Street Youth Research Articles

Situating gangs within Scotland\u2019s illegal drugs market(s)

The Scottish government’s (2008) publication ‘The road to recovery: A new approach to tackling Scotland’s drug problem’ elaborates and outlines the Scottish National Party’s (SNP) desire to make Scotland ‘drug free’ by 2019. To achieve this objective, the Scottish Government’s (2015) ‘Serious Organised Crime Strategy’ (SSOCS) entails dismantling networks of drug supply. Yet missing from this strategic planning is a) recognition of how, if at all, different types of gangs are involved in drug supply, and b) how drug supply processes actually work. Therefore, this article seeks to extend McLean’s (J Deviant Behav, 2017) Scottish gang model, which specifies a typology of gangs in Scotland, in an effort to locate precise levels of gang involvement in the drugs market. This is achieved by drawing upon Pearson and Hobbs’ (2001) hierarchical model of the UK’s illegal drug(s) market. In-depth interviews with 35 offenders involved in criminal networks and five practitioners, indicate that recreational Youth Street Gangs are really only involved in ‘social supply’. Youth Criminal Gangs are primarily involved in commercially motivated dealing at the low- to mid-levels, including bulk-buying between the retail-to-wholesale markets. And enterprising Serious Organised Crime Gangs operate from the middle-to-apex market level. Conclusions which situate this gang typology within the illegal drug market(s) are used to put forward recommendations aimed at dismantling of drug supply networks.

Emerging Street Youth Violent Groups in Musoma: What is the Role of Individual Parents’ Socio-Economic Status (SES)?

This study presents findings regarding violence among emerging street youth violent groups in Musoma, Tanzania using a total sample of 94 (M = 20.02 years, SD = 4.05) respondents purposefully selected from four violent groups. Specific objectives included: examining the variation in violence involvement among the violent groups; establishing the level of relationship between individual parents’ SES and the level of violent behaviour among the members of the violent groups; and examining to determine if individual parents’ SES is a significant predictor of the development of violence among members of the violent groups. Findings revealed higher level of involvement in violent behaviours among groups (M = 70.85, SD = 11.14). The ANOVA results indicated a statistical significant difference [F (3, 90) = 6.035, p = 0.001] in the mean scores of the level of involvement in violent behaviour among the violent groups comprised of members drawn from different socio-economic status. The contribution of parents’ socio-economic status (SES) on individual’s violent behaviours measured by multiple regression analysis was weak (R² =.112, p =.161). Thus, parents’ SES is a weak and non-statistical significant predictor for individual’s involvement in violence and violent acts. Thus, immediate intervention programmes such as establishment of rehabilitation centres and counselling services is recommended.

Challenging conceptions of young people as urban blight: Street children and youth’s ambiguous relationship with urban revitalization in Lima, Peru

Government officials, city planners and elites frequently position young people, especially street children and youth, as detrimental to revitalization, contributing to urban blight and needing removal. Through an examination of urban change in Lima, Peru, this article challenges the assumption that street children and youth exclusively detract from urban revitalization. Although many young people have been negatively affected by Lima’s revitalization, I argue that conflict does not tell the whole story. Street children and youths’ reactions are often more ambiguous than many assume, and young people may even be central to some efforts to improve urban space. Further, an examination of street children and youths’ informal and formal efforts to negotiate public space reveals the importance of relationships to perceptions of urban change and the success of various urban revitalization efforts. Such relationships are often overlooked in binaries that represent street children and youth as either a problem or, less typically, the solution. Instead, this research indicates the need for a more nuanced understanding of young peoples’ relationship with the uneven production of urban space.

Eldoret, Kenya: Creating a Music Experience for Street Youth

Eldoret, Kenya: Creating a Music Experience for Street Youth

Street Youth, Social Schemas, and Crime

Utilizing 400 youths living on the street, the article examines the social schematic theory of crime developed by Simons and Burt. It explores the role homelessness, physical abuse, emotional neglect, violent victimization, and peers play in the development of criminogenic knowledge structures (CKSs). It then examines the associations between adverse experiences, the CKS, and crime. Results show that deviant peers mediate the relationships between physical abuse, homelessness, violent victimization, and the CKS, while emotional neglect is directly associated with the CKS. The CKS in turn is directly linked to crime along with peers, homelessness, and violent victimization. The CKS also mediates the relationships between deviant peers and offending, and emotional neglect and offending. The relationships between physical abuse, homelessness, violent victimization, and crime are mediated by deviant peers. Furthermore, these relationships are also serially mediated through deviant peers and the CKS. Avenues for future research and policy implications are discussed.

