Order without Law? Gangs and Other Forms of Alternative Social Order in and Beyond the Prison

Suggested hashtag for Twitter users: #LSEgangs

LSE Debating Law public debate

Dr Insa KochAssistant Professor in Law and Anthropology, LSE

Dr Lisa McKenzieFellow in the Department of Sociology, LSE

Dr David SkarbekSenior Lecturer in Political Economy, King’s College London

Professor Nicola LaceyChair, LSE

The prison’s economy includes “cooks, painters, restaurateurs, carpenters, electricians, cleaners, accountants, [artisans], and doctors.”

1851 present1957 1970

no prison gangs exist

prisongangs form

prison gangs

dominate

The Puzzle of Prison Gangs

Never rat. Don’t be nosy. Don’t gossip. Don’t lie.Don’t steal. Pay your debts. Don’t weaken. Don’t whine.

0

5,000

10,000

15,000

20,000

25,000

30,000

1851

1856

1861

1866

1871

1876

1881

1886

1891

1896

1901

1906

1911

1916

1921

1926

1931

1936

1941

1946

1951

1956

1961

1966

Total California Inmate Population, 1851-1970

prison gangs form

020,00040,00060,00080,000

100,000120,000140,000160,000180,000200,000

1851

1858

1865

1872

1879

1886

1893

1900

1907

1914

1921

1928

1935

1942

1949

1956

1963

1970

1977

1984

1991

1998

2005

2012

Total California Inmate Population, 1851-2014

prison gangs form

“We need to keep the boys in line. If one of our guys is a hot head or something and is always shooting off his mouth it can get everyone into trouble.

We don’t want a lockdown, we don’t want a riot…If one of my guys is messing up then we either offer him up to the other guys or we take him down ourselves.”

Trammell 2009, 763-764

“Well, we don’t fight in a riot and stuff unless we have to…If I’m locked down, then I’m not working. You can make some serious bank in prison and shot-callers hate it when you’re in lockdown”

Trammell 2011

‘there’s definitely not a gang scene going on’

‘It’s not really like there’s a gang that runs the prison’

‘where you heard of this gang thing?, I don’t know nothing about that’

-- from C. Phillips, Punishment & Society, 2012

3,425

721

88 73 700

500

1,000

1,500

2,000

2,500

3,000

3,500

4,000

Male(California)

England& Wales

Norway Sweden DenmarkCalifornia

Average Prison Population

0

2,000

4,000

6,000

8,000

10,000

12,000

14,000

1937

1940

1943

1946

1949

1952

1955

1958

1961

1964

1967

1970

1973

1976

1979

1982

1985

1988

1991

1994

1997

2000

2003

2006

2009

Total Female Inmate Population, 1937-2009

0

20,000

40,000

60,000

80,000

100,000

120,000

140,000

160,000

180,000

1937

1940

1943

1946

1949

1952

1955

1958

1961

1964

1967

1970

1973

1976

1979

1982

1985

1988

1991

1994

1997

2000

2003

2006

2009

Male and Female Inmate Population, 1937-2012

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PrisonUseRate

Order without Law? Gangs and Other Forms of Alternative Social Order in and Beyond the Prison

Suggested hashtag for Twitter users: #LSEgangs

LSE Debating Law public debate

Dr Insa KochAssistant Professor in Law and Anthropology, LSE

Dr Lisa McKenzieFellow in the Department of Sociology, LSE

Dr David SkarbekSenior Lecturer in Political Economy, King’s College London

Professor Nicola LaceyChair, LSE