|
Abstract
|
VioLit summary:
OBJECTIVE:
The purpose of this article by Goldstein was to describe how drugs and violence can be connected using drugs as an etiological component in the relationship.
METHODOLOGY:
A non-experimental review of the literature in drugs and violence and the author's previous work was used for this study.
FINDINGS/DISCUSSION:
The author argued that drug use, in addition to the social context in which it occurs, is an important factor in many social phenomena; this is especially true for violence. There were three models described of how drugs and violence are connected: psychopharmacological, economically compulsive, and the systematic. These three could be overlapping and were discussed as "ideal types" which would assist in understanding what we know and give guidance to further research. Psychopharamological violence suggests that some individuals, as a result of short or long term ingestion of specific substances, may become excitable, irrational, and may exhibit violent behavior; the most relevant substances were listed as alcohol, stimulants, barbiturates, and PCP with more recent literature discrediting these claims for opiates and marijuana. Withdrawal symptoms for opiates, however, were also seen as possible sources for drug-related tension. Some drugs, it was reported, may lessen violent impulses. Drug use, it was stated, could inspire violence from the offender or the victim's actions. The victim, it was claimed, may behave in such a way as to assist or bring about their victimization. Economic compulsive violence suggested that some drug users engage in economically oriented violent crime to support costly drug use. Heroin and cocaine were listed as the most relevant substances. The violence was reported to be more likely in the circumstances surrounding a non-violent crime than from an impulse to act violently. Victims could be about anybody but are most likely to be persons living in the same neighborhood as the offender or others who have come into the neighborhood to buy drugs. Systemic violence referred to the occasion when violence was intrinsic to the involvement with any illicit substance; this applied to the traditionally aggressive patterns of interaction within the system of drug distribution and use. Examples were given as these: 1) disputes over territory, 2) violence committed dealing with hierarchies and enforcing codes, 3) robberies of drug dealers and violent retaliation, 4) elimination of informers, 5) punishment for selling bad drugs, 6) punishment for failure to pay debts, 7) disputes over drugs and/or paraphernalia, and 8) robbery violence related to the social ecology of copping areas. Becoming more active in the drug distribution process increased the risk of becoming a victim or perpetrator of systemic violence. Victims were most likely to be those involved in the use or trafficking, but occasionally noninvolved individuals would become innocent victims (such as in the case of the stray bullet). The conceptual framework, it was argued, allows an event to be effectively analyzed and broken down into constituent parts and processes; as the concepts are employed, a fuller understanding of the event emerges. Data available were reported to be inadequate because qualitative data are not amenable to making national projections and quantitative data do not have enough information. Uniform Crime Reports includes only those reported crimes and the National Crime Survey cannot give full information for motivation of offenders and specifics of drug involvement.
EVALUATION:
Models which help to organize knowledge into a comprehensible basis for understanding are in great need in the field of drugs and crime in general, and drugs and violence in particular. This article makes a contribution in this regard. It would appear that all logical elements of how drugs and violence might be associated are included. Testing, particularly with better data, is needed to both determine the viability and extent of drug-related violence with solid empirical data. (CSPV Abstract - Copyright © 1992-2007 by the Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence, Institute of Behavioral Science, Regents of the University of Colorado)
KW - Literature Review
KW - Drug Trafficking
KW - Drug Related Violence
KW - Drug Use Effects
KW - Substance Use Effects
KW - Substance Use-Violence Co-Occurence
KW - Violence Causes
KW - Adult Violence
KW - Adult Offender
KW - Adult Substance Use
KW - Offender Substance Use |