Delinquency Among Members of Hong Kong Youth Street Gangs: The Role of the Organizational Structures of Gangs and Triad Affiliations.

This study explores the importance of organizational structures and formal affiliations with the Hong Kong triads to delinquency among youth street gang members in Hong Kong. More specifically, this study examines the relative importance of the number of organizational structures and triad affiliation to patterns of delinquency in a sample of active members of youth street gangs ( N = 201). With the aid of outreach social workers, a convenience sampling method was used to recruit a gender-balanced sample of at-risk youths. Logistic regression analysis of the survey data that was gathered indicated that formal affiliation to Hong Kong triads and the presence of organizational structures significantly increased the odds of delinquency (independently of each other). Suggestions for future research on gang membership and delinquency, with particular reference to the Asian context, are provided.

The urban and virtual rhetoric of tcharmil: display, violence and resistance

ABSTRACT‘Three years after the “Arab Springs”, “operation tcharmil” resembles a postrevolutionary suspense, a police enigma where the culprits are known and the crime has yet to be discovered’ (Florence Aubenas, Le Monde, 4 August, 2014) This paper revolves around Tcharmil, whose spatial and structural manifestations (i.e. in urban and internet spaces) signal a paradigmatic shift in the existing simple and straightforward meanings of youth violence. It recommends a way to link youth subcultures with the rising spirit of banditry, while minding the broad context of social resistance to political stagnancy as well as the deterioration of fundamental sectors, such as health, education, security, etc. In so doing we could further intensify the diverging symptoms of Moroccan youth’s being in the world as well as register the characteristics worth deriving from youth phenomena. By the same token, we aspire to contribute to a far more adept reading of urban youth practices and new (sub)cultural stipulations. The accounts of mcharmlin are therefore vigorous texts for the inspection of conceptual categories like street violence, urban dynamics, youth resistance and counter-power.

Freedom, mobility and marginality: an interdisciplinary study of the historical roots of contemporary street youth in urban Brazil

ABSTRACTThis study is focused on the lives of street youth in urban Brazil through an interdisciplinary and cross-historical approach, providing a conceptual analysis of three different but interconnected sources of knowledge: A historical study of vagrants in the 1800s by [Fraga Filho, Walter. (1996). Mendigos, Moleques e Vadios na Bahia do Século XIX. São Paulo: HUCITEC/EDUFBa], the novel Jubiába by [Amado, Jorge. ([1935] 1984). Jubiába. New York: Avon Books] on the life of a youth on the streets in the 1930s, and empirical material from a current ethnography of boys and young men on the street. This approach facilitates a broader perspective on stability and change regarding the dynamics of street life, allowing cross-historical themes to surface. It reveals how young men on the street challenge socio-spatial and moral boundaries. While their marginal position empowers them and increases their mobility, it also encumbers their trajectories. The conclusion arrived at is that marginality and mobility are closely interlinked, as marginality is not only the cause but also consequence of mobility, and sometimes even the obstruction of it.

THE NEED OF INTERDISCIPLINARY PARTNERSHIP IN RECREATION AREA TO WORK WITH STREET YOUTH

Both Europe and Lithuania aim at involving youth into the activities, encouraging their activeness and participation in social life. The article analyzes the social work with street youth. The initiatives of social work in informal environments of a city streets by applying interactive methods, interfering with creative-artistic or sports leisure activities are discussed. The results of the research carried out highlighted the need of interdisciplinary partnership in recreation area to work with street youth.

The social dimensions of gambling among street youth in Mumbai: Is it really an addiction?

This mixed-methods, exploratory study investigates the gambling activities of street youth in Mumbai, India. Data from surveys and brief interviews of 70 youth aged 12–24, two focus groups, and ethnographic observations offer descriptive snapshots of the gambling behavior of participants. The article includes details about games played, popular venues, initiation patterns, time spent gambling, and interactions with the police. Street youth gamble for social benefits, such as group membership and fun; it is also a leisure activity enabling time to go by quickly. Individual benefits include intermittent rewards and a high after winning or being referred to as a gambler. The inability to save, the lack of recreation options, living in groups, and the environment of the streets structure and sustain gambling. This study discusses the group and social dimension of gambling among street youth, and how this dimension makes their participation different from adolescent gambling in general and General Addictions Theory. It contributes to the literature by emphasizing that for street youth the social/group aspects of gambling predominate the psychological. The paper concludes with a discussion of the implications for practice, highlighting the need to develop recreational, income-saving, and educational awareness programs.

