A Philosophy of the Social Construction of Crime 9781447327332

Table of contents :
A PHILOSOPHY OF THE SOCIAL CONSTRUCTION OF CRIME
Contents
1. PHENOMENOLOGY, SOCIAL CONSTRUCTION, AND CRIMINALITY: SOME BEGINNING OBSERVATIONS
Why phenomenology and social construction?
The phenomenology of strain
Toward a unified criminology: realistic possibility or philosophical contradiction
How, then, to proceed?
2. THE PHENOMENOLOGY OF THE SOCIAL CONSTRUCTION OF CRIME: SOCIAL CONTEXT AND STRUCTURAL REALITIES, AND THE MEANING OF BEING
Dasein and the world
Being-in-the-world and the phenomenology of the “they”
The phenomenology of the body as cultural artifact
Integrating this structuring phenomenology
3. THE SOCIAL CONSTRUCTION OF CRIMINAL BEHAVIOR: TOWARD A PHENOMENOLOGY OF STRAIN
Introduction
The being of being-in-the-world
The experience of strain
4. SOME CLOSING REFLECTIONS
The apparatus and the they-self: toward a phenomenology of the “subject”
REFERENCES
Newspaper references
Index

Citation preview

D AV I D P O L I Z Z I

A PHILOSOPHY OF THE SOCIAL CONSTRUCTION OF CRIME

POLICY PRESS

SHORTS

RESEARCH

DAVID POLIZZI

A PHILOSOPHY OF THE SOCIAL CONSTRUCTION OF CRIME

POLICY PRESS

RESEARCH

First published in Great Britain in 2015 by Policy Press North America office: University of Bristol Policy Press 1-9 Old Park Hill c/o The University of Chicago Press Bristol 1427 East 60th Street BS2 8BB Chicago, IL 60637, USA UK t: +1 773 702 7700 t: +44 (0)117 9​ 54 5940 f: +1 773 702 9756 [email protected] [email protected] www.policypress.co.uk www.press.uchicago.edu © Policy Press 2015 British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data A catalog record for this book has been requested. ISBN 978-1-4473-2645-8 (hardcover) ISBN 978-1-4473-2647-2 (ePub) ISBN 978-1-4473-2648-9 (Mobi) The right of David Polizzi to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved: no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without the prior permission of Policy Press. The statements and opinions contained within this publication are solely those of the author and not of the University of Bristol or Policy Press. The University of Bristol and Policy Press disclaim responsibility for any injury to persons or property resulting from any material published in this publication. Policy Press works to counter discrimination on grounds of gender, race, disability, age and sexuality. Cover design by Andrew Corbett Front cover: image kindly supplied by Bigstock (© Merydolla/ Bigstock) Printed and bound in Great Britain by CPI Group (UK) Ltd, Croydon, CR0 4YY Policy Press uses environmentally responsible print partners

Contents

1 Phenomenology, social construction, and criminality: Some beginning observations 2 The phenomenology of the social construction of crime: Social context and structural realities, and the meaning of being 3 The social construction of criminal behavior: Toward a phenomenology of strain 4 Some closing reflections References Index

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PHENOMENOLOGY, SOCIAL CONSTRUCTION, AND CRIMINALITY: SOME BEGINNING OBSERVATIONS Why phenomenology and social construction? Perhaps the first question the reader may consider when looking at the title of this book is simply put: “What is the phenomenology of the social construction of crime?” Though undoubtedly many readers are already familiar with the conceptual framework of phenomenology and social construction as specific philosophical approaches or as theoretical vehicles by which to describe a broad variety of phenomena which fall under the purview of the social sciences, it is probably much less likely, however, that these same readers have ever seen these two approaches combined in the way suggested by the title. For some, such a combination may appear philosophically contradictory, given that phenomenology is often commonly viewed as a structuralist or Cartesian account of human experience that is defined by its privileging of the subject or a perceiving consciousness (Weinberg, 2014). Social construction, on the other hand, though also privileging the subjective point of view, rejects any purely structuralist biases, and

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retains a very specific engagement with the social world, albeit from a very specific subjective point of reference (Berger and Luckmann, 1967). How, then, does such a joining of these two seemingly incapable theoretical approaches make sense? It is argued here that not only are phenomenology and social construction philosophically compatible approaches by which to explore the phenomena of crime, but that any perceived contradictions between these two approaches has more to do with the misreading of phenomenology, intentional or otherwise, then it does with any genuine theoretical contradiction between these two approaches. In its most general sense, the social construction of reality reflects a type of phenomenological rendering of lived-experience insofar as our access to social knowledge is always perspectival and social, situated within a very specific frame of reference. The integration of social construction within the phenomenological tradition reflects an approach that seeks to situate the “sociology of knowledge” within a specific epistemological and ontological frame of reference. Though it is certainly true that Berger and Luckmann (1967, p 19) sought to avoid the question of philosophy, and actually state that their intention “… is not to engage in philosophy,” it remains equally true that the sociology of knowledge can never truly be separate from these epistemological and ontological concerns as they relate to human experience and meaning. Berger and Luckmann (1967, p 19) seem to recognize this observation by stating: Everyday life presents itself as a reality interpreted by men and subjectively meaningful to them as a coherent world. As sociologists we take this reality as the object of our analyses. Within this frame of reference of sociology as an empirical science it is possible to take this reality as given, to take as data particular phenomena arising within it, without further inquiring about the foundations of this reality, which is a philosophical task. However, what this observation attempts to avoid is that the given nature of this subjectively meaningful reality is, in fact, already philosophically

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situated within the lived-experience of the individual and needs no further empirical validation. Does the “presence” of auditory, tactile or visual hallucinations, recognized as clinically significant within certain manifestations of severe or chronic psychopathological experience, become invalidated because these symptoms lack the factual objective evidence by which the foundational reality of this type of phenomena may be measured and quantified? Do the attitudes related to racism, sexism, or sexual preference and the social challenges such beliefs evoke suddenly become resolved when the foundations for such beliefs are shown to be inaccurate or incorrect? Of course not, but we are still practicing a type of philosophy. When we take for granted the given reality of lived-experience, what phenomenology has identified as the natural attitude (Gurwitsch, 1964, 1979/77; Natanson, 1973; Schutz and Luckmann, 1973), we are also making a variety of epistemological and ontological claims, albeit indirectly, concerning the existence of the world and the knowledge we employ to make that world coherent and meaningful. Though these given truth claims may not have been “validated” by rigorous methodological analysis, they still reflect a very specific and observable epistemological trajectory situated within a very specific ontological understanding of what is truly real. Take, for example, the reality of racism and its relationship to criminal behavior. For the racist, this relationship between “race” and criminality reflects a taken-for-granted givenness, a taken-for-granted epistemology and ontology, concerning the social construction of blackness. Though these two philosophically driven processes may go unrecognized or even unstated, they remain fundamentality implicated in this meaninggenerating process. As such, the alleged ontological inferiority of blackness becomes foundational to the epistemology that follows, thereby justifying not only one’s racist presuppositions, but also that aspect of social knowledge, which connects criminality and black presence. Further philosophical validation becomes unnecessary. What becomes subjectively meaningful for the racist is the “philosophically validated” stance that this socially constructed process inevitably must embrace.

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Under such circumstances, the truth claim(s) evoked by any socially constructed position already retains a high degree of “validity” regardless of its relationship to a more rigorous methodological examination of the “facts” of a given experience. Though, for example, one may point out that the conceptualization of “race” is neither scientific nor biologically grounded, its “truth” is still stubbornly embraced and is not likely to be swayed by the introduction of such objective evidence. As a result, this taken-for-granted attitude is informed by the perspective one brings to this project of knowing and the structure by which the meaning of this social encounter defines or establishes the contours of what is real; this is the phenomenology of the social construction of reality. As a philosophical approach, the phenomenology of the social construction of reality brings together three different, but inseparable aspects of the same meaning-generating process: social knowledge, subjective perspective and the ontological grounding of human experience. Within this context, social knowledge emerges from the perspective of the subject, which in turn is already situated within very specific social contexts, and which encourages or invites certain ways of “knowing.” As such, the “recognition” of social knowledge, the recognition of meaningful experience is made possible in part by the epistemological focus applied and the ontological grounding of experience that makes this type of knowing possible. But how does this process inform the social construction of crime? The social construction of crime, much like any socially constructed process, is concerned with the taken-for-granted perspective that conceptualizes the social meaning of crime and criminal behavior. As a result, socially constructed attitudes concerning various aspects of criminality, or any social phenomena for that matter, will reflect not only a specific subjective point of view, but will include a set of embedded social biases situated within a variety of existing social structures and prejudices that will likely inform that perspective and become foundational to the social knowledge this process “reveals.” To help exemplify this point, I now explore the phenomenology of two seemingly unconnected social phenomena: the phenomenology

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of the social construction of terrorism, and the socially constructed experience of African American offending. In his text, Terrorist’s creed: Fanatical violence and the need for human meaning, Roger Griffin (2012) explores the phenomena of terrorism. However, unlike other texts generally concerned with the same subject, Griffin attempts to uncover what he describes as the existential meaning of terrorism and by so doing, also reveals the phenomenology of this socially constructed experience. For Griffin (2012, p 7), terrorism reflects a: … murderous commitment to a terrorist cause as primarily neither pathological or criminal, but as an intelligible, analyzable, reconstructable response, however pervaded with utopian, mythic thinking, to a particular objective cultural threat or existential dilemma, or combination of the two. [emphasis in original] Griffin (2012, p 7) then seeks to re-situate the subject of terrorism “… within the orbit of humanistic understanding by considering the non-instrumental rationalities, the symbolic, existential, metapolitical motivations of terrorist acts.” By conceptualizing the experience of terrorism in the way that he does, Griffin is able to explore not only the socially constructed motivations that drive these acts, but also the cultural context from which they emerge. From this perspective, the act of terrorism reflects a specific socially constructed set of lived-meanings, which become recognized as a phenomenological response to this perceived cultural or existential threat. Terrorism, then, is no longer viewed as an individually isolated act, produced by an individual actor or group intent on invoking some manner of violence on a given target; rather, it becomes a complex network of social meanings located within the individual or group, and situated within a specific configuration of the social world that perceives some manner of threat, which in turn culminates in the articulation of fanatical violence. Central to this meaning-generating process is the specific threat, which the act of terrorism seeks to address. Taken from this perspective,

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the criminal act of terrorism becomes a defensive response to a perceived threat emerging from a specific social context, constructed from a very specific point of reference. It is therefore possible to view terrorism as a type of culturally situated strain, which has a negative impact on an individual or social group within a given society, resulting in some type of violent response by which to challenge this perceived threat. The implications of this threat are twofold: (1) its perceived threat to individual identity; and (2) its eroding influence on the very foundations from which human meaning becomes possible for both the individual and a particular configuration of the social order. As the title of Griffin’s (2012) text announces, terrorism or fanatical violence becomes the manifestation of this perceived loss of human meaning. Griffin, in his attempt to examine the structure of this loss of meaning, employs the mythic concept of the nomos provided by Peter Berger (1967) in his important text, The sacred canopy, by which to contextualize his discussion. For Berger (1967), the nomos is viewed as a meaning-generating structure that orders social existence and becomes foundational to the creation of individual identity. The nomos, also unintentionally recognizable, perhaps, as a manifestation of Heidegger’s (1953/2010) “they-self,” provides an “ordered meaning” for human existence, which defines what will be valued and what will not. The actual manifestation of the nomos, be it religious, secular or some combination of the two, provides the individual within a given social context an “ordered meaning” for human existence and identity as long as this structure remains intact. However, when this protective structure is threatened, the very foundation of personal identity is threatened as well. Berger provides the following observation as this pertains to what he identifies as a nomic threat: Anomy is unbearable to the point where the individual may seek death in preference to it. Conversely, existence within a monic world may be sought at the cost of all sorts of sacrifice and suffering and even the cost of life itself, if the individual believes that this sacrifice has nomic significance. (Berger, 1967, p 22)

