Under Siege: Poverty and Crime in a Public Housing Community

by Walter S. DeKeseredy West Virginia University, Shahid Alvi, Martin D. Schwartz, Andreas E. Tomaszewski

Overview

Under Siege is one of the first books of its kind. It vividly describes the devastating consequences of living in a public housing community damaged by the disappearance of manufacturing jobs, government cutbacks, and other alarming structural transformations that currently plague the United States and Canada. Walter DeKeseredy and his colleagues build on the rich theoretical perspectives developed by feminist scholars—as well as those constructed by Jock Young, Robert Sampson, and William Julius Wilson—as they present both the qualitative and quantitative results of a case study of six public housing estates located in an impoverished urban area.

This groundbreaking book provides an in-depth analysis of predatory crime victimization, intimate partner victimization, public racial and sexual harassment, and the relationship of all these harms to the residents' perceptions of their neighborhood social disorganization/collective efficacy. Under Siege is uniquely valuable both for its rich theoretical basis and for its transparent presentation of the authors' research methodology. It is a thought-provoking sociological contribution that offers progressive strategies for ameliorating both poverty and crime in North American public housing complexes.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780739105931
Publisher:	Lexington Books
Publication date:	08/18/2003
Pages:	200
Product dimensions:	6.22(w) x 9.22(h) x 0.79(d)

About the Author

Walter S. DeKeseredy is Professor of Sociology at Ohio University and Chair of the American Society of Criminology's Division on Critical Criminology. Shahid Alvi is Associate Professor of Sociology and Director of the Criminal Justice Program at the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul, Minnesota. Martin D. Schwartz is Professor of Sociology and Presidential Research Scholar at Ohio University. E. Andreas Tomaszewski is Assistant Professor of Sociology at Eastern Michigan University.

Table of Contents

Chapter 1 Preface
Chapter 2 The Historical, Political, and Economic Context of the West Town Study
Chapter 3 Predatory Crime Victimization, Illegal Drug Use, and Alcohol Consumption in West Town: Incidence and Sociodemographic Risk Factors
Chapter 4 Violence Against and the Harassment of Women in West Town
Chapter 5 The Role of Perceived Social Disorganization and Collective Efficacy
Chapter 6 The Failure of Neo-Conservative Policy
Chapter 7 Rethinking Crime Prevention in Public Housing
Chapter 8 Appendix A: The QNLS Instrument
Chapter 9 Appendix B: Face-to-Face Interview Schedule
Chapter 10 References

Editorial Reviews

Under Siege will become the book that researchers and housing advocates, as well as advocates for battered women, will have to cite. It is a groundbreaking study.

Claire Renzetti

This book exposes the raw reality of the impact of poverty and crime on the lives of Canada’s urban poor. It is about time that this book was written and that this reality was exposed.

Ron Hinch

This study is at the same time theoretically sophisticated and grounded in meticulous research. It presents a harrowing account of social exclusion in a Canadian public housing community which will cause the reader to substantially re-evaluate conventional wisdoms with regards to Canadian and U.S. differences in crime and poverty.

Jock Young