Social disorder and the criminalization of indolence

Bibliographic Data

ID12581005
AuthorsVincenzo Ruggiero (0000-0002-4090-849X, Xerox (United Kingdom), corresponding author)
Year2010
Volume14
Issue1-2
Pages164-169
Publication date2010-02-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueCity (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1360-4813 • E-ISSN: 1470-3629
PublisherTaylor & Francis (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/13604810903529084
OpenAlexW2054239234
LanguageEN
Citations received4
References cited2

Social disorder is constructed in particular ways around certain groups, and widely used to serve certain particular interests. It may contribute to mobilizing despair as a political weapon rather than demands for justice. Appropriated by powerful groups, and turned into fear, it reflects, reshapes and reinforces the status quo (Shirlow and Pain, 2003). In common understandings ‘social disorder’ is associated with behaviour involving potentially threatening strangers, ‘verbal harassment on the street, open solicitation for prostitution, public intoxication and rowdy groups of young males in public’ (Sampson, 2009, p. 1). Physical disorder, in turn, is typically referred to markers such as graffiti, abandoned cars, garbage and the proverbial ‘broken window’. In the following pages I will deal with some neglected aspects of the debate on social disorder, arguing that fear in public spaces transcends the potential criminal nature of the threat experienced. Through a brief historical excursus, social disorder will be linked with the perception of certain groups as troublesome individuals, useless young people who fail to act as consumers. I will suggest that what is feared, in other words, is less the criminal capacity of these groups than their indolence, their absence from markets and their relative deprivation

Criminalization · Criminology · Sociology · Crime Patterns and Interventions · Crime, Deviance, and Social Control · Criminal Justice and Corrections Analysis · Psychology

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