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An example of this experience of nomic threat can be witnessed in the creation and development of the Society of Muslim Brothers in Egypt. The Society of Muslim Brothers, which was founded by Hasan alBanna in 1929, emerged as a direct response to the perceived threat posed by the British occupation of Egypt (Qutb, 1953/2000, 2002; Moussalli, 1992; Mitchell, 1993; Kepel, 2005; Wagemakers, 2012). It was feared by the Brotherhood that the encroachment of Western secular values represented by the British presence in Egypt would destroy the Islamic identity of Egyptian culture and its people, if not directly confronted. In the attempt to ward off this nomic threat, a variety of educational, political and religious, strategies—some of which resulted in violence—were initiated to meet this existential cultural challenge (Kepel, 1991/94, 2005; Mitchell, 1993; Ali, 2002). As the political presence of the Brotherhood grew over the first two decades of its existence, so, too, did its violent clashes with the police. One major consequence of this rise to power was witnessed in the murder of its leader Hasan al-Banna, who was killed by the police of King Farouk in 1949. In the aftermath of al-Banna’s death, growing tensions within the movement began to appear as disagreements over ideology, and strategy started to become more and more apparent. However, by 1952, the political environment of Egypt was suddenly transformed with the overthrow of King Farouk, who was removed from power by a military coup lead by Muhammad Najib and Jamal Nasser. Though the Brotherhood was initially supportive of the Nasser government, all this changed by 1954 after a member of the Brotherhood attempted to assassinate the President, which resulted in either death or imprisonment for large numbers of individuals in this movement, a condition that remains more or less in place currently in Egypt (Kepel, 2005; Calvert, 2010). However, as a result of this change in political fortunes, the movement split into two different branches: one which espoused political moderation and non-violence and another which espoused a radically fundamentalist Islamic position committed to the violent overthrow of the Egyptian government (Wenner, 1982; Kepel, 2005; Calvert, 2010, Wagemakers, 2012; Turner, 2013). What is most

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important to our purposes is the socially constructed phenomenology, which this threat to the Islamic nomos evoked within certain segments of this movement and the larger Egyptian society. As the perceived threat of the encroachment of Western secular values became more and more pronounced, a specific socially constructed process became more explicitly manifest relative to this nomic threat. Taken from this perspective, British influence became configured as an explicit attack on both individual Muslim identity and the cultural context from which that identity emerged. The process by which this particular recognition of social knowledge was experienced revealed not only a specific epistemological understanding for what the world should mean or be, but a specific ontological structure that provided this way of knowing, its unshakable certainty. It is from this structuring of social knowledge that its phenomenology is revealed. Taken from this perspective, the phenomenology of the social construction of terrorism emerges from a subjective experience of existential threat; though this threat may be shared with others within a given social group, it is based on a specific engagement with the social world, which in turn challenges the very foundation of the meaning of one’s lived-experience (Polizzi, 2011b, 2011c). As the foundation for individual meaning begins to erode, a variety of possible epistemologically driven strategies are employed by which to address the ontological implications of this nomic threat. In the above example, the Society of Muslim Brothers was created as a response to the threat posed by the increasing presence of Western secular values in Egyptian culture; this threat, which was constructed from a fundamentalist Islamic perspective, employed a very specific epistemological point of view by which to construct this way of knowing, while also situating this “social knowledge” within a very specific ontological frame of reference. As a result of this phenomenological process, terrorism becomes the vehicle by which feelings of fear, humiliation, shame, and social alienation may be experienced and resolved. The violence manifested in the act of terrorism can be viewed as an attempt to assuage the feelings imposed by this example of social strain. A similar dynamic

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is discussed by Katz (1988) in Seductions of crime, whereby “righteous rage” comes to represent the “corrective” response to the experience of humiliation” (Polizzi, 2011a, p 1053). Whether this experience of “righteous rage” is the result of individual humiliation or the artifact of a shared group process, its articulation reflects a very specific intentional relationship between the social world and a specific subjective or shared point of view. As Katz (1988, p 26) continues to observe, the experience of humiliation “… is already a socialized emotion, reflecting an immediate, unquestionable connection between one’s discomfort and another’s attack.” Within this context, the experience of humiliation becomes for Katz a meaning-generating process, which manifests itself from the in-between of human existence that is neither exclusively individual nor exclusively social (Polizzi, 2011a). Whether the topic is terrorism, criminal behavior or individual lived-experience, the social knowledge that informs these events, though seemingly exclusively subjective in nature, is always authored by a variety of inseparable vectors of meaning, representing the point from which human existence takes up its world. Such a dynamic may be witnessed within the theorizing of African American offending. In their text, A theory of African American offending: Race, racism, and crime, Unnever and Gabbidon (2011, p 1) begin by stating, Our basic assumption is that a theory of African American offending must be derived from the lived experience of blacks as they negotiate living within a conflicted racially stratified society. We further assume that the past and present lived experiences of African Americans have created a shared worldview that is unlike those that inform whites or other minorities. The authors’ opening observations lead the reader to a general conclusion: any attempt to conceptualize a general theory of crime is likely impossible, given that the experience of crime and criminal behavior reflect a unique social relationality, which becomes manifest within individual or group experience, and is also inseparably situated

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within a variety of different social contexts. Unlike the example of the Society of Muslim Brothers discussed above, the social construction of the criminality of blackness emerges from the contextual ground of anti-black racism, which in turn becomes central to the livedexperience of African Americans—an experience that is not shared with other minorities in the same way. By focusing their discussion as they do, Unnever and Gabbidon (2011) seek to re-connect the fact of African American offending with the social reality from which this aspect of black lived-experience is inseparably fused. Such a theoretical approach challenges the reader to re-contextualize the act of criminality within the larger structural framework of the lived-experience of African Americans and not isolate the act of crime from this social reality. However, it is also important to recognize that the authors clearly acknowledge the empirical evidence concerning the over-representation of African American involvement in crime and the American penal system (Unnever and Gabbidon, 2011). Unwilling to ignore the tragic reality of this fact, they decide instead to ask a simple question: why hasn’t the discipline of criminology developed a theory of African American offending that is similar to, for example, feminist criminology’s focus on female criminality and the lived-experience of woman (Unnever and Gabbidon, 2011)? For Unnever and Gabbidon (2011), the issue is not whether African Americans are over-represented in the criminal justice system; rather, their concern is why this is so, and how the reality of anti-black racism influences that result. In an attempt to answer this question, the authors provide a brief historical overview of the uniqueness of the black experience in America. Central to this discussion is the simple fact that black livedexperience has confronted historical challenges not faced by any other minority ethnic groups in America with the exception perhaps of tribal Native Americans. Though it is certainly true that other minority ethnic groups have experienced bigotry and social prejudice, these experiences have not been presenced with the same frequency, intensity, or duration. In observing the quality of these differences, the authors state:

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First, even though other groups (eg, Irish Americans) were intensely despised, they were never enslaved, legally subordinated by Jim Crow laws, or persistently segregated in poor isolated neighborhoods. Second, the importance of skin tone—white— and it’s a white racial identity—has advantages. (Unnever and Gabbidon, 2011, p 7) What becomes most significant to this process is not related to the shared involvement by various ethnic groups in the project of criminality; rather, it is the unchangeable and unshareable reality of being black in an anti-black world. From this context, the act of criminality becomes a description or artifact of its phenomenology, which emerges from the reality of certain manifestations of black lived-experience. It simply cannot be overlooked how the social degradation of blackness fundamentality disrupts the development of personal or group identity making the achievement of social success difficult, if not impossible, depending on the specific point from which black lived-experience seeks to take up its projects. Central to this meaning-generating process is the ontological status given to black presence when situated within ethnically stratified social contexts. Unlike the social reality of other ethnic groups in American society, black lived-experience must confront on a daily basis the criminalization of its very social presence, regardless its comportment or demeanor. As was witnessed in the killing of Trayvon Martin, what was deemed as criminal by the individual who ultimately took his life was not the fact of any overt action or recognizable intent that revealed his criminality; rather, it was simply the fact of his blackness, which constructed his seemingly benign behavior into an anticipated and certain threat (Polizzi, 2013). From this perspective, the “hoodie” becomes a metaphor for criminality, and the fact of prior unsolved crimes in the neighborhood, “proof ” of Martin’s guilt. All that was needed to tie together this “chain of evidence” was the fact of Martin’s blackness. When viewed from the perspective of existential phenomenology, Unnever and Gabbidon’s theory of African American offending

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attempts to explore how black lived-experience confronts the unique challenges of being situated within a context of anti-black racism. Stated differently, any attempt to understand the structure of African American offending must also take into account how black-beingin-the-world takes up what Heidegger (1953/2010) has described as its facticity or “thrownness.” Taken in its most general sense, thrownness or being thrown describes the basic quality or ontological characteristic of beingin-the-world, that is, human being always finds itself within a specific social context. As such, being-in-the-world is always situated within a specific social world or ontic manifestation of being-in that includes historical, cultural and familial possibilities which help to define the meaning of being.(Polizzi, 2011b, p 135) When placed within the context of black lived-experience, as discussed by Unnever and Gabbidon (2011), the construct of thrownness reflects the unique phenomenology of being-in-the-world-as-African American when situated within a culture that criminalizes, demeans and negatively stereotypes the very social presence of blackness. To be “thrown” in Heidegger’s sense, is to recognize the place from which I encounter my world and from which the world encounters me. If I am able to be like others are allowed to be, my being-in-the-world retains what Spinelli (2005) has described as the finite openness of being. However, when that same being-in-the-world is restricted and devalued, the possibilities for being are threatened as well, which of course, is precisely the point Unnever and Gabbidon forcibly argue. By emphasizing the significance of the unique configuration of black lived-experience as this relates to criminal offending, the authors are similarly recognizing the difficulties involved in any attempt to formulate a general theory of crime. Such mistaken theoretical projects often assume an unexplored set of epistemological and ontological presuppositions, which tend to view the construct of crime or criminal offending as an objectively present artifact that is then “rationally” taken up by individuals living in a given social context. However, as

