Within the previous chapter is the contention that accompanying the arrival of Patterson’s ‘dark strangers’ to Britain was a dangerous sociology which (un)wittingly reaffirmed the conceptualisation of the post war black migrant as a social, political and cultural problem. Related to the work of Krumer-Nevo and Sidi (2013) such reconceptualisation contributes to the construction of an objectified and hence Othered black immigrant. This identification along with a number of seemingly unique, yet powerfully mediated events facilitated a politicised conjuring of a ‘strong case’ to legitimise the introduction of immigration controls (Carter et al 1987) framed within a powerful discourse which attributed a plethora of socio-economic problems with the culturally maladapted and criminogenic presence of the ‘black immigrant’ (Miles and Phizacklea 1984. Pryce 1979). Yet, rather than being located within empirical fact or (social) reality, the black immigrant was constructed, imbued with pathological traits and characteristics, and argued as being incompatible with the social, economic and cultural complexity of British society (Amos et al 1982, Miles and Phizacklea 1982, Sivanandan 2008). Uncritically, the raison d'etre of race relations research was to identity the problems encountered by the post-war immigrant to inform evidence informed solutions to facilitate their successful integration (Rose et al 1969, Patterson 1968). However, for Bourne and Sivanandan (1980) race relations research was central to the production and problematisation of the black immigrant and thereby was concerned with the research question of, the degree to which black people were becoming absorbed, were ‘fitting in’, assimilating and hence becoming British.
At its core, this thesis is concerned to excavate the factors that mark a significant shift in the conception of post-war immigration from a ‘welcome’ to a contemporary representation of immigrants and migrants as a social and political problem. Moreover, how post-war migrants and their children perceive and understand this shift is a critical line of inquiry. As a Research and Evaluation Officer for the National Probation Service between the years 1997 and 2007 and now as a senior lecturer in Criminology, the preponderance of discourses, approaches and theories which serve to present the ‘black community’ as criminogenic, has been a research conundrum and point of personal, professional and political frustration. From a personal perspective, such ideas are at odds, with my personal experience and understanding
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as a young black man growing up in the Manchester area. The central focus of this chapter is to explore the emergence of criminalised constructs of black people in Britain which has served to legitimise the incursion of penal apparatus as a means through which to regulate those constructed as infringing the normative boundaries of British society (Gilroy 1987, Hall 1978). It was within the previous chapter that crime arises as a hallmark of black immigration. Within this chapter, it is therefore necessary to develop this theme as a method through which to mark the continuity in the criminological assertions presented in relation to immigration and how such constructs have underpinned the stubborn persistence of a black people and crime nexus.
The following then will firstly, examine the contemporary (over)representation of Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic (BAME) people within the Criminal Justice System of England and Wales drawing again on official government documents and reports. Whilst a powerful association between racialized groups and criminalised offending behaviour is evident, there remains an inadequacy in academic explanations for such a nexus (CLINKS 2014). It is with this in mind that this chapter will consider the contribution of Criminology and its accompanying domain assumptions (Scraton and Chadwick 1987) which facilitate the perpetual construction and durability of the ascription of the crime label for black people and communities. Crime is presented as inter-generationally transmitted from the ‘black immigrant’, to their children and now their grandchildren. It is the durability of such ideas that necessitates a critical review of the criminological literature, alongside official criminal justice documents and outputs, it will be possible to trace the discursive shifts that result in the transmogrifying of the problematic black immigrant toward the criminal black youth.
Finally, the chapter draws upon a number of published papers, journal articles and book chapters (listed below) which were written solely or co-authored by myself and for which permission to reproduce has been agreed.
Williams, P. (2015) ‘Criminalising the Other: Challenging the Race and Gang nexus.’ Race and Class, Vol. 56(3): 18–35
Williams, P. and Clarke, B. (2016) ‘Dangerous Associations: Joint enterprise, gangs and racism’. London: Centre for Crime and Justice Studies.
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Williams, P. and Clarke, B. (2018) ‘Disrupting the ‘single story’: Collective punishment, myth-making and the criminalisation of racialized communities’ in Poynting, S., Bhatia, M. and Tufail, W. (ed) Racism, Crime and Media. Palgrave.
