Making Up Gangs: Looping,Labelling and the New Politics of Intelligence-led Policing

Abstract

The 2011 ‘summer of violent disorder’ in England cast a spotlight on the often arbitrary and uneven process through which individuals become labelled as ‘gang-members’. Based on data from two separate but concurrently conducted qualitative studies in Glasgow, Scotland, this article draws on the critical vocabularies of Bourdieu and Hacking to conceptualize this new frontier in the politics of gang policing: analysing the distinctive ‘fields’ that street-based young people and police actors inhabit; uncovering the complex chain of interactions through which individuals become labelled as ‘gang-members’; and exploring the consequences of such labelling processes.

Keywords

ethnography gangs intelligence policing sociology of knowledge

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Atkinson

(2013) Beyond Cop Culture: The Cultural Challenge of Civilian Intelligence Analysis in Scottish Policing. PhD thesis, University of Glasgow.

Ball

Curry

(1995) The logic of definition in criminology: Purposes and methods for defining ‘gangs’. Criminology 33(2): 225–245.

Bartie

(2010) Moral panics and Glasgow gangs: Exploring ‘the new wave of Glasgow hooliganism’, 1965–1970. Contemporary British History 24(3): 385–408.

BBC News (2011a) Scottish youths arrested over Facebook ‘riot’ messages’. Available at: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-glasgow-west-14461393 (accessed 26 February 2014).

BBC News (2011b) Glasgow boy, 16, charged with incitement. 10 August. Available at: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-glasgow-west-14481665 (accessed 26 February 2014).

Bourdieu

Wacquant

LJD

(1992) An Invitation to Reflexive Sociology. Cambridge: Polity Press.

Brodeur

Dupont

(2008) Introductory essay: The role of knowledge and networks in policing. In: Williamson

(ed.) The Handbook of Knowledge-Based Policing. Chichester: John Wiley and Sons.

Conquergood

(1994) Homeboys and hoods: Gang communication and cultural space. In: Frey

(ed.) Group Communication in Context: Studies of Natural Groups. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Cope

(2004) Intelligence led policing or policing led intelligence? Integrating volume crime analysis into policing. British Journal of Criminology 44(2): 188–203.

10.

Cottrell-Boyce

(2013) Ending gang and youth violence: A critique. Youth Justice 13(3): 193–206.

11.

Davies

(2013) City of Gangs: Glasgow and the Rise of the British Gangster. London: Hodder & Stoughton.

12.

Densley

(2013) How Gangs Work: An Ethnography of Youth Violence. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.

13.

Donnelly

Tombs

(2008) An unusual day in court. British Medical Journal 337, a2959.

14.

Ericson

Haggerty

(1997) Policing the Risk Society. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.

15.

Feeley

Simon

(1992) The new penology. Criminology 30(4): 449–474.

16.

Ferrell

Hayward

Young

(2008) Cultural Criminology: An Invitation. London: Sage Publications.

17.

Fraser

(2010a) Growing through Gangs: Young People, Identity and Social Change in Glasgow. PhD thesis, University of Glasgow.

18.

Fraser

(2010b) Deviation from the mean?: Cultural representations of Glasgow since no mean city. In: McNair

Ryder

(eds) Further from the Frontiers: Cross-currents in Irish and Scottish Studies. Aberdeen: AHRC Centre for Irish and Scottish Studies.

19.

Fraser

(2013) Street habitus: Gangs, territorialism and social change in Glasgow. Journal of Youth Studies 16(8): 970–985.

20.

Goldson

(ed.) (2011) Youth in Crisis? Gangs, Territoriality and Violence. London: Routledge.

21.

Hacking

(2004) Between Michel Foucault and Erving Goffman: Between discourse in the abstract and face-to-face interaction. Economy and Society 33(3): 277–302.

22.

Hagedorn

(2008) A World of Gangs: Armed Young Men and Gangsta Culture. Minnesota, MN: University of Minnesota Press.

23.

Haggerty

Ericson

(2000) The surveillant assemblage. British Journal of Sociology 51(4): 605–622.

24.

Hallsworth

(2013) The Gang and Beyond: Interpreting Violent Street Worlds. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.

25.

Hallsworth

Young

(2008) Gang talk and gang talkers: A critique. Crime Media Culture 4(2): 175–195.

26.

Heldon

(2009) Exploratory analysis tools. In: Ratcliffe

(ed.) Strategic Thinking in Criminal Intelligence. Sydney: The Federation Press.

27.