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Unnever and Gabbidon correctly observe, any such result must be flawed given that human lived-experience, due to the specificity of its unique thrownness, is therefore not so interchangeable. From this perspective, the over-representation of African American involvement in the criminal justice system is, therefore, not reducible to some inherent flaw of black existence; rather, it reflects a more dysfunctional dynamic that emerges from the social reality of antiblack racism and the potential limits this places on being-in-theworld-as-black. However, it is also important to recognize that the phenomenology of thrownness—this sense of finding oneself in the world—reveals a multilayered structuring for being-in-the-world that may or may not reflect or configure the same possibilities for being. Though black-being-in-the-world must confront the reality of anti-black racism, it would also be incorrect to say that this thrown reality is necessarily determined in all cases by this fact. Fanon (1967, p 12), in his important text, Black skin, white masks, warns of this very possibility when he observes: Many Negros will not find themselves in what follows. This is equally true of many whites. But the fact that I feel a foreigner in the worlds of the schizophrenic or the sexual cripple in no way diminishes their reality. By so observing, Fanon rejects a fatalistically driven determinism that views anti-black racism as insurmountable. However, “Fanon’s observation also implies that the fact of racism never disappears, only that in spite of this fact, black lived-experience retains the possibility of reclaiming the fundamental sense of humanness which racism seeks to deny” (Polizzi, 2003). For example, when Fanon (1967, p 112/113) states that, “All I ever wanted was to be a man among other men,” he implies that he longs for a world that does not immediately translate blackness into something negative. He longs for the possibility where blackness is mundane, where blackness becomes simply another reflection of what it means to be human. However, as Lewis Gordon (1995, p 43) observes, such reciprocity is only possible when “One

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can place oneself in another’s place.” It is due to the absence of this social reciprocity for black lived-experience on which Unnever and Gabbidon make their case. Though Unnever and Gabbidon’s text is exclusively focused on the American experience of anti-black racism and its inseparable influence on African American offending, its general thesis may be applied more broadly to any marginalized social group as this relates to the production of crime. Whether these socially constructed “identities” are predicated on ethnicity, social class, gender, or religious orientation, the lack of social reciprocity evokes a similar type of vulnerability that is all too familiar within black lived-experience. Such an absence of the mundane “presencing” of lived-experience thwarts a person’s ability to be as others are allowed to be and transforms their existence into a problem. For example, on October 23, 1989, Charles Stuart murdered his wife by shooting her in the head; he then shot himself in the leg prior to calling 911. As he was being taken from the ambulance, a police officer asked him who did it, to which Stuart replied, “a black man.” The police immediately began an aggressive sweep of the area, which ultimately turned up their man. The “suspect” was ultimately released after Stuart’s brother confessed that it was actually Charles who had committed the murder. On April 19, 1995, during the immediate aftermath of the Oklahoma City Bombing, two individuals of Arab decent were reported to be detained by local police as potential suspects in that case. Though these individuals were also similarly released after forensic evidence tied Timothy McVeigh to that crime, it is undeniable that the “problematic” social visibility of these individuals is what was used to “legitimize” their initial arrest. It may be argued that these individuals were arrested for the simple reason that African Americans tend to be over-represented in violent crimes and individuals of Arab descent are often implicated in similar types of terrorist bombing episodes, thereby rendering both as legitimate targets of police focus. However, what is most obviously ignored by such “logic” is not the empirical fact of ethnic group involvement in certain criminal behavior; rather, it is the exclusive presumption of guilt. Trayvon Martin was presumed guilty by the

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simple fact of his presence in that neighborhood; in all of the various accounts attributed to George Zimmerman during his pursuit of Martin, not a single one seemed to question the basic rationale which constructed Martin as criminal and dangerous. Evidently all that was needed was the empirical fact of Martin’s ethnicity. What is also important to recognize in the above accounts is the empirical fact that the perpetrators in all of these events were white. What is at issue here is not whether certain ethnic groups are involved in certain types of criminal behavior; rather, it is the social phenomenology that this construction of social knowledge reveals. If one’s attitude toward certain “others” is informed by a context of social knowledge that constructs these individuals as exclusively criminal, as dangerous, as threatening, sinful, or lazy, it is unlikely that any reciprocity with them will be possible. However, as Fanon warned above, the phenomenology of this process cannot be essentialized and must be capable of recognizing those unique aspects of human experience that retain their all too human potentiality. Though it is important to recognize the unique context from which African American lived-experience confronts its world, it is similarly important that we do not foreclose the variability for human possibility that exists within it. The social fact of racism, sexism, religious bigotry, or economic or political marginalization, though certainly real, are not necessarily experienced as real in the same way by those existing within these ethnic, religious, or social configurations. The uniqueness of one’s social existence within a given social group does not necessarily foreclose the possibility for individuals within that group to experience this same context differently. This is not to argue that these structured dynamics of objectification do not exist; rather, it seeks to recognize that our being thrown allows us to “discover” ourselves in different ways, which in turn leaves open our ability to be, even in the most difficult of situations. It may perhaps be helpful to now turn to Agnew’s general strain theory to better exemplify this point.

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The phenomenology of strain In its most general sense, Agnew’s general strain theory reflects a breakdown in various aspects of social relationality. “Strain theory focuses on negative relationships with others; that is relationships in which others do not treat the individual as he or she would like to be treated” (Agnew and White, 1992, p 476). These negative relationships may be experienced as the structural result of economic or political marginalization or experienced within one’s daily encounters with others. I have argued elsewhere that: By focusing on the ways in which individuals respond to negative life situations, the integrity and uniqueness of those individual solutions to the experience of strain is retained. However, it is important to note that such a formulation seems to reject a linear causal relationship between the experience of strain and the individual’s response to this experience, regardless its specific articulation. (Polizzi, 2011a, p 1054) Taken from this perspective, Agnew’s general strain theory, much like the theory of African American offending offered by Unnever and Gabbidon, reflects an undeniable phenomenology of criminality that emerges from the specific confines of individual lived-experience, situated within specific social contexts. Given that the variability of strain evokes a variety of subjective meanings relative to experience and its situated facticity, any attempt to generalize such a “response” seems misguided and superficial. All manifestations of strain, whether these are identified for methodological purposes as objective, vicarious, or anticipatory, remain fundamentally subjective and emerge from very specific configurations of lived-experience (Agnew, 2006a; Polizzi, 2011a). In an attempt to better situate the subjective aspects of strain, Agnew introduced his concept of story lines. Story lines are defined as a “temporally limited interrelated set of events and conditions that increases the likelihood that individuals will engage in a crime or a series of related crimes” (Agnew, 2006b, p 121).

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These narrative configurations of lived-experience represent a sudden or unexpected disruption of normal experience, which also helps to make explicit its phenomenological implications for the perceiving subject or being-in-the-world. “Story lines represent the way in which individuals construct the meaning of their personal experience and give flesh to those situational factors that are most often emphasized by traditional criminological research” (Polizzi, 2011a, p 1056). If we return to the examples of the Society of Muslim Brothers or the experience of anti-black racism, we can better recognize the phenomenology that these story lines reveal. Within both of these examples, the story lines that emerge from these specific experiences of social alienation reflect the subjective reality of lived-experience as it encounters the reality of its thrown existence. However, rather than reflect a “temporally limited” disruption of daily experience, these narratives reveal an ongoing assault on subjective and group meaning that must be confronted on a daily basis. Though certain shared elements of this “objective strain” would be expected to be present in a large number of these group story lines, the specific meaning of these events would still emerge from a very specific point of view. As such, any attempt to reveal or explore the phenomenology explicit in these narrative accounts must be able to recognize the import of subjective perspective as well as its inseparable grounding within a very specific social context. Stated more simply, phenomenology becomes impossible in the absence of this ontology. The significance of the use of story lines in the study of criminal behavior, or for that matter any human experience, helps to not only situate the lived-meaning of a specific event, but also to reveal how the individual authored by these narratives finds themselves in their world. Story lines, therefore, reflect a specific manifestation of being-with that discovers itself in the moment of a given event, but also retains a sense of relationality to certain unarticulated aspects of self and others that are also implicated, but not necessarily explicitly present within a given presencing of lived-experience. Such an observation may seem to contradict the more immediate context by which Agnew conceptualizes the presencing of these story lines, and

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so a more thorough reflection on the philosophical significance of these narratives may be required. To argue that story lines reflect a “temporally limited disruption” of normal day-to-day encounters is to also conceptualize temporality as a linear phenomenon, which is experienced as discrete categories of time, vacillating between moments of normalcy and threat. Though it is certainly true that story lines help to situate the act of crime within a specific narrative process, that discourse is not limited to the slice of time in which these events unfold. As these disruptions of normal lived-experience seek to find some resolution to this sudden unwanted flood of anxiety, fear, and self-doubt, a variety of narrative themes emerge to address the current situation. Some of these thematic formulations will undoubtedly become manifest within the immediacy of the moment, and reflect a degree of contextual specificity, while others will be inscribed in the margins of these story lines, providing the subtext to this narrative. If Quinney (2000) is correct in his observation that crime is the end result of something else, then it could be argued that the concept of story lines helps us remember this “something” as it is presenced in the act of criminal behavior. The temporally limited event of crime is never phenomenologically severed from these co-occurring and co-constituting narratives that provided lived-experience its subjective grounding in the world. The act of crime, rather than an objective social artifact, becomes a specific manifestation of lived-experience, evoking both subjective intentionality and the co-constituting presence of social world. Agnew’s conceptualization of story lines represents a significant evolution of the phenomenology of strain by centering its impact within the “in-between” of subjective experience and social world. By refocusing the experience of strain in this way, Agnew is able to better account for the ways in which subjective experience and social context become inseparably linked by this meaning-generating process concerning the production of crime and criminal behavior. Story lines, then, provide a “subjective coherence” to the study of crime that can neither be generalized nor reduced to a handful of

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objectively recognized variables by which to explain these integrated and co-constituting social phenomena. In fact, such a conceptualization would be both philosophically and theoretically illogical. From this perspective, story lines help to reveal not only the subjective intentionality that is present in any human action, criminal or otherwise, but also the specific ways in which human action is always informed by the contours of one’s social world. Such a configuration incorporates not only the subjective account offered in these narratives, but also reveals the specific point of reference by which this individual perspective is constructed. What this dynamic implies is that social knowledge is variable and dependent on how the reality of social existence is perceived from the perspective of individual livedexperience. However, this is not to argue that these manifestations of social existence are somehow foreclosed and limited to this isolated subjective point of view; rather, it reveals the variability by which human lived-experience takes up the reality of its thrown existence. As discussed above, the social fact of racism or the perceived secularization of Egyptian culture represents a point of reference by which being-in-the-world confronts this reality; by implication, this observation also recognizes that in the absence of these “structural challenges” to lived-experience, being-in-the-world will find itself within a different manifestation of being-with that will evoke a different set of limitations and potentiality for human existence. How these social contexts are perceived by the individual or group will manifest in a variety of different ways and provide the basis by which this particular aspect of social knowledge is recognized and taken up. Story lines, then, not only reflect a specific subjective point of view, but also reveal the influencing presence of the social world along with its ability to inform and co-author individual identity. When placed within the context of the phenomenology of the social construction of reality, the concept of story lines helps to exemplify the way in which social knowledge is recognized and applied to one’s encounter with the world. These narrative accounts of individual livedexperience provide a unique insight into the dynamic process that leads to the construction of social knowledge, which in turn concludes in the

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presencing of crime or criminal behavior. As a theoretical tool, story lines invite the opportunity to reconfigure the study of criminality by rejecting those conceptualizations of crime or criminal behavior that are overly dependent on unidirectional chains of causal significance. The introduction of story lines seems to reject such a conclusion. By situating human lived-experience within a specific social context, the inseparable reality of the two becomes powerfully apparent. Agnew’s introduction of story lines appears related to his more general intention of conceptualizing a general theory of crime that is capable of incorporating both subjective and objective aspects of this social phenomenon. However, the epistemological and ontological frame of reference from which these two points of reference emerge seems to retain the familiar hue of positivism, which seems to reveal an internal philosophical contradiction not immediately apparent. What the phenomenology of the social construction of reality (as this relates to the production of crime and criminal behavior) attempts to reconsider is how the phenomenon of crime and criminal behavior may be reconfigured in such a way to provide a more coherent continuity between ontology, epistemology, and social knowledge. Before we move farther into this reflection, it would be helpful to explore Agnew’s attempt to resolve this contradiction as he recognizes it within the competing philosophical approaches within theoretical criminology.

