Unpacking the paradox of neighboring ties: the moderating effect of criminal context on victimization.

The consistency of the finding that neighboring ties produce social control has been challenged in recent work, leading to more nuanced theorizing. Negotiated coexistence theory posits that neighboring ties between criminal and non-criminal residents reduce social control by increasing the negotiating power of the criminal element. The present study tests whether criminal context moderates the relationship between neighboring and victimization. The effect of neighboring, criminal context, and their interaction on victimization outcomes is estimated while controlling for neighborhood disadvantage using ordinary least squares regression among an urban African American cohort. In support of negotiated coexistence theory, findings show that involvement in neighboring within a criminal context is associated with higher violent victimization among men in young adulthood, while neighboring within a non-criminal context is associated with lower young men's violent victimization. Yet, this relationship does not hold for men in midlife. In contrast, neighboring is associated with lower property victimization regardless of criminal context for women, in line with social disorganization theory; yet, this relationship was only evident in midlife with no such relationship emerging in young adulthood.

Examining the Consequences of the "Prevalent Life Events" of Arrest and Incarceration among an Urban African-American Cohort.

The life course perspective has traditionally examined prevalent adult life events, such as marriage and employment, and their potential to redirect offending trajectories. However, for African Americans, the life events of arrest and incarceration are becoming equally prevalent in young adulthood. Therefore, it is critical to understand how these "standard" criminal justice practices, which are designed to deter as well as punish, affect deviance among this population. This study evaluates the long-term consequences of criminal justice intervention on substance use and offending into midlife among an African American community cohort using propensity score matching and multivariate regression analyses. The results largely point to a criminogenic effect of criminal justice intervention on midlife deviance with a particularly strong effect of young adult arrest on rates of violent and property arrest counts into midlife. The theoretical and policy implications of the findings are discussed.