Book review: David Brotherton, Youth Street Gangs: A Critical Appraisal

Book review: David Brotherton, <i>Youth Street Gangs: A Critical Appraisal</i>

Stepping Into the Shoes of Street Youth: A Scholarly Walk

Stepping Into the Shoes of Street Youth: A Scholarly Walk

Constraints, Incentives and Pockets of Local Order on the Streets of Pelotas, Brazil

This article investigates the life experiences of 19 young people on the streets of Pelotas, southern Brazil. Manifold methods were used revealing several highly interconnected aspects in their realities. This study, which was conducted for a period of seven years (2009–2016), illustrates how the studied street youths form their environments physically, socially and mentally in order to reach their goals and create the multiple means of survival in challenging street environment. It is important to understand heterogeneous, interrelated physical, sociocultural and mental elements to study subjectively experienced realities. Personally experienced multidimensional constraints and incentives and the individual’s own goals shape these realities.

Paying for Sex by Young Men Who Live on the Streets in Dhaka City: Compounded Sexual Risk in a Vulnerable Migrant Community

PurposeDhaka City is home to thousands of migrants from Bangladesh's rural areas who often live in the streets. Prior studies examine street youth's practice of selling sex as a survival mechanism. We assess their less-studied practice of paying for sex and its association with sexual risk behaviors and outcomes. MethodsAs part of the global Link Up project, trained interviewers recruited 447 young men who live on the streets, ages 15–24, from seven Dhaka City “hotspots” to participate in a survey about sexual health. Among those who ever had sex, we examined frequencies and conducted bivariate analyses of sociodemographic characteristics by paying for sex status. We then conducted bivariate and multivariate logistic regression analyses of paying for sex in the last 12 months and sexual health behaviors and outcomes. ResultsMedian participant age was 18 years. Among those who ever had sex (N = 321), 80% reported paying for sex in the last 12 months and 15% reported selling sex in the last 12 months. In multivariate analyses, those who paid for sex had significantly increased odds of reporting sexually transmitted infection–related symptoms in the last six months (adjusted odds ratio = 1.76, 95% confidence interval [CI] = 1.17–2.64) and engaging in unprotected last sex with a nonprimary partner (adjusted odds ratio = 2.19, CI = 1.58–3.03). ConclusionsThe adverse factors associated with paying for sex among young men who live on the streets in Dhaka City highlight the need for programs to educate on HIV/sexually transmitted infection prevention and promote condom use, STI screening/treatment, and HIV testing in this population.

Health literacy and self-perceived health status among street youth in Kumasi, Ghana

Street youth often have poor health. A number of studies have been commissioned across contexts to appreciate and address the problem. Conspicuously missing from extant researches about street yout...

Youth, Poetry, and Zines: Rewriting the Streets as Home

This article focuses on an under-examined archive of young adult literature�words and images created by, for, and about street youth. We describe how street-identified youth use poetry and various forms of cultural jamming to engage in social commentary. Drawn from the pages of a street youth zine developed in a western Canadian city, the poems and images analyzed here illustrate the ways the youth writers remix popular cultural materials such as signs, songs and alphabet books to create new scripts about drugs, homelessness, and youth. In this literature of the streets, youth rewrite the discourses of homelessness and create new storylines that critique the way society serves its citizens. We argue that this archive also asks adult readers, critics, and teachers to rethink traditional categories of YA literature to include writings produced by and for underrepresented youth.

Toronto Healthcare Services and Barriers to Access for Street-Involved Youth: Analysis of the Enhanced Street Youth Surveillance (E-SYS)

Toronto Healthcare Services and Barriers to Access for Street-Involved Youth: Analysis of the Enhanced Street Youth Surveillance (E-SYS)

Contradictory and Intersecting Patterns of Inclusion and Exclusion of Street Youth in Salvador, Brazil

Drawing on longitudinal qualitative research in Brazil involving participant observation and narrative interviews with young homeless persons, and semi-structured interviews with middle class residents, local businesses, and patrolling police officers, three overlapping yet contradictory dimensions of inclusion and exclusion are developed. First the hegemonic exclusionary discourse that tends to produce stigmatizing labels on poor people in general, and boys and young men on the street in particular, is mapped out. Second, socio-spatial exclusionary mechanisms involving architectural measures, surveillance cameras and violent policing, guarding the neighbourhood from stigmatised ‘others’ are examined. Third, the less recognised but equally important inclusionary mechanisms, facilitating street life and enabling a sense of belonging among young homeless people are explored. A simplistic and unidimensional conceptualisation of social exclusion is critiqued while demonstrating the multifaceted, intertwined, and contradictory character of homeless people’s social relationships with middle class residents, businesses, and police. Furthermore, the exclusion/inclusion dualism that is vivid in the existing literature is questioned. It is suggested that a nuanced picture is vital to increasing our understanding of the everyday lives of homeless populations and that further investigation and theorization of their exclusion as well as inclusion is needed.