Toward a unified criminology: realistic possibility or philosophical contradiction In his important text, Toward a unified criminology: Integrating assumptions about crime, people, and society, Agnew (2011) takes on the daunting task of attempting to reconcile the deep theoretical divide which currently exists within the field of criminology. He begins by targeting his focus on the underlying assumptions employed by criminologists concerning “… the nature of crime, people, society and reality” (Agnew, 2011, p 1). Agnew further observes that the theoretical divisions so prevalent within criminology have hurt the discipline, making it impossible

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for scholars to agree on the causes of crime or those strategies most helpful in its prevention. Central to this project of theory unification is the attempt to provide an integrated definition for crime that is comprehensive enough to incorporate a wide variety of social harms as these relate to individual criminal behavior, and the types of harm that emerge from various forms of structural inequality situated within a given social context. However, it becomes almost immediately apparent that such a strategy is also destined to fail, but for reasons not normally identified with sufficient clarity within the literature. What seems most necessary in any attempt to put forward a unified theory of crime is a clear philosophical sense of the specific ontological structure to be employed to render such a project theoretically sound. The focus, then, cannot simply concentrate on this or that example of criminal behavior or this or that configuration of the social surround and its productive effect on the act of crime and the accompanying social harm these actions evoke; rather, it must begin with the most general of postulates—what does it mean to be human and how does the accompanying fact of human relationality become articulated within human action generally and criminal behavior specifically? The advantage of such a starting point helps to provide a general understanding of the ontological contours of human existence that not only inform general human relationality, but also help to shed light on how the specific relationality manifests in the act of crime or criminal behavior. Though Agnew’s impressive work is able to uncover the underlying issues related to his project, his mode of analysis remains overly configured by a positivist ontology that tends to view human subjectivity and social world as two separate and discrete philosophical categories. By theoretically situating his account in this way, it becomes impossible to arrive at his intended destination. The most obvious obstacle confronting this process is the question concerning how such different ontological approaches can ever be integrated in a coherent structure. The easy answer to this question is probably that they cannot. An example of this larger theoretical concern is recognized within Agnew’s discussion of determinism and agency.

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Agnew (2011) begins this discussion by observing that criminologists either embrace a deterministic stance toward human behavior—that is, all human action is determined—or an equally essentialized position that situates human agency at the core of all action—the recognition of the existence of free will. What this observation seems to miss, at least from the philosophical perspective offered here, is that the conceptualization of agency and determinism need not be mutually exclusive categories. Though it is certainly true that human experience is regularly confronted by a variety of determined limitations concerning the potentiality of human existence, it is equally true that authentic agentic action is never absent in this dynamic giveand-take of the passive/active flow of being-in-the-world. Human agency and the determinist aspects of lived-experience, which it must constantly confront, is not a function of human existence; it is the core ontological quality of what it means to be human, or, as Heidegger would perhaps have it, it reflects the type of being that human existence is (1953/2010). Taken from the critical perspective offered briefly above, no accurate description for human existence and lived-experience is possible in the absence of the recognition that human agency is ontologically defined by its ability to choose within the situated context of imposed limitations. As such, any analysis of human experience must therefore be able to sufficiently account for these seemingly contradictory ontological characteristics of human being. The possible articulation of human agency will always be in relation to the degree of limitation imposed by the circumstances of one’s thrown existence. For example, Agnew (2011, p 58) observes the following: Individuals who confront a novel or problematic situation are motivated to search for a solution to their difficulties, but many do not. They may believe that there is little they can do to alter their circumstances for the better. As a result, they simply live with their difficulties, making little effort to engage in agentic behavior. A key factor affecting the exercise of agency, then, is the belief that one has the ability to produce desired change.

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Though Agnew’s observation is generally correct, it seems to conceptualize agency as a functional tool and not as an ontological characteristic of human existence. Human agency always finds itself situated within a variety of given contexts that can often challenge our possibility to be. When confronted by a “novel or problematic situation,” human agency must choose how this challenge to one’s ability will be taken up. For some, it may result in successful resolution of the problem, and for others it may result in the re-focusing of agency in a different way; this observation is particularly important in the dynamic production of crime or criminal behavior. When we reflect on the degree to which criminal behavior is driven by those traditionally recognized aspects of human experience, which are either deterministically understood or unrealistically configured on a process of rational decision, we fail to conceptualize the totality of the problem. As an ontological characteristic of human being, agency is that which allows the possibility for choice and the ability to take up the circumstances of one’s social world; how this specific manifestation of choice is presenced will be, in part, influenced by the specific types of limitations provided by a given context. The where and how of one’s existence will impose which possibilities for being will be allowed and which will not. To take up existence as a being-in-the-world-as-criminal already evokes a variety of agentic possibilities that are inseparable from the context from which that agency finds itself. The realization that the circumstances of one’s being-in-the-world are unchangeable certainly imposes a degree of limitation on that being, but never forecloses some type of agentic response. The sense of hopelessness that emerges from this socially constructed perspective is not necessarily a failure of agency, but rather the result of over-determined contextual limitations that are imposed on one’s ability to be. Agnew’s attempt to reconcile the disagreement within the discipline of criminology, though admirable, seems to add more strength to the argument that the creation of a unified general theory of crime is likely not possible. Some of the readers of this discussion may find this conclusion unfair given the rather perfunctory treatment of this

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rather complex text. Though it is certainly true that the discussion offered has been undeniably brief, its conclusion is based on a careful exploration of the text, which reveals the presence of two competing ontological systems that simply cannot be reconciled in the manner offered by Agnew. In the final chapter of his text, Agnew (2011, p 186) makes the following observation: There is reason to believe that behavior is influenced by both subjective views and objective reality. Individuals based their actions on their views, even if such views are mistaken. But at the same time, the real world imposes constraints on action and influences individuals in ways that they are unaware or misperceive. However, by theorizing the existence of “objective reality” in this way, human subjective experience is either reduced to an epiphenomenal artifact of this objectified world, or is somehow configured as a parallel philosophical category that is separate from this reality. Individual action is predicated on a specific recognition of the social world whereby this action reflects a specific comprehension of that reality. The constraints on action imposed by the “real world” reflects the point of reference from which the social world and lived-experience meet. The notion of misperception is misplaced for the simple reason that this is preciously how the world is given within human livedexperience. Any attempt to correct these “mistaken perceptions” is to unavoidably argue that an a priori configuration of reality exits and can be ascertained.

How, then, to proceed? The above discussion has attempted to explore two interrelated points or premises. The first has attempted to argue that the social construction of crime and criminal behavior, or, for that matter, any socially constructed experience, reveals a phenomenological process,

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which links subjective perspective with the social world within an inseparable co-constituted presencing of human existence and “coauthored” meanings. Related to this premise is the observation that no general theory of crime is likely possible given the incompatibility of competing ontologies present within the discourse of criminological theorizing. However, does this imply that the conversation ends? Not necessarily…. Another implicit premise, which is perhaps the subtext of the two points discussed above, is that a degree of ontological incompatibility is resolved when subjective experience and social world are viewed as a contiguous and co-constituted philosophical category, and not as discrete objects of philosophical analysis. Though this integrative approach may seem wholly unsatisfying for those more persuaded by quantifiable certainty, it does seem better suited to meet human experience where it resides and where it confronts a specific configuration of world. Such a starting point seems central to any legitimate understanding of crime and criminal behavior. The following chapters proceed from this premise. Chapter Two attempts to explore the structural aspects of livedexperience, which are figured or implicated in the phenomenology of the social construction of crime and criminal behavior. Though phenomenology begins from the perspective of a perceiving consciousness (Husserl), being-in-the-world (Heidegger) embodied subjectivity (Merleau-Ponty), an advenant (Romano) or living being (Agamben), it always finds itself inseparably situated within the confines of the world as lived. However, this configuration of the lived-world also includes various vectors of meaning, be they economic, familial, political, psychological, or social, which are inseparably implicated in the construction of that world. How the world is experienced or perceived always includes aspects of the social world that are fundamentally implicated in that process. The ability to perceive one’s world as changeable or finished is fundamentally predicated on the vantage point from which this world becomes meaningful. The circumstances of one’s economic, familial and sociopolitical condition are always in some way implicated within one’s experience

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of their world. How could this be otherwise? The perceptional objects of consciousness (Husserl) are not somehow isolated within individual subjectivity exclusively, somehow cut off from the social world; rather, these “objects” reflect the particular vantage point from which one’s shared existence unfolds and becomes meaningful for them. To find oneself thrown, to recognize one’s body as a “vehicle of behavior” (Merleau-Ponty, 1945/2012), implies the presence of a social world that precedes a person and provides the point of demarcation from which they enter this world. The structural aspects of the phenomenology of the social construction of crime are those socially embedded characteristics or conditions that are implicated in the production of crime. The criminalization of blackness, for example, reflects the social context from which black lived-experience confronts its world. Such an observation is not intended to imply that every manifestation of black-being-in-the-world is fatalistically destined for this fate; rather, it reflects, as Unnever and Gabbidon succinctly argue, how the socially imposed fact of anti-black racism imposes itself on black livedexperience in such a way that it is impossible to ignore. In Chapter Three we explore how the phenomenology of the social construction of criminality unfolds within individual lived-experience. Central to this discussion will be the various ways in which livedexperience takes up the circumstances of its thrown existence. The how and where of individual lived-experience helps to configure the possibilities by which being-in-the-world takes up its projects. The factual realities of poverty, economic, and political marginalization, and so on, all impose formidable challenges to one’s ability to be. As such, the “choice of criminal behavior” reveals a variety of layered vectors of meaning that point to how this aspect of being-with is configured. In the final chapter, the “components” of the phenomenology of the social construction of crime and criminal behavior are reconfigured as a single philosophical category of study. The individual focus on social context and individual lived-experience as discussed in the preceding chapters is actually contradictory given the general theoretical context of phenomenology, and is employed more as a

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descriptive tool, rather than any tacit conceptualization of discrete philosophical categories. Though this focus is intended to reveal the co-joined aspects relative to this phenomenology, it is important to recognize that neither can be legitimately explored in isolation from the other. The phenomenology of the social construction of crime and criminality requires the recognition that human experience is ontologically inseparable from those social contexts that together provide both the possibilities and limitations to be.

