Skip Navigation

This Article
Right arrow Full Text (PDF)
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
Right arrow Email this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Add to My Personal Archive
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrowRequest Permissions
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by JUNGER, M.
Right arrow Search for Related Content
Social Bookmarking
Add to CiteULike   Add to Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us  
What's this?

The British Journal of Criminology 30:493-502 (1990)
© 1990 Centre for Crime & Justice Studies (formerly ISTD)

RESEARCH-ARTICLE

STUDYING ETHNIC MINORITIES IN RELATION TO CRIME AND POLICE DISCRIMINATION

Answer to Bowling

MARIANNE JUNGER*

*Marianne Junger, Research and Documentation Centre, Ministry of Justice, The Netherlands

In this paper I reply to most of the remarks made by Bowling (1990). Bowling seems to have no confidence in either self-report data or arrest data. He argues that blacks (or ethnic minorities) are no more involved in crime than autochthons but that they are discriminated against by the police (and by society at large). Finally, he seems to argue that there is no association between family integration and crime among blacks. My answer to Bowling is divided into four sections. First, Bowling distorts what I did in looking for correlates of crime. He seems to argue that it is unacceptable to situate the causes of crime, in part, in the lack of family integration of respondents. In my study social control was used to look for factors which relate to crime in every ethnic group included in my study. I do not think this is looking for ‘criminogenic black family structure’. Secondly, I explain that self-report delinquency data are not equally valid for different ethnic groups. The differences occur between whites and blacks on the one side (low level of discrepancies) and Turks and Moroccans on the other side (high level of discrepancies); and not between Dutch on the one hand and other ethnic minorities on the other hand as Bowling states. Thirdly, for an explanation of the occurrence of discrepancies I have looked at social control variables and not as Bowling indicates, at ‘culture’. Fourthly, Bowling does not have any confidence in arrest data. He argues that blacks (or ethnic minorities) are no more involved in crime than autochthons but that they are discriminated against by the police (and by society at large). I will state that there is a large body of studies in many West European and North American countries which show that racial discrimination does not in any important way influence arrest data.


Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us    What's this?




Disclaimer: Please note that abstracts for content published before 1996 were created through digital scanning and may therefore not exactly replicate the text of the original print issues. All efforts have been made to ensure accuracy, but the Publisher will not be held responsible for any remaining inaccuracies. If you require any further clarification, please contact our Customer Services Department.