Examines the attitudes and perceptions among parolees, and police officers on why inmates join prison gangs, how powerful they are, and their power and control in prison. Data was gathered from 250 surveys distributed to a group of parolees at an undisclosed southern California municipal police department jail, and 250 surveys distributed to police managers attending the FBI National Academy in Quantico, Virginia. Results of this study validated the hypothesis that there is a significant difference in attitudes and perceptions of parolees and police officers of why inmates join prison gangs and the power and control gang inmates have in prison.

Youth gangs infiltrated Portland's illegal drug trade in the early 1980s. By the mid-1980s, entire neighborhoods in some parts of the city were affected. Residents expressed fear that their children would be drawn into gangs. Violence between rival gangs was frightening. Citizens, law enforcement and social services personnel organized to defend themselves and adjust programs to manage the problem. City officials denied a problem existed until a gang style shooting death forced recognition. The shooting death was catalytic in that it launched an effort to respond with a continuum of services. The House of Umoja was one of the services. The research was a case study of the response by citizens, street level service providers, and government officials to craft a meaningful gang control policy. Two themes were followed: The first addressed forces influencing decision-making and how those decisions shaped the process. The second examined considerations involved in selection of a community-based, residential, culturally-specific program. Data were collected through media accounts of events, organizational documents, and personal interviews utilizing a questionnaire format. The information was used to reconstruct the "story" as it was shaped by events and policy decisions which affected it. It was determined that affected citizens and street level service providers recognized, early on, they were dealing with a more dysfunctional juvenile delinquent. Efforts to respond were valiant, but hampered by lack of support from the levels of government able to allocate funds to build appropriate methods of control. The House of Umoja, part of the continuum of sanctions for gang involved youth, was implemented only after a painful, but rewarding, process involving citizens, strong community leadership, and the support of high ranking officials and influential business persons. Program selection was determined by arguments for establishing stronger ties between youth and their community in order to intervene with a holistic, rather than piecemeal approach. It was also influenced by the reputation of the Philadelphia House of Umoja which had been providing services to African American youth for 25 years.

Mémoire numérisé par la Division de la gestion de documents et des archives de l'Université de Montréal.

Mémoire numérisé par la Division de la gestion de documents et des archives de l'Université de Montréal

Gangs exist as metaphors of the societies in which they are embedded and are powerful, hence the need is great for an ecologically powerful model and a collation of a picture about gangs and gang life as described by knowledgeable individuals. With so much literature and knowledgeable individuals at hand to provide insight into the problem, the rationale for this study comes forth in the form of taking all this knowledge and insight and creating a collation of a picture of gangs as it is understood by those who study them and by those who have been confronted with them. The theoretical framework is a social constructionist cybernetic epistemology. One-on-one interviews were conducted with knowledgeable sources and audio-visual material assisted in understanding the context of gangs better. A hermeneutic analysis was used. The interview transcripts from the participants were analysed and themed according to a thematic network analysis and linked with available literature. These themes were then used to represent a Time Cable of gangs. / Psychology / M.A. (Psychology)

In hierdie studie word die ses Suid-Afrikaanse gevangenisbendes vergelyk met vyftien bendes uit oorsese lande of streke, tw. Amerika, Sentraal- en Suid Amerika, Kanada, Nieu Zeeland en Brittanje. As basis van vergelyking dien hul Oorsprong, Ontstaansdoel, Geslags- en Etniese samestelling, Eienskappe, Gesagstruktuur, Uitkenningstekens en Metodes van kommunikasie. Die verskillende bendes word ook vanuit Penologiese oogpunt beoordeel. `n Spesiale hoofstuk word gewy aan die uniekheid van die sogenaamde "Nommerbendes", tw. die 28, 27, 26, 25, 24 en 23 bendes. Verskeie aspekte soos die ontstaan, rituele en geheimhouding word volledig onder die soeklig geplaas. In die bespreking van die Nommerbendes word `n groot verskeidenheid geheime inligting vir die eerste maal geopenbaar. Die studie word afgesluit met enkele aanduidings van terreine wat roep om verdere navorsing. `n Vyftal bylaes dien om sekere aspekte van die navorsing en gevangenislewe verder toe te lig. / In this study the six South African prison gangs are compared to fifteen prison gangs from foreign countries, namely America, Central and South America, Canada, New Zealand and Britain. The comparison is based on their Origin, Original aim, Gender and Ethnic make-up, Characteristics, Authoritative structure, Gang identifiet·s and Methods of communication. The different gangs are then evaluated from Penological viewpoint A chapter is specially dedicated to the uniqueness of the so-called "Number Gangs", i.e. 28, 27, 26, 25, 24 and 23 gangs. Difierent aspects, such as their common origin, rituals and secrecy, are carefully described. In the discussion of the different Number gangs a large variety of secret information is exposed for the first time ever. The study concludes with some indicators for possible further research. Five Addenda serve to elucidate certain aspects of the contents. / Penology / M.A. (Penology)

This thesis examines marginality as a regime of interconnectedness. Drawing on the ethnographic material from a 16-month-fieldwork between October 2009 and December 2010 on the street economy and streetlife in Arada, the old city centre of Addis Ababa’s inner city, I argue that marginalized subjects are not to be seen as social actors that inhabit and create alternative and parallel social, political and economic realities away from the mainstream society. Rather, the way the urban poor are connected and integrated in the broader political economy of the Ethiopian urban society frames and defines modalities, forms and experiences of marginality. From this perspective, this thesis focuses on the on-going reconfiguration of the street economy in Addis Ababa’s inner city. Since the early 2000s, the increasing concern with poverty reduction and good governance in the development agenda has concurred with the attempts of the ruling party to expand its machinery of political control and mobilization at the grassroots of urban society. In this context, under the impact of development programs promoting the establishment of small-scale enterprises, the street economy has undergone a pervasive process of formalization and politicization that has come to advance the realization of an authoritarian form of developmental state, while imposing a regime of unskilled and badly paid labour on the street. This thesis examines this process by looking at the history of streetlife in Arada, as a terrain of social, economic and political practice, and it recounts the everyday life and life trajectories of those involved in the street economy. In particular, I look at how the political reconfiguration of the street economy has come to intertwine with the way living through marginality and dealing with forms of social inequality on the street have been historically conceptualized and experienced in Addis Ababa’s inner city.

Mémoire numérisé par la Division de la gestion de documents et des archives de l'Université de Montréal.

Mémoire numérisé par la Direction des bibliothèques de l'Université de Montréal.

During the last decades, funk music produced in the favelas of Rio de Janeiro has been travelling the world as a genre of contemporary cool. Construed as both hip and authentic and consumed globally, it has become a political and commercial asset in the nation’s rise to economic dominance and in Rio’s campaign to become a global city. In Brazil, however, favela funk draws the boundaries between the shanty towns of the urban margins, where it remains a social practice, and the state, by which it is condemned and sometimes prohibited for lyrics that allude to violence in an alleged glorification of gang power. This dissertation is an ethnographic inquiry into social life and power relations in one of the favelas of Rio de Janeiro. It tells the story of how a drug-dealing faction challenges the sovereignty of the state on its turf by means of both arms and the control and distribution of pleasure and fun. Funk, in this account, emerges as an immensely popular social practice and thus an instrument of drug-dealing power. By treating violence and the sexually explicit as both unifying and fragmenting in the social dynamics of this place, the dissertation uncovers the paths that favela youth tread in the context of severe poverty, vulnerability and limited access to state institutions and formal employment.