This paper will serve to make an attempt to correlate the similarities of the social disorganization theory and organized crime, and evaluate the similarities of the political machine and organized crime as they apply to social disorganization. The study of crime has produced several theories; those that apply to organized crime are centered on how organized crime functions, and the relationship between the social environment and the individual and group within. According to Lyman and Potter "Some researchers link criminality to social conditions prevalent in neighborhoods. Many of them believe that the reasons crime rates are high in these areas are urban decay, a general deterioration of the ecology of inner cities, and general social and familial deterioration." (Lyman, Potter, 2007) Organized Crime is supposed to have structure and follow a regimented sequence that follows patterns during its day-to-day operations.
Code of the Street In the ethnographic book, Code of the Street, Elijah Anderson, a professor of sociology at Yale University, makes some interesting and insightful assessments amid his in-depth examination of the many pertinent issues surrounding the economical, educational and social factors that exist in the urban community. These developmental conditions affect its social organization, shape the urban culture and heavily contribute to the aggression and youth violence that is so prevalent today. Some of the major problems that plague the impoverished inner city black community are that of the persistent poverty as well as the widespread violence that the young inflict on one another. Professor Anderson attempts to generally approach and address the question of why the quality of life is consistently compromised for so many inhabitants within urban communities. The book discusses that in addition to the alienation that the people who are struggling financially and reside in poor inner city neighborhoods feel from mainstream America, there is still yet another division within this confine, that is of the “decent” family in opposition to the “street” family.
Analysis of James Baldwin’s “Harlem” Cameron Wong James Baldwin knows the Harlem ghettos in New York City are grim and unforgiving. His familiarity with the neighborhood is showcased in his essay, “Harlem”. In it, Baldwin utilizes imagery, syntax, and detailed language to achieve his goal of evoking a little sympathy for his hometown and perhaps encouraging others to take action against the discreet injustice that takes place there. Baldwin strives to open the eyes of the rest of the world to how miserable life is for a Harlem resident. Baldwin’s essay begins with short, repetitious sentences stating the main idea of his paper: how Harlem and all its inhabitants are hated by white people.
In 1877 Riis became a police reporter for the New York Tribune. Knowing the struggle of life in urban poverty, Riis was fixated on utilizing this opportunity to employ his writing abilities to communicate and raise awareness of this inhumane treatment that was present in a “civilized society” to the public. He ceaselessly claimed that the "poor were the victims rather than the makers of their fate.”
Cameron Ohlin Baldwin’s Harlem In his essay entitled, “Fifth Avenue, Uptown: A Letter from Harlem,” James Baldwin composes a masterful description of the slum that is Harlem, New York. Baldwin takes the reader on a journey through the “colorless, bleak, and revolting” streets that make up Harlem. He portrays the white policeman as a soldier, prepared for war at a moments notice. While Baldwin’s essay is of upmost seriousness, he discovers a way to incorporate irony and even sarcasm into his writing. Baldwin shows his knowledge of the streets history as he describes how Harlem began and gradually became the ghetto that it is today.
McMath, Jr., Edward C. American Populism: A Social history 1877-1898. Hill and Wang, 1992, 211 I believe that McMath wrote the book because he wanted the reader to understand the hardships of the lower classes back in the populism era. He gave us key area’s to look at such as New York and Texas. It shows how the workers and farmers were treated unfairly as well as looked down upon by the upper class. He captures the populism of that time from the strikes all the way to the farmer’s debt.
Candace Allen Mr. Barrios World History AP-6 6 September 2012 While Egypt and Mesopotamia had similar class systems, they were very different in the use and importance of slavery in their respective civilizations. Egypt and Mesopotamia both possessed similar class systems with the separation of the nobles, priests, and politicians, who were known as the elites, the artisans, soldiers, and farmers, known as the free commoners, and at the bottom of the class system were the slaves. This separation was important to the overall productivity of the city. The level of definition that was placed on the class system depended on the government and the different levels of treatment that lower level citizens received in society. Both the Egyptian
Ethan Carpenter Poetry Analysis Dr. Lockridge 2/14/13 Wilmington Delaware by Nikki Giovanni The poem “Wilmington Delaware” written by Nikki Giovanni in 1967 is about the oppression and hard experiences that many impoverished African Americans experienced in the city during that time. The speaker emphasizes the separation of classes by referring to the chemical company DuPont, which is a renowned and wealthy company in Delaware, as the antagonist. This company focuses its industry towards the production of chemical goods, and is responsible for giving off large amounts of pollution to the environment. The poem compares Wilmington to “a funni Negro” who is often mistreated even though he works as hard as a he can to get by. This poem describes the feeling of stress, intimidation, and unequal treatment of blacks in Wilmington.
The setting of A Raisin in the Sun is a ghetto in Chicago, where most blacks lived. Colas goes on to explain how these districts consisted of over priced, over crowded and poorly maintained apartments and homes; and that in the ghettos the crime rates were high and public services were limited. Colas also lets us know that most blacks living in the ghetto had hopes of leaving to move to better suburban neighborhoods, but segregated housing kept them stuck in the ghetto. An interesting fact that Colas brought out was that the housing industry was the greatest cause of segregated housing in Chicago; within the housing industry many social scientist observed that real estate agencies play the largest role in maintaining segregated communities. He also revealed that real estate agents made enormous profits manipulating whites with the fears of integration.
The methodology of their studies was based on the comparisons of cities with high and low levels of segregation and the effects on the society based on the changes in those levels of segregation. study gives credence to the argument that the isolation of the black community was a driving force for the concentrations of poverty within black urban neighborhoods. Economic dislocation is held responsible for the many of the societal problems that these communities grapple with. It is concisely argued that the withdraw of economic resources within the black urban communities were instrumental in the creation of what they call the “underclass.” It was through this economic restructuring, of the cities in which the majority of African-Americans lived, that the opportunities for a large demographic effectively disappeared. The trends of isolation of poor communities demonstrate the negative effects of a downward spiral of poverty that continually worsens its