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2

THE PHENOMENOLOGY OF THE SOCIAL CONSTRUCTION OF CRIME: SOCIAL CONTEXT AND STRUCTURAL REALITIES, AND THE MEANING OF BEING Anyone familiar with American nightly newscasts has likely listened as a witness provides some degree of background information concerning either the alleged perpetrator of a particular crime or some insight concerning the background of the victims. In most of these accounts, particularly when the crime in question has occurred in an area not “normally recognized” or identified by such behavior, the notion of surprise or shock is often prominently discussed. Statements such as, “This type of behavior may happen elsewhere, but it doesn’t happen here,” or “He was such a quiet guy, it’s hard to believe that he could have done such a horrible thing.” What such observations reveal is the socially constructed belief concerning not only the designated place where this type of behavior is exclusively expected to occur, but the type of individual likely to be involved—an individual who is clearly identified as “not like me” (Gordon, 2013).Recall from Chapter One that Trayvon Martin becomes “recognized” by George Zimmerman as a criminal based on a type of incongruence that emerges between

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individual presence and social place. Martin’s presence becomes a “problem” for Zimmerman given that this type of social visibility is viewed as being “out of place” or “suspicious” with what would be “normally” anticipated or excepted. Much like the hypothetical scenario discussed above, the experience of surprise or threat reflects the immediacy of a disruptive incongruence between what is expected and what has imposed itself on one’s immediate frame of reference. From this perspective, one’s understanding of the social world becomes framed by a set of contextually situated taken-for-granted expectations that are constructed or recognized as being most consistent or normal to that locality. Perhaps stated slightly differently, the structural contours of a given social context are implicated in the construction and meaning of social visibility as it encounters the social world (Schutz and Luckmann, 1973). The above descriptions evoke what Schutz (1932/72) has described as the motivational phenomenology located within the face-to-face relationship. In describing what he calls the motivational context of social interaction, Schutz (1932/72, p 162) makes the following observation: The motivational context of the interaction itself derives its validity from the direct social relationship, of which all other interactions are mere modifications. In the living intentionality of the direct social relationship, the two partners are face to face, their streams of consciousness are synchronized and geared to each other, each immediately affects the other, and the in-orderto motive of the one becomes the because-motive of the other, the two motives complementing and validating each other as objects of reciprocal attention. From this context, the understanding of the social world emerges from the immediacy of the face-to-face encounter. What is perhaps most salient in the description provided by Schutz is the emerging relationality by which a person finds themself “synchronized and geared” to this other and they to the person. The how of this faceto-face encounter not only reveals the meaning of the immediacy of

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this relation, but also provides the broader social context from which this “reciprocal attention” receives its focus and point of reference. Perhaps the most obvious aspect of the face-to-face experience is that a person encounters another human being with whom they are currently in relation; however, what is perhaps not so obvious is how the social visibility of this other will be constructed. To this encounter with the other person I bring a whole stock of previously constituted knowledge.This includes both general knowledge of what the other person is as such and any specific knowledge I may have of the person in question. (Schutz, 1932/72, p 169) Such a conceptualization of the face-to-face encounter also forces us to recognize that much more is involved then the simple meeting of two individuals suddenly engaged within the same shared perceptional field, a fact made obviously clear within the case of George Zimmerman. What we witness in the face-to-face encounter between George Zimmerman and Trayvon Martin is a highly constricted sense of “reciprocal attention” based on the “general knowledge” concerning who Martin must be for Zimmerman. However, this sense of Martin is not solely an isolated artifact of Zimmerman’s perceptional field, but also helps to reveal the constitutive fact of a broader configuration for the meaning of blackness, which fundamentally denies any possibility of any legitimately shared reciprocal attention that is not exclusively preformed from this restricting point of view (Hart, 2013). Though Martin throughout this encounter seeks to distance himself from Zimmerman’s tireless objectifying gaze, the fact of his “blackness” makes escape impossible.The inescapability for Martin is the inescapability evoked not solely by Zimmerman’s pursuit; we must also include in this manifestation of the face-to-face encounter the constant threat posed by the suffocating presence of anti-black racism to which Zimmerman was certainly party to, but not its sole author. Gordon (2013, p 86) observes that:

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Being up to something is, of course, a function of crossed boundaries. To be where one is ‘not supposed to be’ is already a violation. In some instances, that involves simply appearing, since black appearance, especially belonging, as having a right to exist, is, within a racist framework, illicit. The “fact” of the face-to-face encounter, therefore, may invite the possibility for a genuine reciprocity to emerge, but such a result is never guaranteed. The reality of the presence of conflicting and contradictory social worlds and meanings makes such reciprocity difficult without first recognizing that these worlds exist. Social visibility, then, regardless of its specific subjective manifestations, emerges as a phenomenological process that constructs the presencing of lived-experience in very proscriptive and often contradictory ways. To be phenomenologically present within a given context is not solely determined or predicated on the actions of subjective reflection or a perceiving consciousness, but rather must also include the co-constituting influence of anticipated or expected ways to be. What this phenomenology reveals is the way in which the social world and lived-experienced come together, providing the ground from which the presencing of human existence becomes possible. Such a configuration of the place of human existence evokes what Heidegger (1953/2010) has generally described as Dasein or “being-in-the-world.”

Dasein and the world Heidegger (1953/2010, p 53) describes Dasein in the following way: Dasein is a being which is related understandably in its being toward that being. In saying this we are indicating the formal concept of existence. Dasein exists. Furthermore, Dasein is the being which I myself always am.However, existence for Heidegger never find itself as an isolated being, as somehow separate from beings like itself. Rather, the “mineness” of this existence always emerges from the ontological constitution of

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that existence, which is being-in-the-world. For Dasein, the “there” of this being is the place from which Dasein reveals itself, which is the world. As a result, no separation is possible: Dasein begins from the ontological starting point of being-in-the-world. The compound expression ‘being-in-the-world’ indicates, in the very way we have coined it, that it stands for a unified phenomenon.This primary datum must be seen as a whole. But while being-in-the-world cannot be broken up into components that may be pieced together, this does not prevent it from having a multiplicity of constitutive structural factors. (Heidegger, 1953/2010, p 53) As a “unified phenomenon,” being-in-the-world reflects the type of being that it is. Such a configuration of being, however, must not confuse the ontological structure of this being with Dasein’s specific potentiality to be. The “there” of being-in-the-world reveals the point from which Dasein discovers itself and takes up its ability to be. The specificity of this ontic manifestation of the “there” of being simultaneously reveals the ontological fact of being-in-the-world while also identifying the specific contours of a lived-world. Such a configuration of human being recognizes that all being-in-the-world shares this basic fact of existence; what is not necessarily shared is the way in which this being discovers itself in the world. It is on the recognition of these differing possibilities for being that the social construction of reality is grounded. In its most general sense, the social construction of reality reflects the constitutive variability for being-inthe-world. The construction of social knowledge reflects the way in which Dasein defines itself within these encounters, the way in which it situates its own sense of the world relative to others. However, this sense of the meaning of being is not exclusive to that being, and must often confront a variety of imposed challenges that seek to transform this potentiality into an objectified presencing of social existence. What seems too often forgotten or ignored is that the social construction of reality emerges from the fact of our relationality with others and

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world. The unified phenomenon of being-in-the-world, along with the various manifestations of social knowledge which this concept evokes, reveals a shared world of differing meanings and potentiality. So when or how do we define this world? If, as Heidegger (1953/2010, p 64) argues, the “world is already prefigured” in the very meaning of being, how do we discover the ontological character of the world? In attempting to clarify his conceptualization of world, Heidegger offers the following: Is ‘world’ indeed a character of being of Dasein? And then does every Dasein ‘initially’ have its own world? Does not ‘world’ thus become something ‘subjective’? Then how is a ‘common’ world still possible ‘in’ which we, after all, are? If we pose the question of ‘world,’ which world is meant? Neither this nor that world, but rather the worldliness of world in general. (Heidegger, 1953/2010, p 64) For Heidegger, the worldliness of the world reflects the ontological character of the world that by so doing also rejects any formulation of the world that is somehow exclusively subjective or perhaps even epiphenomenal to human being. The worldliness of the world is the ontological configuration of world where being and world are unified. Such a conceptualization, therefore, requires us to recognize that any exploration concerning the ontological character of the world always includes an exploration of being, given that the world is a fundamental characteristic of Dasein itself (Heidegger, 1953/2010). For Heidegger, this exploration of the ontological character of the world is reflected by that which is closest to Dasein: that is, the everyday givenness of the surrounding world. Perhaps most relevant to our immediate concerns is the way in which the surrounding world constitutes our being-with-others. Though Heidegger includes in his exploration of the surrounding world Dasein’s relation to things, it will not be specifically included here. For our purposes, the surrounding world reveals the way in which Dasein finds itself as a being-with-others— because this being-with is an ontological characteristic of Dasein, any

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causal determinations concerning its configuration must be avoided. What can be explored is the relationality of the “there” of Dasein and the implications this may have on the ability to be. Heidegger describes Dasein as being taken over by the world, a process that in turn reveals the everydayness of being. However, because this being there is already prefigured by a world, any attempt to ascertain its meaning must reside within the “in-betweens” of this unified phenomenon. But how does this prefiguration of world manifest in the meaning of being? As already stated, the prefiguration of a world is never causally situated, never determined in some exclusive way by a world that is located somewhere outside of the “there” of being. But neither can it be constructed as an enclosed or selfreferential “there” that is able to deny the presence of this prefigured world. If to be taken over by the world reflects that point of reference from which the everydayness of being is discovered, then it is from this vantage that the meaning of the world is revealed. By exploring the “there” of being-in-the-world we also come into contact with a specific grounding for the meaning of being. What this implies for being-in-the-world is that the meaning for being emerges from the point of this “there.” Such a configuration of world recognizes not only one’s take on the world, but how that location becomes implicated in the being that the person is. If one’s “there” is located within a context that values a person’s ability to be, then the experience of the world will be one of more or less open potentiality. However, if this same “there” is situated within a prefiguration of world that denies a person’s ability to be, that seeks to limit how they find themself in the world, then the person’s “there” is a place of marginalization and constricted potentiality. Imagine finding yourself in a world where the very fact of the color of your skin, your gender, your sexual orientation, your religious affiliation, or economic class already prefigures a specific set of socially constructed meanings concerning who or what you are. Though these meanings may hold no specific currency or significance for you, they remain very real obstacles to your ability to be. People may cross the street as you approach, make fun of your appearance, ridicule the manner of your dress or gate, or simply brush past you

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quickly without even acknowledging your presence. As a result you may feel angry, hurt, indifferent, or puzzled, emotionally upended by the dissonance these encounters evoke. What one quickly comes to realize is that the meaning for who you are already precedes you; that the very fact of your social existence, of your being-in-the-world, brings with it a taken-for-granted meaning that envelops you as you take up your projects. Whether this occurs within the immediacy of the face-to-face encounter or within the immediacy of the “there” from which you take up the world, these meanings not only precede you, but actually structure the contours of social experience. If your “there” is overdetermined by the taken-for-granted belief that your social presence is, in fact, the presencing of criminality, then every action that you pursue, every encounter that you experience, will similarly be colored by this taken-for granted expectation, regardless your actual comportment or demeanor. You remain forever a suspect, not based on what you have done, but based on the socially constructed “certainty” of what you are expected to do. As a result, you may be so overwhelmed by the demands of the “there” that you embrace them as if they’re your own, as if they are the sole measure by which being is to be defined. Sometime ago, I recall listening to a segment on American National Public Radio, which was exploring adolescent perceptions of incarceration with African American teenage boys from North Philadelphia and a group of white male teens from New York. Central to this discussion was whether or not the possibility of prison or jail represented something fearful that should be avoided. The general response from both groups was a resounding “no.” When asked to explain their position, the general consensus of both groups was that incarceration was actually viewed as a badge of honor, which provided a greater degree of “street cred” on their release. In fact, one teen added that most of the people that they know are either in prison, have been released from prison, or have been involved in some way with the “cops;” if you weren’t receiving attention from the police it was more likely that you were a cop or perhaps a “snitch.” To be viewed as “okay” or as “one of us” presupposed a similar experience of police attention, or else you were viewed with some suspicion.

