Within and Between-Group Violence: Is Intergroup Violence More Likely to Occur Where Contiguous Neighborhoods Differ?

• In Event: Communities and Place: Setting an Agenda for Neighborhoods, Race, and Crime Research in the 21st Century

Abstract

A number of theoretical perspectives try to explain the origins of inter and intragroup conflict, largely focusing on how economic or racial/ethnic differences within neighborhoods might explain violent behavior. These theories have less routinely been applied to understanding conflict that may occur when differences exist between contiguous neighborhoods. We incorporate aspects of social disorganization theory, relative deprivation theory, and defended neighborhood perspectives to assess whether intergroup conflict is more likely to occur at the boundaries of neighborhoods where different groups come into contact. We use NIBRS data from a large representative city in the West to identify inter and intragroup crime incidents. In doing so, we determine whether violent crimes between members of different racial or ethnic groups are more likely to occur nearer to geographic areas where different racial or ethnic groups are juxtaposed, or where residents of different socioeconomic statuses abut.

Authors

• Lyndsay N. Boggess, University of South Florida

• Alyssa Chamberlain, Arizona State University