Breaking the code of the street: extending Elijah Anderson's encryption of violent street governance to retaliation in Scotland

Abstract

The ‘code of the street’ is a theoretical framework concerning violent interaction. Its enactment on the street can be seen as illustrating a hegemonic masculinity. The typical setting where the code is pervasive is in disadvantaged urban communities. Those in thrall to the code's localised retaliatory edicts are usually young working-class males. Understandably, given the code's origins in the US ghetto, it is a US criminological research tradition which has stimulated the terms of this framework. Although European scholars have pursued theorising violence by recourse to the code, Scotland has not been studied, and the qualitative study reported here aims to remedy this. Based on these data, a behavioural code is evident in Scotland sharing characteristics with Anderson's original contribution, despite differences in terms of chronology and cultural setting. The study contributes to our knowledge of the life histories and personal theorisations of young offenders whose trajectories are arguably entrapped by forms of retaliatory justice and performances of a ‘protest’ type of marginalised masculinity.

Keywords:

• assault
• code of the street
• masculinity
• violence

Acknowledgements

I am grateful to the reviewers of the papers for their constructive insights. I am also indebted to the research participants for their generosity in sharing experiences and time.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.