Contingent Ties
Undercover Drug Officers' Use of Informants
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 7676901 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Bruce A Jacobs (corresponding author) |
| Year | 1997 |
| Volume | 48 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Pages | 35 |
| Publication date | 1997-03-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | British Journal of Sociology (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0007-1315 • E-ISSN: 1468-4446 |
| Publisher | JSTOR (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.2307/591909 |
| OpenAlex | W2331470162 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 4 |
| References cited | 14 |
No study yet has investigated the process by which undercover officers, as unfamiliar customers, use informants to dramaturgically integrate themselves into dealing circles. Drawing from semi-structured interviews with 24 undercover officers located in a midwestern US municipality, the present paper seeks to address this gap in three ways. First, the paper describes techniques officers use to justify their presence among dealers who have never seen them before. Second, the paper examines relationship claims officers make to explain the capacity in which they know the individuals, or informants, who introduce them. Third, the paper describes 'cutting out techniques'. Cutting out techniques are linguistic devices used by officers to remove informants from operations. Discussion offers the notion of contingent ties to conceptualize this process. The paper seeks to show the relevance of this concept beyond undercover operations, considering its broader sociological forms, dimensions, and implications
Criminology · Political science · Process (computing · Public relations · Relevance (law · Sociology · Computer Science · Crime Patterns and Interventions · Crime, Illicit Activities, and Governance · Law · Management and Organizational Studies · Psychology · Social Psychology
The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life
The Informant
Vice isn't nice
Some Dimensions of Altercasting
Observations on Police Undercover Work
Clustering and Structural Balance in Graphs
Qualitative Analysis for Social Scientists
Drifting into dealing
The Finishing Moment
Drug Entrepreneurs and Dealing Culture
The Milkman and his Customer
Growth, Politics, and the Stratification of Places
A Macrosociological Theory of Social Structure
The Strength of Weak Ties
| Unique citing works | 4 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 0,22 |
| Citation span | 2008 - 2025 (18) |
| Citation velocity | recent |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 4 |