Herald Scotland (2011) Cameron vows to learn from Scotland riots. 11 August 2011. Available at: http://www.heraldscotland.com/news/home-news/cameron-vows-to-learn-from-scotland-over-riots.14706619 (accessed 4 November 2013).

28.

HM Government (2011a) PM’s speech on the fightback after the riots. Available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/pms-speech-on-the-fightback-after-the-riots (accessed 23 July 2013).

29.

HM Government (2011b) Ending Gang and Youth Violence. London: Home Office.

30.

Hobbs

(1997) Criminal collaboration: Youth gangs, subcultures, professional criminals and organized crime. In: Maguire

Morgan

Reiner

(eds) Oxford Handbook of Criminology. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

31.

Holdaway

(1994) Recruitment, race and the police subculture. In: Stephens

Becker

(eds) Police Force, Police Service: Care and Control in Britain. Basingstoke: Macmillan.

32.

Jacobs

(2009) Gang databases: Contexts and questions. Criminology & Public Policy 8(4): 705–709.

33.

Jenkins

(2002) Pierre Bourdieu. London: Routledge.

34.

Katz

Jackson-Jacobs

(2004) The criminologists’ gang. In: Summer

(ed.) The Blackwell Companion to Criminology. Oxford: Blackwell.

35.

Katz

Webb

(2006) Policing Gangs in America. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

36.

Kennedy

(2009) Gangs and public policy: Constructing and deconstructing gang databases. Criminology & Public Policy 8(4): 711–716.

37.

Kintrea

Bannister

Pickering

Reid

Suzuki

(2008) Young People and Territoriality in British Cities. York: Joseph Rowntree Foundation.

38.

Latour

(2005) Reassembling the Social: An Introduction to Actor-Network-Theory. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

39.

McAra

McVie

(2012) Youth crime and justice: Key messages from the Edinburgh Study of Youth Transitions and Crime. Criminology and Criminal Justice 10(2): 179–209.

40.

Miller

(1975) Violence by Youth Gangs and Youth Gangs as a Crime Problem in Major American Cities. Washington DC: Department of Justice.

41.

O’Malley

(2001) Policing crime risks in the neo-liberal era. In: Stenson

Sullivan

(eds) Crime, Risk and Justice: The Politics of Crime Control in Liberal Democracies, Cullompton: Willan Publishing.

42.

Patrick

(1973) A Glasgow Gang Observed. London: Eyre Methuen.

43.

Pitts

(2008) The Changing Face of Youth Crime. Cullompton: Willan Publishing.

44.

Police Scotland (2013) Equality and Diversity in Police Scotland 2013. Available at: http://www.scotland.police.uk/assets/pdf/foi-documents/diversityandequalityinpolicescotlandreportfinal (accessed 26 February 2014).

45.

Punch

(1985) Conduct Unbecoming: The Social Construction of Police Deviance and Control. London: Tavistock Publications.

46.

Ralphs

Medina

Aldridge

(2009) Who needs enemies with friends like these? The importance of place for young people living in known gang areas. Journal of Youth Studies 12(5): 483–500.

47.

Ratcliffe

(2008) Knowledge management challenges in the development of intelligence-led policing. In: Williamson

(ed.) The Handbook of Knowledge-Based Policing. Chichester: John Wiley and Sons.

48.

Reiner

(1992) Fin de siècle: The police face the millennium. The Political Quarterly 63(1): 37–50.

49.

Reiner

(2010) The Politics of the Police. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

50.

Sillitoe

(1956) Cloak Without Dagger. London: Cassell.

51.

Smithson

Ralphs

Williams

(2013) Used and abused: The problematic usage of gang terminology in the United Kingdom and its implications for ethnic minority youth. British Journal of Criminology 53(1): 113–128.

52.

Spergel

(2009) Gang databases: To be or not to be. Criminology & Public Policy 8(4): 667–674.

53.

The Guardian and LSE (2012) Reading the Riots: Investigating England’s Summer of Disorder. Available at: http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/46297/1/Reading%20the%20riots(published).pdf (accessed 26 February 2014).

54.

Waddington

PAJ

(2007) Public order: Then and now. In: Smith

Smith

(eds.) Transformations of Policing. Aldershot: Ashgate.

55.

Westley

(1953) Violence and the police. American Journal of Sociology 59(1): 34–41.

56.

White

(2008) Disputed definitions and fluid identities: The limitations of social profiling in relation to ethnic youth gangs. Youth Justice 8(2): 149–161.