NSmolenskiFan on Nostr: Fascinating piece on the anthropology and economics of prison gangs. ⬇️ Gangs, ...
Fascinating piece on the anthropology and economics of prison gangs. ⬇️
Gangs, like clans, are a form of governance that arises organically when populations reach a certain *scale.* Exploding prison populations in certain U.S. states (Texas, California, New York, Chicago) mean that prison officials can’t effectively govern them all. Gangs step in to fill the void.
Political economist David Skarbek: “So each of these is consistent with a causal claim that big, diverse communities that can’t rely on official governance tend to form gangs. If you look at clan-based societies, they’re socially organized in a very similar way. And I hadn’t discovered this clan literature until I finished writing my book. But clans form when there are not strong and effective state based institutions, and when groups are large enough that they can’t rely on these informal mechanisms. So there’s a similar phenomena arising in certain times and places like we might expect.”
https://asteriskmag.com/issues/08/why-we-have-prison-gangs
Gangs, like clans, are a form of governance that arises organically when populations reach a certain *scale.* Exploding prison populations in certain U.S. states (Texas, California, New York, Chicago) mean that prison officials can’t effectively govern them all. Gangs step in to fill the void.
Political economist David Skarbek: “So each of these is consistent with a causal claim that big, diverse communities that can’t rely on official governance tend to form gangs. If you look at clan-based societies, they’re socially organized in a very similar way. And I hadn’t discovered this clan literature until I finished writing my book. But clans form when there are not strong and effective state based institutions, and when groups are large enough that they can’t rely on these informal mechanisms. So there’s a similar phenomena arising in certain times and places like we might expect.”
https://asteriskmag.com/issues/08/why-we-have-prison-gangs