The Criminology of the Other
Sociology, and more recently Criminology, as a discipline of modernity informed by enlightenment philosophy, has been criticised for creating racial hierarchies, which have helped to ‘institutionalise oppression and discrimination, through the production of the Others’ (Spalek 2008, Bowling and Phillips 2004). Othering is best conceptualised as ‘the process of attaching moral codes of inferiority to difference’ (Krumer-Nevo and Sidi 2012, Aliverti 2012). From this position, otherisation is a discursive tool for understanding discrimination and exclusion against individuals and/or groups based on their belonging to marginalised populations (Krumer-Nevo and Sidi 2012). Whilst, the Other has become appropriated throughout a number of academic disciplines, reflecting various methods of analyses and inquiry the identification of a group as the ‘other’ originates in social processes linked to the cultural and political themes within specific societies. That is othering and processes of otherisation are contingent upon the political and social context within which they arise. Second and related to the above, the construction and social categorisation of the other marks the normative boundaries of the community and thus the appropriate methods of inclusion (and exclusion) (Ajzenstadt and Shaprio 2012, Anderson 2013, Spalek 2008). Otherisation therefore, involves the perpetuation of dominant norms which results in the suppression, silencing and concealment of difference(s). For Spalek (2008), those identities that reside outside of the moral boundaries and ‘regimes of power’ are deemed the Other, that is ‘the devalued - and their voices and perspectives are largely suppressed’.
With particular reference to the discipline of Criminology, ‘othering’ facilitates the constitution of ‘a judicial status and the socio-political condition of a group, designated by society as not belonging to its core values’. The discipline then is concerned with the systematic identification, isolation and in turn (policy) reaction to the ontologically
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vague construct of ‘crime’ (Spalek 2008). Critically, it is those individuals who are deemed to pose a threat to the social order or those who disrupt the imagined normative boundaries through the imposed signifiers of, race, sexual conduct, gender and other social, cultural and political attributes. For Ajzenstadt and Shaprio (2012:687),
‘Marking the ‘other’—the ‘outsider’—as violating social and moral boundaries is thus a symbolic cultural code, according to which people and groups may be included in society and become a ‘deserving’ member, or may be excluded and regarded as ‘undeserving’…[T]his classification process leads to the designation of a host of penal, social and legal practices of control.’
Whilst in criminology, the Other is often presented as a negated status conferred upon an individual or groups as a facilitator for their criminalisation (Becker 1964), not all Others are subject to processes of criminalisation or criminal regulation. As such, it is therefore necessary to consider the conceptual distinction between the constructions of the Other as outsider and social constructions, which result in the imposition of State penal and legal regulation. Critically, this difference can be communicated through the concept of the ‘folk devil’, invariably attributed and ‘applied’ to those who are episodically evoked as transcending the legal boundaries and are therefore mediated as threatening societal values (Cohen 1973, Becker 1964). The other as 'folk devil’ is best conceptualised through the amplification and transmission of symbols and cues concerning those whose deviance, behaviour, lifestyle traits and ‘subculture’ pose a threat to society’s norms. The identification and mediation of the ‘outsider’ becomes problematized through the attribution of folk devil status, who in turn become foci necessitating state regulation through criminal justice apparatus which cyclically (re)affirms their imposed negated status and its subsequent mediation (Wilkins 1964, Cohen 1973, Hall 1978, Alexander 2008).
The process through which the post-war Caribbean migrant then becomes (an)other crime problem was notably chronicled by Stuart Hall and colleagues in their classic text, ‘Policing the Crisis’. Writing in 1978, the book explores the context and structural contingencies that facilitate processes whereby ‘race’ as a social and political relation become manipulated and utilised by the State. ‘Policing the Crisis’ focuses attention upon the reconfiguration of street robbery, as a new (and imported) offence of
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‘mugging’ appropriated as a discursive tool through which to articulate dramatic economic and social changes of the period (Hall et al 1978). The contradictory nature of this crisis can be found in the literature, where post war ideas around black immigrants and crime reflect a remarkable shift from a position which posits the under involvement of black people with crime and offending behaviour, through to the now annually reported ‘over-representation’ in academic and official CJ policy discourses. For example, the following quote from a Yorkshire Chief Constable in 1952 suggests,
‘the West Africans are all out for a good time, spending money on quaint suits and flashy ornaments and visiting dance halls at every opportunity. The Jamaicans are somewhat similar, but they have a more sensible outlook and rarely get into trouble. They take great pains with their appearance and use face cream etc. to make themselves attractive to the females they meet at dances, cafes etc. One feels, however, that they only attract a certain type of female by reason of the fact that they have more money to spend than the average young Englishman.’
