San Diego State University The Social Disorganization Theory Discussion

you will be reading Chapter 6 in the textbook, reading the Introduction and Chapter 1 to Anderson’s Code of the Street, viewing the chapter slides, examining the case study, and completing the standard assignments in this course: Discussion Board #7.

Social disorganization theory focuses on the community environmental factors that may lead to crime, including poverty, breakdown of family and social institutions, high turnover of residents (i.e., many persons moving in and then out of the neighborhood), and lack of attachments to the community. Areas with these characteristics are said to be socially disorganized. The general concept of social disorganization theory, with its notion that crime varies between neighborhoods because those areas that experience social disorganization also experience more crime, has remained a powerful criminological perspective (Owens et al., 2019).

Within the concept of social disorganization theory is the idea of collective efficacy, which is defined as cohesion among neighborhood residents combined with shared expectations for informal social control of public space. The root of collective efficacy is the willingness of community residents to be involved with each other and to exercise informal control. Essentially, communities vary in their cohesiveness of relationships and the collective capacity for informal social control. Therefore, the level of crime and delinquency in a neighborhood depends on that neighborhood’s collective efficacy (Burfeind & Bartusch, 2016).

Social disorganization theorists pay a lot of attention to the question of how the state of a neighborhood might increase or decrease the likelihood of street delinquency.

Elijah Anderson’s Code of the Street emphasizes the struggles that poor inner-city black communities are forced to deal with on a daily basis–the main issues being interpersonal violence and aggression. The “code” is a set of informal rules governing interpersonal public behavior, including violence. Respect is at the heart of the code.

Your discussion board asks you to analyze social disorganization theory and apply Code of the Street.

Valenzuela, Sylvia, Paul Kaplan, and Stuart Henry (2013). Crime and Behavior. Cognella Press.

• Chapter 6: Social Ecology and Subcultural Theories
• Code of the Street: Introduction and Chapter 1
• Examine the following Case Study:

answer these questions with 250 words each:

1. Discuss the ways in which the social structural processes described in social disorganization theory influence behavior at the individual level. (Hint: Be sure to include material from the main text as well as Anderson’s Code of the Street).

What are some of the race, class, and gender concerns addressed by social disorganization theory? What race, class, and gender concerns go unaddressed in the theory? (Hint: Be sure to include material from the main text as well as Anderson’s Code of the Street).

APA STYLE

in text citation: (author name, year, p. page).