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What this brief recollection reveals or helps to exemplify is how individual experience always emerges from a specific social context, which in turn provides meaning to these face-to-face encounters. For the young men in the above example, the experience of incarceration was not something to fear, but something to embrace, something which allowed a firmer connection to the world they inhabit. However, it also reveals the structure of their social experience and the required “recognitions” demanded by this specific social context. To embrace the initiation of arrest, conviction, and incarceration is also to embrace the broader contextual grounding from which individual identity becomes possible. It is through this transformation of stigma or a discredited identity that a different meaning of the world is configured, and with it, a clearer sense concerning “who is like me” and “who is not” (Goffman, 1963).

Being-in-the-world and the phenomenology of the “they” What the above account of the meaning of incarceration reveals is the way in which individual experience, individual being-in-the-world, finds itself within a shared world, or what Heidegger has defined as “being-with.” For Heidegger, this being-with is a fundamental ontological characteristic for human being, and reflects how experience is always in relation with others (Polt, 1999). However, Heidegger (1953/2010, p 115) states that: “‘Others’ does not mean everybody else but me—those from whom the I distinguishes itself. Others are, rather, those from whom one mostly does not distinguish oneself, those among whom one also is.” From this context, to be incarcerated is to be among those who are “most like me.” To be hassled by police, to be on parole, to have familiarity with prison, is to share those characteristics or experiences, which most closely approximates that type of being that I also am. Those “not like me” are those from which I distinguish myself. The absence of police involvement or bouts of incarceration evokes suspicion, evokes a type of being-with that is unrecognizable to those that are most like me. The shock conveyed by a neighbor in the aftermath of a horrible crime is the shock that is experienced within the “normal” manifestation of being-with that is suddenly disrupted

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by a course of events not familiar to everyday being. “The relation of being to others than becomes a projection of one’s own being toward oneself into an other” (Heidegger, 1953/2010, p 121). If that other is alien, is “not like me,” no such projection can occur. The ability to project oneself into an other, then, requires that this other is “just like me” and more or less shares the same situated experience of being-with. This is not to say that this other is an extension of oneself, a manifestation of a person being there; rather, it reflects a configuration of a shared social world, which this other also inhabits. Whether this co-habitation is situated within a structure of shared meaning related to ethnic or religious orientation, political affiliation, economic status, or given lifestyle, a world emerges that allows a person to recognize this being-with as that which is closest to the person. Central to the relationality present in being-with is what Heidegger has described as the “they-self.” Heidegger (1953/2010, p 123) makes the following observation: The everyday possibilities of being of Dasein are at the disposal of the whims of others.These others are not definite others. On the contrary, any other can represent them. What is decisive is only that the inconspicuous domination by others that Dasein as being-with has already taken over unawares. One belongs to the others oneself, and entrenches their power. The “inconspicuous domination by others,” to which Heidegger (1953/2010, p 123) eludes, is clearly present within the discourse provided above insofar as the subjective meaning for these various encounters with the law becomes situated within this larger context of being-with that produces a very specific social meaning for these experiences. However, and perhaps more importantly, such a configuration of social meaning also reflects one’s connection to these “others” that provides not only a sense of belonging, but as Heidegger contends, entrenches a sense of certainty that this relationality reveals. Heidegger (1953/2010, p 123) continues by observing that:

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In this inconspicuousness and unascertainability, the they unfolds its true dictatorship. We enjoy ourselves and have fun the way they enjoy themselves. We read, see and judge literature and art the way they see and judge. But we also withdraw from the ‘great mass’ the way they withdraw, we find shocking what they find shocking. What this description of the they-self reveals is the way the dictatorship of the they ties being-in-the-world to a particular type of beingwith. To be like others are allowed to be is to reflect the demands of this “dictatorship,” while also enjoying the meaning for being that it provides. To recognize a degree of commonality within a given experience or social context provides a sense of belonging to these others as long as the dictates of this they are recognized and obeyed. To engage with another who does not share your disdain for the police or who has not experienced some degree of police attention is not to judge how they judge and therefore is “not like me.” To fail to see blackness in the way that they do, or religion or socioeconomic class, or the conditions of economic, political, or social marginalization, is not to judge how they judge and is therefore “not like me.” In its being, the they is essentially concerned with averageness. Thus, the they maintains itself factically in the averageness of what belongs to it, what it does and does not consider valid, and what it grants or denies success. This averageness, which prescribes what can and may be ventured, watches over every exception which thrusts itself to the fore. (Heidegger, 1953/2010, p 123) To be a being-in-the-world configured by some degree of criminality or criminal involvement is also to evoke a specific manifestation of the they, which validates that type of being-with described by the adolescents in this interview. These teens construct the meaning of their experience by identifying with those others who are most like them. The willingness to go to jail or prison, the refusal to talk to the

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police, the refusal to provide any meaningful information concerning the neighborhood or those with whom they interact on a daily basis is to judge like they judge, is to act like they act. Similarly, those individuals described as being not like them are judged as those who do not belong and are therefore “not like me.” However, this same dynamic is equally visible when these same teens are judged from a different perspectival manifestation of the they. From this context, these same teens are those who don’t belong, who are worthy of regular police attention and are denied to succeed like they succeed. The condition of their day-to-day experience, the reality of their economic, political, and social marginalization, is judged, and their very social presence is invalidated and reduced to that of an objective social threat. From this manifestation of the they, the condition of poverty is the result of a lazy resolve, of an unwillingness or inability to succeed or to be validated as they are validated. It is to be constructed as one of “those people” who cannot be trusted, who are violent, who are unworthy of any assistance from society, and who clearly are “not like me.” Such configurations of the they also help to provide a context for the structuring of social knowledge, which in turn conforms to these others and what they think and how they judge. Competing structural realities within a given society simultaneously evoke the privileging of certain manifestations of the they that legitimate certain aspects of being-with that are validated by this unfolding dictatorship. However, the structure for being-with is not necessarily configured from a specific or single manifestation of the they, which often reveals a variety of thematic layers that may or may not always agree with what they say or how they think. The most obvious tensions between these competing “theys” is clearly witnessed in the examples offered above. The legalistic they justify these strategies of marginalization, which create the conditions from which specific types of crime are likely to emerge along with the type of individual likely to be involved. Given that this expectation or taken-for-granted belief concerning the locality of criminality is always situated within very specific social contexts, locality and social presence are conflated into a specific

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socially constructed image of criminal behavior that reflects how they think and how they conceptualize the meaning of crime. Examples of this dynamic are witnessed in various types of white-collar crime that seem immune to the same constructive process often imposed on the street criminal (Leonard, 2015). Similar dynamics are witnessed in the behavior of police who sometimes break the law to apprehend the “criminal.” From this manifestation of the they, questionable law enforcement strategies are justified based on the target of that attention, which is almost always focused on those individuals or groups who are exclusively defined by the presumption of their guilt as a de facto aspect of their social existence. With the criminalized manifestation of the they-self, we see a similar dynamic in place. Criminality is that which is validated or allowed as a result of the thrown reality of economic or political disenfranchisement, marginalization, and social objectification. To belong to this configuration of the they is to reject those normative values that place a cultural premium on obeying the law. Acquiescing to such a normative system is viewed as a type of economic and political suicide insofar as compliance offers little material advantage to those struggling under the very conditions this system has created (Anderson, 2000). The phenomenon of organized crime powerfully exemplifies this process. The manifestation of the criminal they within the context of organized crime or the various examples of ethnic street gangs reflects a specific configuration of this process that further distinguishes this phenomenology of being-with. Within this context, the contours of belonging become more exclusively articulated and predicated on more specific characteristics, which are not defined by structural locality alone. For example, the colloquial term “made man” signifies not only a person’s membership in the Italian-American mafia, but also underscores the fabrication of a new social presence that distinguishes itself from those not also part of this structured association (Polizzi et al, 2014). The tattooed image of specific street gangs not only inscribes the cultural history of that group, but also fabricates a version of the self that is now part of that discourse.

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In both of these examples, the fabricated self that emerges from these highly proscribed versions of being-with are constructed on or actually nullify those preceding layers of the they that formerly determined the what and how for being-in-the-world. Once so configured, the fabricated self emerges as a specific example of being-with that carefully demarcates the specific there of this type of being-in-the-world. Unlike these more generalized versions of being-with, being-in-the-world now finds itself in relation to a highly “specialized” they-self, which further delineates the meaning of being. In fact, within the world of organized crime different titles are used to designate the precise way in which being-with is configured. Within the context of the Italian-American mafia, the individual who is “made” has now entered a configuration of being-with that designates those others who are “most like me” and who determine what will be allowed and what will not. One’s connection to this specialized they is formalized within a right of initiation that requires an oath of fidelity to the “family,” which recognizes an uncompromising demand for loyalty that is more important than any other previous association, be it familial or social. Though certain interactions regularly occur between “made men” and those who are not, the difference in status is clearly present. Those individuals who have not been formally invited to join a family, but who are involved in the criminal activity of the organization, are considered associates—though they “enjoy” some benefit through their association to a specific family, they are clearly not “made,” and therefore are not allowed the same benefits “enjoyed” by those officially initiated into the family. What the above discussion has attempted to explore is the way in which the they not only configures the meaning for being-in-theworld through these various examples of being-with, but also how the experience of being in relationship with others also configures very specific points of demarcation concerning how one belongs to a certain socially constructed locality. Whether these modes of relationality are defined by specific attitudes concerning the police, the criminality of certain individuals or groups, or those socially constructed attitudes that emerge from the “specialized” perspectives offered by one’s affiliation(s)

