<![CDATA[James W. Clarke - Blog]]>Thu, 26 Feb 2026 12:51:39 -0800EditMySite<![CDATA[Black on Black Violence]]>Tue, 10 Feb 2015 20:10:46 GMThttp://www.jameswclarke.net/blog/black-on-black-violencePicture
In the February 9, 2015 issue of the New Yorker, Kelefa Sanneh, "Don't Be Like that: Does Black Culture Need to be Reformed," reviews Orlando Patterson's recent anthology, THE CULTURAL MATRIX: UNDERSTANDING BLACK YOUTH.  In it, he addresses what I consider to be the misguided debate in sociology between "structuralists" and "culturalists" as to which perspective provides the best explanation for high rates of violent crime among "poor black youth."  It is regrettable that Sanneh and Patterson are unaware of THE LINEAMENTS OF WRATH: RACE, VIOLENT CRIME, AND AMERICAN CULTURE.  In its carefully documented pages, I explain the consequences of both custom (culture) and policy (structure) that have shaped subcultures of white and black violence throughout American history.

The roots of black-on-black violence can be traced back to the previous century, the southern experience, and the system of criminal justice that took the place of slavery as a means of social control and mobilizing convict labor after emancipation.  Long before the urban transformation of the black population that began with the Great Migration north in the second decade of the 20th century, southern blacks were assaulting and killing one another at remarkable levels.  By this time, blacks were also well aware that few whites cared whether they lived or died.  The paradox of emancipation is that freedom removed the monetary value of blacks as white property, meaning that so long as their victims were also black and so long as such crimes did not affect white interests, southern courts cared little about who was murdered, raped, or robbed, or by whom...If the victim was white it was a different matter – as revealed in the long history of lynching, discriminatory capital sentencing, and convict labor.

Such disdain and indifference had a profound effect on both the way blacks thought about law enforcement and on their relations with one another.  Since blacks could not expect to find justice at the hands of law enforcement and in southern courts, it was better to settle grievances and disputes personally – a custom that continues today.
]]><![CDATA[Broken Windows]]>Thu, 11 Dec 2014 17:11:19 GMThttp://www.jameswclarke.net/blog/broken-windowsI agree with Eugene Robinson in this article. The "broken windows" policy of law enforcement has become racist. That was predictable. For those who are interested learning more about this issue, I recommend my book, "The Lineaments of Wrath: Race, Violent Crime, and American Culture," which as one prominent reviewer put it, "explores the deep historical roots [of the present crisis in American race relations] as no other scholar has done."
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]]><![CDATA[How might killers, like Rodgers, be identified BEFORE they act?]]>Wed, 28 May 2014 18:11:24 GMThttp://www.jameswclarke.net/blog/how-might-killers-like-rodgers-be-identified-before-they-actPicture
I've been watching the experts commenting on Santa Barbara tragedy. Yes, the killer is sick, obsessed, weird, hates women and men he's own age who engage with them, and so on, and decided to take out his revenge. Who would disagree? The killer made his motives clear in both his video and "manifesto." But an important question that is not addressed, beyond the need for more rational gun regulation, is: How might killers, like Rodgers, be identified BEFORE they act? I've proposed a method to do that. It is not based on what suspects tell investigators because wrong-doers lie -- like Rodgers did to the Santa Barbara police. And with tragic consequences they believed him. A better method is to determine what suspects are DOING before these attacks. What is happening in their lives that can be assessed apart from unreliable self-reported information? 

If you are interested, I've suggested a method to do that in Chapter 12 of DEFINING DANGER: AMERICAN ASSASSINS AND THE NEW DOMESTIC TERRORISTS.

"To understand violence, it is essential to understand not only the personality of the perpetrator, but also the the context in which the behavior occurs.  In the rush to analyze personalities, context is sometimes ignored.  By context, I mean the array of cultural, political, economic, and social forces that mold and channel behavior over time, as well as the immediate situational factors that often precipitate the actions in question.  Without taking into account the context of behavior, it is virtually impossible to understand the motives behind it.  For the same reason, an understanding of context provides the best clues yet known concerning the potential dangerousness of suspects who come to the attention of [authorities]."
]]><![CDATA[The Emancipation of Abe Lincoln (New York Times January 1, 2013)]]>Fri, 04 Jan 2013 21:25:14 GMThttp://www.jameswclarke.net/blog/the-emancipation-of-abe-lincoln-new-york-times-january-1-2013Picture
The author of The Emancipation of Abe Lincoln, Eric Foner, might have mentioned that probably Lincoln's greatest reservation about emancipation was his fear that once blacks lost their value as slaves, racial violence would follow in the South.  That fear was confirmed in the wake of Appomattox.  What can only be described as a reign of terror was expanded after the last federal troops were withdrawn and Home Rule was restored in the former Confederate states in 1877.  Torture or death awaited anyone who resisted white supremacist customs and policies.  White-on-black crime was not a punishable offense in state courts.  Lynching, for example, slowly declined in the twentieth century primarily because state executioners replaced lynch mobs in carrying out the will of the white majority.  True emancipation did not occur until the Supreme Court and Congress acted to abolish such policies in the 1950s and 1960s.

For more on this subject, see Clarke's book The Lineaments of Wrath: Race, Violent Crime, and American Culture.
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