Socioeconomic Change and Homicide in A Transitional Society

Datos Bibliográficos

ID2277243
AutoresW A Pridemore (0000-0002-5553-8698, Indiana University, autor de correspondencia), Kim Sang-Weon (Dong-Eui University), Sang-Weon Kim (Dong-Eui University, South Korea)
Año2007
Volumen48
Número2
Páginas229-251
Fecha de publicación2007-05-01
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessSí
TipoARTICLE
RevistaSociological Quarterly (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 0038-0253 • E-ISSN: 1533-8525
EditorialInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1111/j.1533-8525.2007.00077.x
PMID19043617
PMCIDPMC2587340
OpenAlexW2163063454
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas10
Referencias citadas58

Durkheim argued that rapid social change would produce anomic conditions which, in turn, would lead to increases in criminal and deviant behavior. Russia provides a unique opportunity to test this theory given the large-scale fundamental socioeconomic changes occurring in the nation. Russian homicide rates more than doubled in the years following the dissolution of the Soviet Union and are now among the highest in the world. The pace and effects of the socioeconomic transition vary widely throughout Russia, however, as do rates of and changes in violent crime. In this study, we took advantage of the unique natural experiment of the collapse of the Soviet Union to examine the association between socioeconomic change and homicide. We measured the negative effects of socioeconomic change by creating an index of changes in population size, unemployment, privatization, and foreign investment. Using data from Russian regions (n = 78) and controlling for other structural covariates, regression results indicated that regions that more strongly experienced the negative effects of socioeconomic change were regions where homicide rates increased the most between 1991 and 2000. Further analysis of the individual components of this index revealed that regions with greater increases in (1) unemployment experienced greater increases in homicide rates and (2) privatization experienced smaller increases in homicide rates

Demographic economics · Development economics · Economic growth · Economics · Environmental health · Geography · Homicide · Poison control · Population · Socioeconomic status · Socioeconomics · Sociology · Suicide prevention · Unemployment · Crime Patterns and Interventions · Demography · Health disparities and outcomes · Medicine · Terrorism, Counterterrorism, and Political Violence