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to social or criminal organizations, what becomes most recognizable is how these relationships clearly distinguish “who is like me” and “who is not.” As a result, the possibility for a shared world becomes fractured by the tension created from these competing manifestations of the they. As discussed in the beginning of this chapter, with the examples of Trayvon Martin and the shocked neighbor reflecting on the unexpected presencing of crime, we can clearly witness the manifestation of this fracturing tension of the theys. These unexpected presencings of “criminality” are taken up metaphorically as perhaps a patient would, reacting to the news from their doctor that they have a potentially life threatening disease. The sudden manifestation of the presencing of crime becomes similar to the unexpected discovery of the likely presence of an emerging illness that could be fatal. Such configurations of crime become possible based on the way in which the they determines what is allowed and what is not within these specific contexts. From this perspective the criminal act becomes the way in which they do not behave and who is therefore “not like me.” Such recognition reveals not only one’s relationship to a specific they, but also the territory that they control, which configures both being and world. Crime, much like the sudden emergence of disease, is constructed as a type of alien force that imposes itself on a specific locality that seeks protection from its potentially toxic effects. Once these lines of demarcation have been firmly established, crime becomes something that happens elsewhere, an ailment that is not part of the social body that one inhabits. Criminality exists there, and is performed by those who are “not like me.” However, this artificial fracturing of the social body fails to recognize that the “dis-ease” that is present there is also here (Polizzi and Lanier, 2012; Arrigo, 2013; Arrigo and Bersot, 2014); it is the same body, the same shared world, albeit experienced from differing points of view. Perhaps another angle on this conceptualization of the they can be explored within the phenomenology of what Roberto Esposito has described as the immunity paradigm. In his text Bios: Biopolitics and philosophy, Esposito (2008) explores the philosophical tradition of the paradigm of immunity. Central to this paradigm is the “protection of life,” which Esposito also describes as a founding characteristic of modernity, though not necessarily

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exclusive to that specific manifestation of the body politic. However, included within this paradigm is the tension created by the contradictory presence of communitas and immunitas. Whereas communitas reflects that which evokes a binding obligation to others, immunitas reflects that which does not have anything in common (Esposito, 2008). It is from this dichotomist manifestation of communitas and immunitas that the they is able to institute its specific power over the there of being. The constituting relationality of being-with fabricates a type of communitas that identifies one’s obligation to others, to those “most like me,” while clearly identifying those who do not share any commonality with oneself. Within this context, the they becomes that which configures the protection of the communitas relative to those contagions that threaten its “health.” In those instances where the contagion appears uncontained, such as the sudden emergence of “social dis-ease” (Polizzi and Lanier, 2011; Arrigo, 2013), crime, or the refusal to act in a certain way towards the ruling authority, the communitas of the they resorts to more aggressive strategies of intervention by which to “defend” life. However, this defense is fundamentally predicated on the precise fragmentation of social existence that clearly explicates that life which is required to be protected and that life which is not (Dona, 2006).Examples of this process of fragmentation have been witnessed in the military strategies employed by the US in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks. The use of torture, rendition, confinement without charge or trial, and the liberal use of drone strikes, all reflect the increased intensity of this strategy of containment (Agamben, 2005; Esposito, 2008, Lanier et al, 2014). Similar strategies have been observed closer to home, resulting in the seemingly unending string of events where an African American suspect is killed as a consequence of an altercation with police. Perhaps the most troubling example of this escalation was witnessed in the summer of 2015 in McKinney, Texas, where an officer is viewed on video acting widely out of control as he attempts to subdue a group of seemingly uncompliant teens at a pool party. Though this encounter resulted in no fatalities, the officer in question did draw his gun and physically drove the head of a teenage girl into the ground before lying on top of her to subdue her. The out-of-

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control officer is seen frantically confronting various teens in his failed attempt to “de-escalate” the situation. His frantic comportment seems the result of the sudden encroachment of an uncontained threat that is overwhelming in its scope. What these various examples reflect in their own way is the degree to which a specific configuration of communitas aggressively seeks to contain a targeted “contagion” so as to prevent any future spread of its “toxic” effects (Esposito, 2011; Polizzi and Lanier, 2012; Lanier et al, 2014). As these “pathogens” continue to encroach and “threaten” life, a more rigorous set of strategies is employed by which to contain its possible effects. Whether the danger that lies in wait is a disease threatening the individual body, a violent intrusion into the body politic, or a deviant message entering the body electric, what remains constant is the place where the threat is located always on the border between inside and outside, between the self and other, the individual and the common. Someone or something penetrates a body—an individual or collective—and alters it, transforms it, corrupts it. (Esposito, 2008, p 2) From this perspective, what becomes most central to the locality of threat, to the threat of impending criminality, is a specific configuration of the body whose very presence identifies the vehicle by which this “contagion” will be delivered. Esposito’s observation also reflects what Drew Leder (1990) has described as the body in dysappearance. For Leder, the normal modality of bodily presencing is the body in disappearance—that is, the mode of presencing that occurs within the context of normal bodily function. However, with the sudden onset of physical pain or the experience of serious injury, the body evokes a pathological mode of presencing that demands our attention. A similar type of attention is evoked when witnessed within the dysappearance of the social body, except that with this mode of bodily appearing, the dysfunction is the result of a mode of pathological relationality. We trace this socially constructed configuration of the body through the work of Merleau-Ponty.

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The phenomenology of the body as cultural artifact In his seminal text, Phenomenology of perception, Merleau-Ponty (1945/2012, p 364) describes the body in the following way: “The very first cultural object, and the one by which all exist, is the other’s body as the bearer of a behavior.” However, as seen above, the meaning of this behavior becomes predicated on how the body as cultural object is specifically constructed. My gaze falls upon a living body performing an action and the objects that surround it immediately receive a new layer of signification: they are no longer merely what I can do with them, they are also what this behavior is about to do with them. (Merleau-Ponty, 1945/2012, p 369) For the body perceived as a vehicle of danger or threat, every behavior and every object it attempts to employ becomes defined by the layer of signification that this conceptualization evokes. Even the most benign bodily performance such as walking down the street, walking through a mall or airport, or approaching another person, already carries with it a set of socially prescribed meanings that proceed and envelope the body in an imposed context of signification. Whether this process manifests itself within the presencing of a bearded terror suspect, the tattooed teen, or is recognized as a result of the criminalization of blackness, the locality of the body is taken over and thrown into a state of dysappearance. Once so configured, the visibility of the body evokes the presence of a pathological there that has the power to negate any “competing” manifestation of the body that does not in some way reflect this process. The criminalized presencing of the body becomes that point from which the image of criminality is both constructed and “recognized.” Within such an example of being-with, the body loses any sense of a shared reciprocity, and is taken over. “Without reciprocity there is no alter Ego, since one person’s world would thereby envelop the other’s, and since one would feel alienated to the benefit of the other” (Merleau-Ponty, 1945/2012,

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p 373). Taken from this theoretical perspective, the criminalization of the body comes to reflect the locality from which this potential threat may emerge, which is the body itself. Though this process may also be further “enhanced” when contained within very specific social contexts, such a condition is not essential to its construction. As long as the body itself is that which is defined as a threatening being-with, its actual locality takes on less significance given that the social world is already implicated in the meaning of its existence. As Merleau-Ponty (1945/2012, p 379) observes: I can certainly turn away from the social world, but I cannot cease to be situated in relation to it. Our relation to the social, like our relation to the world, is deeper than every explicit perception and deeper than every judgement. It is just as false to place us within society like an object in the midst of other objects, as it is to put society in us like an object of thought, and the error on both sides consists in treating the social as an object. We must return to the social world with which we are in contact through the simple fact of our existence, and that we inseparably bear along with us prior to every objectification. In the above quote, Merleau-Ponty powerfully describes the coconstituted reality of the there of embodied subjectivity. However, if this “simple fact of existence” is not recognized, the body is reduced solely to that of an artifact of objectification, which it must “inseparably bear.”When taken up from the social construction of crime or criminal behavior, this observation becomes particularly significant. To return to a social world that configures the body as criminal, deviant, or threatening, as that which reflects the simple ontological fact of its existence, is to find oneself in the absence of a situated reciprocity. Taken from this point of view, the body must bear this configuration of the social world, which its very visibility comes to represent. Stated differently, perhaps, it becomes the type of body that they say it must be. Numerous examples of this process exist.

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Though Trayvon Martin comes immediately to mind, his tragic death hardly exhausts the possible accounts that could be used to exemplify this breakdown of bodily presencing. Regardless of the specifics of such encounters, what is central to all of these shared circumstances is the way in which the visibility of the body becomes caught or trapped within a process that denies reciprocity and denies coexistence. Within these experiences of the social world, reciprocity becomes impossible in certain contexts for the simple reason that it is denied any prethematic potentiality, any possibility for a shared coexistence. When Trayvon Martin was pursued by George Zimmerman, Martin was perceived as thoroughly criminal, and his behavior was defined from that point of view. The fleeing Walter Scott who was shot and killed by police in South Carolina was presumed to be guilty and dangerous, and his attempt at escape the alleged proof of that guilt, even though no specific evidence could be offered to substantiate that claim. When the unarmed Amadou Diallo reaches into his jacket to retrieve his wallet, an officer sees this object in his hand and yells, “Gun!” to the other officers at the scene, who immediately fire 41 shots, killing Diallo outside his apartment. Though police maintained that Diallo seemed to match the description of a rape suspect, who was subsequently arrested after his death, no doubt seemed to be present at the time of his killing in either his guilt or the immediate danger his presence posed to the police. Perhaps the most infamous of these events is recognized in the figure of Rodney King being pummeled by a cadre of officers prior to his actual arrest. Many can probably recall the horrific image of King being beaten and tazed by Los Angeles police officers while on his knees, helplessly attempting to shield his head from the relentless attacks from the arresting officers. It would later be claimed by police authorities that King’s behavior was proof that he was unwilling to comply and still potentially dangerous to the officers on the scene, thereby legitimating the actions they directed toward him. What the phenomenology of the body reveals is the way in which the visibility of the body becomes structured by the meaning affixed to its social presence and behavior. In normal modes of presencing, the body as a vehicle of behavior reflects a shared prethematic potentiality

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that finds itself situated with a social world that reflects a mode of shared existence, which takes on a type of mundane or anonymous presencing that does not stand out as an example of an objectified social “object.” The body that one perceives in day-to-day encounters is a body more or less “like me,” and reflects a point of reference that one can recognize and share. However, when the body is constructed exclusively as criminal, dangerous, suspicious, or threatening, the normal mode of presencing is negated, and the prethematic structuring of the body is lost. From this configuration of the body, the presencing of criminality, normally localized within very specific social contexts, now becomes reflected in the body itself. As such, the body now stands out as an extension of those marginalized localities, as an example of a taken-for-granted type of behavior that is most commonly located there, and thematized as an object of social harm.

