Major Crime In The African American Community

Statement of the Problem
The problem of major crime in the African American community can be characterized as the greatest challenge since the civil rights movement of the 1960’s. Today in many African American communities across the nation there is an ever-present issue facing many African American citizens, and this is the problem of the high incidence of major crimes committed by African Americans. The problem of major crime in the African American community is multi-faceted. In the categories of crime that Americans fear the most, Rape, Robbery, Simple Assault, Aggravated Assault, and Murder, statistics constantly describe the involvements of African American in these crime categories. According to the CDC in Atlanta, the problem of major…show more content…
In this research this is operationalized as the percent of African American families in the United States in the last five years that had a higher than average percentage of single parent homes as compared to the other races in the United States. The rationale is that the African American family structure in the strongest factor in understanding why major crime rates are so high. A 1988 study published in the Journal of Research on Crime and Delinquencies found that the rates of violent crime in a community correlated directly with the proportion of single-parent households in the community.
The disintegration of the African American family may account for the higher major crime rate among African Americans but there are other factors that have an impact as well.
Poverty (H2) – In this research this variable is operationalized as the percent of African American citizens in the United States in the last five years that had an average income of less than…show more content…
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