Self-Control, Social Consequences, and Street Youths’ Attitudes towards Police

Data from a self-report survey of 400 homeless street youths are used to explore the relationship between self-control and negative orientations towards the police. The study examines whether the relationship is direct and/or mediated through its association with deviant attitudes, criminal peers, police contacts, criminal behaviour, and homelessness – factors found in past research to have been linked to young people’s attitudes towards police. Findings reveal that self-control is directly associated with negative attitudes towards the police. This relationship is mediated by deviant attitudes, criminal peers, police contacts, and criminal participation. The study shows the importance of recognizing both the direct and the indirect relationship of self-control with attitudes towards police in marginal populations as well as specifying the continued importance of various street life factors in understanding the way youth perceive the police.

Christine Guionnet et Sophie Rétif (dir.), Exploiter les difficultés méthodologiques. Une ressource pour l’analyse en sciences sociales , Presses universitaires de Rennes, 2015, 175 p.

Christine guionnet and Sophie Retif, eds., Exploiter les difficultes methodologiques. Une ressource pour l'analyse en sciences sociales [Making use of methodological difficulties: a resource for social science analysis], Presses universitaires de Rennes, 2015, 175 p.Now that social science researchers are expected to demonstrate clear epistemological thinking, they may be tempted to try to achieve a kind of perfect axiological neutrality through rigorous application of methods and techniques. And in such a context, any methodological difficulties encountered in the various research stages may be experienced as stumbling blocks and lead to feelings of discomfort and illegitimacy. The result is that everyone - students and experienced researchers alike - tend to smooth such difficulties. To counter that tendency, to lay bare the difficulties researchers may encounter and show how they can be analysed and used to fuel thinking on research subjects, Christine Guionnet formed a group of researchers from the Centre for research on policy action in Europe (CRAPE) and the Nantes Centre for sociology. This work delivers their thinking. In emphasizing the heuristic value of the difficulties, the work is both a pedagogical argument for gaining proper perspective on the obstacles researchers encounter in their fieldwork and indeed rehabilitating them, and an invitation to researchers to integrate analysis of the meaning of such difficulties more systematically into their scientific work. In this respect, it is for both experienced researchers and beginners.Most of the book's seven chapters discuss fieldwork experiences and difficulties. In the first contribution, Beatrice Damian-Gaillard and Mathieu Trachman present the difficulties they had to cope with during two surveys on pornography use in France. Problems envisaged at the outset - here, entering a perceived as fairly opaque and inaccessible and the need to justify studying a illegitimate subject in an academic context - may prove quite different from the ones encountered in the field. For the female researcher, the main problem turned out to be sexualisation of the survey relationship, whereas the male researcher was compelled to objectify the effects of his male socialization, specifically in connection with female sexuality. The dialogue between the two researchers shows how their personal characteristics - particularly sex and age - influenced their relationship to respondents and clarifies the identities respondents ascribed to them in the as subjects and objects of desire.Chapter 2, by Sami Zegnani, examines how working in a presumably close to the researcher affects that researcher while discussing the assumptions that such proximity elicit not only in respondents but also other researchers. The sociologist in question, originally from a sensitive or rough neighbourhood, was studying three groups with roots in neighbourhoods of the same type (street youth, Salafi Muslims, and rap musicians). He shows that the distantiation requirement that followed from his presumed insider status proved largely irrelevant. Without denying the advantages he enjoyed due to his origins and local embeddedness and ties, he details all the strategies he had to develop for adapting to the and respondents, especially when it came to winning respondents' trust while maintaining distance and circulating within relatively closed groups. He seeks to demystify the widespread idea that 'native' ethnographers fit naturally into the field (p. 69) and to move beyond the insider/ outsider binary opposition so as to analyse more effectively what our relationship to the may tell us about the phenomena under study.The issue of variation in interviewer-respondent interaction by personal characteristics of all parties is likewise the subject of Sylvie Ollitrault's contribution. A political scientist, she reviews her twenty years of research on French environmentalist movements, offering a diachronic perspective on how research difficulties changed over the course of her career. …