Uses an interview format with Michael Zinzun to discuss the work of the Coalition against Police Abuse, organized in Los Angeles (California), to come up with solutions to police abuse. The Coalition was instrumental in forging a truce between two large gangs in southern California, and this effort, and efforts to broaden the truce into a movement…

More than 6,021 groups have been identified that work to bring peace to urban streets in constructive ways. Approaches that can help bring these groups together as exemplified by the Youth Peace Movement are discussed. The transcommunal approach of the Youth Peace Movement brings together many allies at the grass roots level. (SLD)

Examines how the minority drug problem is framed in terms of anomie and underclass models suggesting that drug subcultures in urban black areas are formed as an adaptation to aggregate community conditions. The article considers how researchers use ecological and ethnographic data to back up claims that drug subcultures are a response to inner…

Studied the impact of victimization and fear of crime on 56 Latina teenagers in urban and suburban areas. Fear of crime was associated not only with the variables traditionally correlated with fear of crime, but also with feelings of identity. Also examined were coping mechanisms Latina teenagers used to deal with those fears. (SLD)

Challenges recent portrayals of the demonic character of female gang members by examining the life histories and social organizations of several different female gangs. Interviews with 65 female gang members from seven groups show that these young women experience potential and actual violence in different violence prone situations. (SLD)

Presents and discusses the "street scripts" of five African American urban high school and college students, writings that reflect personal perspectives on urban life and crime. These young people know that their lives, desires, and dreams are quite different from those that have been constructed in the public spaces of politics and the…

Instead of working solely to control young people and to put offenders behind bars, society should be trying to build a responsible community in which young people, aware of their value, act responsibly because they have seen responsible behavior in action. The importance of ritual and initiation for youth is discussed. (SLD)