitalist society: A critical philosophy of legal order. Issues in Criminology, 8, 75-79.
67.
Quinney, R.
(1977). Class, state and crime. New York: Longman.
68.
Raudenbush, S. W.
, & Sampson, R. J. (1999). Assessing direct and indirect effects in multi-level designs with latent variables. Sociological Methods & Research, 28, 123-153.
69.
Rodwin, L.
(1989). Deindustrialization and regional economic transformation. In L. Rodwin & H. Sazanami (Eds.), Deindustrialization and regional economic transformation (pp. 3-25). Winchester, MA: Unwin Hyman.
70.
Rusk, D.
(1993). Cities without suburbs. Washington, DC: Woodrow Wilson Center.
71.
Sampson, R. J.
, & Wilson, W. J. (1995). Toward a theory of race, crime and urban inequality. In J. Hagan & R. Peterson (Eds.), Crime and inequality (pp. 37-54). Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.
72.
Sampson, R. J.
, & Wooldredge, J. D. (1986). Evidence that high crime rates encourage migration away from central cities. Sociology and Social Research, 70, 310-314.
73.
Sayrs, L. W.
(1989). Pooled time series analysis. Newbury Park, CA: Sage.
74.
Shaw, C.
, & McKay, H. (1942). Juvenile delinquency and urban areas. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
75.
Shihadeh, E. S.
, & Maume, M. O. (1997). Segregation and crime: The relationship between Black centralization and urban Black homicide. Homicide Studies, 1, 254-280.
76.
Shihadeh, E. S.
, & Ousey, G. C. (1998). Industrial restructuring and violence: The link between entry-level jobs, economic deprivation, and Black and White homicide. Social Forces, 77, 185-206.
77.
South, S. J.
(1987). Metropolitan migration and social problems. Social Science Quarterly, 68, 3-18.
78.
Spitzer, S.
(1975). Toward a Marxian theory of deviance. Social Problems, 22, 638-651.
79.
Taylor, W.
, Walton, I., & Young, J. (1973). The new criminology: For a social theory of deviance. Boston: Routledge and Kegan Paul.
80.
Tifft, L.
(1993). Battering of women. Boulder, CO: Westview.
81.
U.S. Bureau of the Census
. (1988). County and city data book. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.
82.
U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development
(1999). Now is the time: Places left behind in the new economy. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.
83.
White, G.
(1999). Crime and the decline of manufacturing, 1970-1990. Justice Quarterly, 16, 81-98.
84.
Whitman, D.
(1996, December 16). Things are getting better? Who knew?U.S. News & World Report, pp. 30-32.
85.
Widom, C. S.
(1996). The cycle of violence. In J. Conklin (Ed.), New perspectives in criminology (pp. 51-59). Boston: Allyn & Bacon.
86.
Wilson, W. J.
(1987). The truly disadvantaged. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
87.
Wilson, W. J.
(1996). When work disappears. New York: Knopf.
88.
Witkin, G.
(1998, May 25). The CRIME bust. U.S. News & World Report, pp. 28-37.
89.
Young, J.
(1997). Left realism: The basics. In B. MacLean & D. Milovanovic (Eds.), Thinking critically about crime (pp. 28-36). Vancouver, Canada: Collective Press.
