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An Assessment Of Cross-National Variation In Rates Of Incarceration, Ryan Spohn, Travis Linnemann
An Assessment Of Cross-National Variation In Rates Of Incarceration, Ryan Spohn, Travis Linnemann
Center on Children, Families, and the Law: Faculty Publications
Our theoretical approach compares the relative efficacy of multiple theories of law and social control. From a general social threat perspective, we find that variables reflecting the size of the unemployed youth population and general measures of income inequality have positive impacts on a nation's rates of incarceration. We also find partial support for one of Durkheim's laws of quantitative change and penal evolution, in that, all else equal, nations with a more authoritarian form of government utilize incarceration at a higher rate than their more democratic counterparts. We also find that the institutional anomie perspective, which has previously been …
Investigating Racial Disparity At The Detention Decision: The Role Of Respectability, Don L. Kurtz, Tavis Linnemann, Ryan Spohn
Investigating Racial Disparity At The Detention Decision: The Role Of Respectability, Don L. Kurtz, Tavis Linnemann, Ryan Spohn
Center on Children, Families, and the Law: Faculty Publications
A concern over inequity and the existence of racial disparity of youth served by the juvenile justice system has long been a topic of considerable interest among scholars, policymakers, and court officials. Numerous empirical studies undertaken by academics and various public and private organizations have attempted to shed some light on this phenomenon. Research findings on disproportionate minority contact have hardly been uniform, leaving much of this practice unexplained. This study uses data obtained at the detention decision point over a three-year period examining variance in juvenile case processing related to race. Findings suggest that extra-legal factors influencing the decision …
Is There Such A Thing As “Defended Community Homicide”?: The Necessity Of Methods Triangulation, Ryan Spohn
Is There Such A Thing As “Defended Community Homicide”?: The Necessity Of Methods Triangulation, Ryan Spohn
Center on Children, Families, and the Law: Faculty Publications
Data on homicides in Buffalo, New York, are analyzed to demonstrate the importance of “methods triangulation” for assessing the validity of quantitative measures. Defended community homicides are quantitatively operationalized as acts that occur in the offender’s community against a nonlocal victim. Poisson models provide strong support for the existence of defended community homicide, which is significantly more common in residentially stable and racially homogenous neighborhoods. However, subsequent qualitative analyses of the victim and offender characteristics and motives of these homicides undermine the “defended community” concept. Qualitative analyses are necessary to assess the validity of quantitative measures in criminological research.