Similarly,
‘Everywhere they have appeared the police and magistrates are ready to say that the West Indians make no trouble, which is more than some are ready to say of Irish workers.’
And finally,
‘...on the whole the coloured population are as well behaved as many local citizens.’ (All quotations cited in Carter et al 1987:7, emphasis added)
Together, the above quotes offer an unambiguous view derived from police sources of ‘Jamaicans’ and ‘coloureds’ as less involved in crime and offending behaviour. When such findings are juxtaposed with contemporary publications (MOJ 2015) amid wider media constructs of black peoples involvement with crime and offending behaviour, it becomes necessary to consider the strategies through which black people become subject to processes of criminalisation.
70 The Contemporary Position
On the 31st January 2016, the British Prime Minister David Cameron announced a
review, to be led by the Labour MP David Lammy, to investigate ‘evidence of possible bias against black defendants and other ethnic minorities.’ He continued,
“If you’re black, you’re more likely to be in a prison cell than studying at a top university. And if you’re black, it seems you’re more likely to be sentenced to custody for a crime than if you’re white. We should investigate why this is and how we can end this possible discrimination.” [Ross 2016]
The concept of the black male as crime prone remains one of the enduring realities of contemporary British society. Traces of such imagery are historically located within the British conscience, presenting a powerful discourse episodically evoked, repackaged, looped and (re)presented as an infallible myth, transcendental folklore, a ‘single story’ to explain the crime problem within British society (Ngozi-Adichie 2009, Hall 1978, Gilroy 2002, Spalek 2008, Bowling and Phillips 2003). The story succeeds in the presentation of a simplistic and consumable explanation, which accentuates and reaffirms ‘them’ from ‘us’ (Keith 1993, Anderson 2013), demanding penal solutions to protect the public from the dangerous black criminal other. The following will therefore proceed through a contemporary appraisal and evaluation of the literature which serves to (re)affirm an association between black people and criminality.
The now bi-annual publication of the ‘Statistics on Race in the Criminal Justice System’ (RCJS) marks a statutory obligation enacted through Section 95 of the Criminal Justice Act (1991) that:
‘The Secretary of State shall in each year publish such information as he considers expedient for the purpose...of facilitating the performance of those engaged in the administration of justice to avoid discriminating against any persons on the ground of race or sex or any other improper ground...’ [MOJ 2015:10 emphasis added]
Now in its 27th year, the report has consistently demonstrated the disparity of CJS
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counterparts in England and Wales.5 The most recent publication (MOJ 2017) again
shows that BAME people are up to eight times more likely to be subject to stop and search by the police when compared to their white counterparts. In addition, BAME people were three times more likely to be arrested and sentenced for indictable offences. Further, a discussion of imprisonment rates points to the significant overrepresentation of BAME people when compared to both their white counterparts and their proportions within the general population. Where 15 people per 10,000 of the population are serving a custodial sentence, this figure increases to 44 per 10,000 for the ‘mixed’ group and 55 per 10,000 for the ‘black’ group (MOJ 2015).
The now almost predictable outputs of RCJS are often (mis)read as indicative of a black criminality. They are not. They are at best, a numerical representation of an individual’s encounters with the agencies of the CJS, providing a bureaucratic monitoring function of the system’s throughput. Such statistics cannot explain the
processes that result in differential outcomes for BAME people, a point acknowledged within the report, where ‘no causative links can be drawn from these summary statistics’ (MOJ 2015:7). Of concern then, the report ambiguously alludes to racial disparities, yet neglects to offer any meaningful explanation for this apparent ‘discrimination’. For example, the vexed issue of police stop and search and in particular the use of s60 of the Police and Criminal Evidence (PACE) Act, 1984 empowers the police to undertake ‘suspicionless’ (Bowling 2015) stop and searches of individuals where,
‘the police believe, with good reason, that there is a possibility of serious violence; that a person is carrying a dangerous object or offensive weapon; or that an incident involving serious violence has taken place and a dangerous instrument or offensive weapon used in the incident is being carried in the locality’ (MOJ 2012:44).
