The Rise and Decline of Hard Drugs, Drug Markets, and Violence in Inner-City New York

Abstract

Introduction in the mid- to late 1990s, violent crime plummeted nationwide. The Uniform Crime Report (UCR 1998) program documented a 28 percent decline in homicides recorded by the police from 1993 to 1997 and similar or larger declines in robbery and aggravated assault. The National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) also identified a 21 percent decline in reported victimization for violent crimes (U.S. Dept. of Justice 1998). These statistics are discussed in detail in Chapters 2 and 9. This chapter examines the cultural changes behind the statistical trends. Violence is the outgrowth of personal interactions. The violence statistics thus reflect a propensity based on the way people are organized and interact. We suggest that the recent decline in violence reflects fundamental transformations in drug use and sales. This chapter focuses in detail on inner-city New York, our geographic area of greatest expertise. New York City has historically had the nation's largest number of heroin users and crack users, the largest and most diverse market for illegal drugs, and a disproportionate share of crime, violence, and disorder in public places (Musto 1973, 2000). Golub and Johnson (1997) found evidence to suggest that similar changes in recent drug use prevailed across much of the nation; this observation provides limited evidence to suggest that comparable subcultural transformations might have occurred in other locations.