The (Ir)relevance of Social Ties for Neighborhood Crime: Examining the Moderating Influence of Disadvantage

• In Event: Exploring the Mechanisms Underlying Community Social Organization

Abstract

Some scholars have argued that neighborhood social ties are not necessary for developing collective efficacy, nor for fostering informal social control in neighborhoods. This contention is supported by the existence of neighborhoods with high levels of collective efficacy and low levels of crime, even when social ties among neighbors are weak or absent. We examine whether this apparent irrelevance of social ties is more likely to characterize affluent neighborhoods than poor neighborhoods. The challenging social context in poor neighborhoods, including lack of access to resources, greater distrust in police, and heightened fear of crime, may require greater familiarity and interaction among residents in order to develop meaningful levels of mutual trust, collective efficacy, and informal social control. We test this hypothesis using data from the Project on Human Development in Chicago Neighborhoods. First, we estimate models at the neighborhood level to test whether social ties have a stronger impact in disadvantaged neighborhoods for outcomes including collective efficacy, moral cynicism, and crime. Next, we estimate multilevel models to examine whether neighborhood social ties have a stronger effect on juvenile offending in disadvantaged neighborhoods.

Authors

• Jhon A. Pupo, Florida State University

• Brian Stults, Florida State University