5 Whilst I acknowledge the criminal justice ‘system’ in England and Wales encompasses a large and
varied number of organisations, for our purpose, we isolate The Police Service, Her Majesty’s Court Services (HMCS) inclusive of Crown and Magistrates Courts, the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS), the National Offender Management Service (NOMS) and Her Majesty’s Prison Service (HMPS).
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The most recent data attests to the disproportionate use of s60 against Black people. For example, in 2007/08, just over a quarter (28%) of s60 stops were recorded as being carried out on BAME people, with 65% conducted on white people. Markedly, there has been a significant reversal in this trend where by 2010/11, 64% of s60 stops involved BAME people against 31% for white people. Whilst such findings are often subject to what Gilroy (1982) terms ‘empirical haggling’ the report serves to strategically silence claims of discriminatory policing practice, and yet serves to mediate and suggest to the reader an enduring association between black people and criminal behaviour. As alluded to above, such ideas have become intergenerationally mediated as an idiosyncrasy of black people in Britain, so alongside the official documents which uncritically affirm such criminal associations, it is through analysis of the mediation of such discourses which serves to consolidate the durability of the race and crime nexus.
Race and Crime nexus
Along with the bi-annual publication of statistics on race in the criminal justice system, a perennial concern within the sociology of deviance and the sub-discipline of Criminology has been the contentious debate as to the relationship between black people and crime. Whilst racializing concepts of black people as criminal can be detected within the early theories of Cesare Lombroso (Bowling and Phillips 2003, Spalek 2008), the following section is concerned with the emergence of recent academic criminological explanations as a method to appreciate the contemporary problematisation of the black people in Britain.
Included within Lea and Young’s (1984) ‘What is to be done about Law and Order’ was a specific chapter relating to what emerged as the ‘race and crime’ debate. Presented as an uncompromising rebuttal of criticisms put forward by Paul Gilroy and colleagues in a series of papers relating to ‘The Myth of Black Criminality’ (see Gilroy and Bridges, Gilroy, etc.). At the core of this debate lay the emergence of official police statistics, which attests to an overrepresentation of black people as involved in the offence of street robbery. Specifically, Lea and Young cite figures, which suggested that, 36% of victim reported crime of ‘robbery and violent theft’ in London was perpetrated by ‘coloureds’ (1984:140). For Lea and Young then, such figures were
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indicative of the ‘reality’ of black crime, which served to confirmed a shift in the criminal behaviour patterns of what was a previously crime-free or low crime cohort of the population. What Lea and Young succeeded in was the attribution of street robbery or ‘mugging’ (Hall et al 1978) as the preserve of black people, which in turn became characterised as a ‘black crime’.
Of particular relevance here, the race and crime debate was precipitated by the ‘Brixton Riots’ which took place between the 10th-12th April 1981, where it was reported
that up to 5000 people were involved in clashes between the police resulting in 280 injuries to police officers and some 45 injuries to members of the public. In addition, buildings and vehicles were damaged and notably, such imagery was for the first time, beamed into the homes of the British public (Fryer 1984, Marlow and Loveday 2000). Similarly, disorders also took place in many other cities across the country including the Moss Side area of Manchester (Scarman 1982, Fryer 1984, Bowling and Phillips 2004). For Gilroy et al, the emergence of ‘black crime’ was illustrative of the construction of ‘alien violence’ as an important and powerful discursive tool in the hands of ‘politicians and police officers’. It is against this backdrop that both political and importantly academic debate of such ‘alien violence’ facilitates and legitimises the growth and use of law and order apparatus, including military policing, through ‘a racist appeal to the British nation [which was] integral to maintaining popular support for the government in crisis conditions’ (Gilroy 1982:47).
‘[I]ndeed the recent history of 'law and order' characterised by an increasing authoritarianism is scarcely separable from the growth of popular racism and nationalism in the period following Enoch Powell's famous intervention’.
For now, Gilroy’s arguments which moved to situate the emergence of ‘black crime’