Integrating this structuring phenomenology Throughout this chapter an attempt has been made to explore how the social world structures the various ways in which human experience is constructed and defined by competing manifestations of the they. Taken from this perspective, the structure of a specific configuration of the social world becomes the point from which the inseparability of the world is confronted and lived. Though we all find ourselves within the reality of a shared world, the meaning of that world is rarely the same and rarely offers the same possibilities to be. The there from which the social world is encountered is predicated on a variety of thrown realities that fundamentally challenge the ability to be like others are allowed to be. The manifestation of the production of crime emerges as a “structural” reality of a given set of co-constituting social contexts that help to legitimize and reify this type of behavior. Whether this is the typical manifestation of street crime or the less “visible” presence of business-related corruption or political maleficence, the act of crime is always, to some degree, implicated by the structure from which it is situated. Though the possibility for agency is always in some way present, individual human action is never separable from this co-

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constituted reality. As a result, the agentic act is always validated by the context from which it emerges. This fact was tragically reflected in the horrifying events that took place in Charleston, South Carolina at the Emanuel African Methodist (EAM) Episcopal Church on June 19, 2015. Dylann Roof, a 21-year-old unemployed Caucasian resident of the city, who had some previous involvement with the local police, entered the iconic EAM Episcopal Church in downtown Charleston and joined a group of African American congregants participating in their weekly Bible study group, which was held in the basement. Roof sat with the group for approximately an hour before standing up and discharging his recently purchased .45-caliber hand gun, killing nine and seriously wounding three. It was reported by one of the surviving witnesses that as Roof was reloading his weapon, one of the male congregants pleaded with Roof not to shoot. “You don’t have to do this,” he is reported to have said. Roof is alleged to have responded by saying, “You rape our women, you’re taking over the country, you’ve got to go,” and continued firing his weapon, reloading on five different occasions in the process before leaving the church. Those who survived this ordeal feigned death, successfully convincing Roof that all his victims had perished in the attack. Though some media outlets have attempted to deny the racially motivated context for this event, such as Fox News, the motivating factors of Roof ’s actions tell a much different story. It has been reported by the local police that Roof openly admitted that his intent was to kill blacks in the hope of starting a war between the “races.” He has admitted to have planned this attack for six months, and specifically researched the EAM Episcopal Church as a possible target for this attack. At the time of his arrest he wore a black jacket “… adorned with two flags—one from apartheid-era South Africa and the other from white-ruled Rhodesia—that have been adapted as emblems by modern-day white supremacists” (Robles et al, 2015). These facts seem to be consistent with the reports provided by a number of Roof ’s friends who maintain that he openly discussed his racist views with them and believed that “whites should live with whites and blacks should live with blacks.”

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Subsequent reporting has revealed that Roof began this “journey” in the aftermath of the George Zimmerman murder trial, which he felt unjustifiably accused the defendant of being criminally responsible for the death of Trayvon Martin (Murphy, 2015; Robles, 2015). Roof himself is reported to have written in his manifesto that he was so angered by the media treatment of the Zimmerman case that he googled “black on white crime,” which lead him to the website for the Council of Conservative Citizens (CCC). There were pages upon pages of these brutal black on White murders. I was in disbelief. At this moment I realized something was very wrong. How the news could be blowing the Trayvon Martin case while hundreds of these black on White murders got ignored? (Murphy, 2015) For Roof, his actions represent the articulation of a specific discourse on “race” that is unmistakably configured by the narrative of white supremacy (Murphy, 2015; Robles, 2015). However, it would be a mistake to view his actions as an isolated event perpetrated by an individual or isolated “rational actor” not in relation to a very specific manifestation of the dictatorship of the they. As the Christian Science Monitor and the New York Times have powerfully observed, if Root were Muslim, this experience would be viewed as his process of radicalization (Murphy, 2015; Robles, 2015). The specific elements of this attack help to provide a clear view of the phenomenological “structure” easily recognized in Roof ’s actions. From this point of view, being-in-the-world-as-white sees itself as being under consistent attack from those who do not “judge like they judge,” or “look like they look,” or “think like they think.” The there of this manifestation of the they—if you will, the nomos of white supremacy—rejects any legitimate face-to-face encounter that allows for a shared reciprocity of meaning, that is, the ability to be as others are allowed to be. Roof admitted as much when he stated that he almost decided not to carry out his murderous act because the individuals

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in the Bible group had treated him so nicely. Even this momentary “cognitive dissonance” was not sufficient to redirect his intent. What Roof ’s admission reveals is how the configuration of the black body continues to retain its visibility of threat, even when that threat is clearly not present. Roof ’s interaction with his victims prior to their death, though experienced as “pleasant,” was not sufficient to override white supremacy’s construction of the visibility of the black body. As a result, any possibility for a shared communitas is rejected, and blackness continues to be constructed as that which is “not like me,” as that which must be controlled, contained, and negated. Within this absence of shared reciprocity, the presence of the black congregants continued to reflect a dangerous, almost alien, visibility to the white body that “needed” to be violently confronted. For Dylann Roof, this integrative phenomenology reveals not only a specific stance for this manifestation of being-in-the-world, but also a specific relationship to the racist-they, which in turn requires a specific response to the threatening potentiality posed by the black body. However, Roof ’s momentary hesitation prior to his murderous act also reveals the presence of a competing they that seeks to disrupt the way they think and judge. Though Roof is ultimately not moved by these other configurations of the they, his own admission does reflect its presence, albeit for only a moment, that seeks to break through this violent totalizing of the black body. From this perspective, being-inthe-world is configured as a being-with that emerges within various manifestations of the body that is presenced within a variety of faceto-face interactions influenced by the defining presence of a specific configuration of the they that provides the context from which these competing points of view are experienced and lived.

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THE SOCIAL CONSTRUCTION OF CRIMINAL BEHAVIOR: TOWARD A PHENOMENOLOGY OF STRAIN Introduction In Chapter Two the focus of our discussion concentrated on the constituting influence of the social world as this relates to the conceptualization of the unified phenomenon (Heidegger, 1953/2010) of being-in-the-world. As an inseparable ontological characteristic for a human being, it was, therefore, necessary to first explore the there from which Dasein takes up and discovers its world (Richardson, 2012). Though it would be philosophically and theoretically incoherent from the point of view offered here to argue that world is the sole determining factor relative to the meaning of being, it would be equally as confused to propose that human being or Dasein is its sole author. As a unified phenomenon, both being and the world are inseparably implicated in this process. So how, then, do we proceed to the being of being-in-the-world? Though we always find ourselves thrown within the specific configurations of a socially constructed there, it is from the vantage of this there that the potentiality of human being is confronted. Given that human being and world are never, for Heidegger, viewed as discrete

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philosophical categories, the possibilities for human being still remain open and are never completely foreclosed by the circumstances of one’s thrown existence. This is not to argue that the challenges posed by the social constructs of racism, sexism, religious prejudice, or various forms of structured economic and political marginalization do not impose a profound influence on one’s ability to be; rather, it is to simply recognize that point from which the world is grasped and lived. However, before we proceed with this discussion, it may be helpful to explore the philosophical context from which this formulation of being and world are configured. To say that being-in-the-world is a unified phenomenon that cannot “… be broken up into components that may be pieced together...” (Heidegger, 1953/2010, p 53) is to recognize that both sides of this unified phenomenon are in play concerning the construction of the meaning of being. As a result, the meaning of this being there becomes that which emerges within the “in-betweens” of this unified phenomenon. Taken from this perspective, such philosophical categories as agency, free will, choice, and freedom lose some of their presumed theoretical clarity for the simple fact that they are no longer configured as discrete and finished categories of meaning that are uninhibited by the there of human existence. From this context, the potentiality for free will, agency, choice, and freedom are, to some degree, constrained by the fact that being is always and already situated within a variety of social contexts that are also implicated in the choices of human being. Free will is therefore never completely free, and choice is always in some way constitutive to the there of being. The fact that I choose to perform this or that activity can never be viewed as being absent from the context from which this choice is in constant relation. The act of crime, for example, can never be viewed solely as the behavior of an isolated rational actor, somehow disconnected or separate from the social world in which the significance of this performance is recognized. Though there must always be an actor in the performance of criminality, there must also always be a world that helps to stage this activity.

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Some would argue therefore that such a configuration of these philosophical concepts renders them virtually incoherent, given that they no longer signify what the term intends to convey (Crewe, 2013). However, the legitimacy of this critique is contingent on the theoretical perspective employed, and is representative of a very specific philosophical frame of reference, which requires discrete and finished categories of meaning by which to conduct its method of analytic discourse. Taken up phenomenologically, agency, choice, and freedom become “relational” possibilities for human existence and not essentialized categories of theoretical meaning. My ability to choose or my ability to engage in some type of agentic activity is still foundational to my ability to be, but is certainly not limitless in its scope. The fact that human agency, choice, and freedom are in some way hindered by the reality of one’s thrown existence does not invalidate the use of these concepts; rather, it reflects the complex and subtle relationality of human existence, and reveals a paradoxical aspect of what it means to be human. Similarly, it is important to recognize that the fact of our situated relationality with the world is never sufficient in determining the meaning of being. Though in certain instances the configuration of the social world can overwhelm and limit the potentiality of being, it cannot completely silence one’s ability to be. The there of human being becomes the point from which human agency finds its voice and takes up the world, but it is never completely determined by that world. In certain manifestations of the there of being, human existence will be more or less able to pursue its projects and be allowed to be like others are allowed to be. In other more debilitating and deficient manifestations of this there, human potentiality is greatly limited and can often be denied the very possibility of existence. Human agency, then, becomes the articulation of choice(s) as this relates to the situated reality of human existence. As a result, human agency is neither completely free of the influencing forces of the social world and yet, it is never completely determined by it. An example of this situated relationality can be witnessed in the Autobiography of Malcolm X (Polizzi, 2003).

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What seems most central to the narrative provided in the autobiography is the clash that emerges between competing meanings for blackness relative to Malcolm’s experience of world. Though Malcolm finds himself thrown into a world that views his existence through the lens of anti-black racism, this is not the only manifestation of the they that informs his experience. As a young child he is also exposed to Marcus Gravey’s Back to Africa Movement by his parents, which provides a very positive meaning for blackness and can be viewed as a cultural therapeutic relative to the toxic implications of anti-black racism. Similar examples can be witnessed within Malcolm’s prison experience and conversion to the Nation of Islam, and his later conversion to Sunni Islam. Though it is certainly true that none of these various manifestations of the they are capable of ending anti-black racism, they do provide for Malcolm a different way to be. As the reader follows the litany of Malcolm’s various personal transfor mations descr ibed in his autobiography, a specific phenomenology emerges that is always in relation to the demands of very specific social contexts. Though his ability to be is never completely free from a being-with that includes the presence of antiblack racism, that fact is simply not sufficient to silence the power of his agency. Now it has been argued that such an observation is little more than an existential fetish that fails in any way to address the structural realities of day-to-day existence that remain unchanged by this stance (Hall, 2012). However, this observation ignores the various ways in which human agency, though certainly not omnipotent, retains the potential for change that begins with a single act or choice.

The being of being-in-the-world As we turn our focus to the being of being-in-the-world, our attention is now concerned with the how of that being as it seeks to take up the ontic manifestations of world and the they. Given that being-in-theworld always finds itself situated with a specific manifestation of the world, the taking up of being is always in relation to these ontically derived constructs. Such a focus is particularly significant to the

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analysis of crime or criminal behavior insofar as it helps to configure the phenomenology of the event of criminality, which must include the relationality of this unified phenomenon. It has already been observed that being-in-the-world or Dasein is always thrown and always in relation to a variety of manifestations of the they that help to describe the ontic configuration for the meaning of being. For example, to be a being-in-the-world-as-addict or a being-in-the-world-as-gang-member is to find oneself thrown within a “specialized” and at times “exclusive” manifestation of Dasein that takes up the world from that specific point of view. To be a beingin-the-world-as-addict brings to the fore those constitutive aspects of being that construct the meaning of the world from that perspective. For the addict this entails the use and pursuit of one’s specific drug of choice, as well as an attraction to those who are “most like me.” The meaning of one’s being-with becomes almost exclusively defined by the there that the world of addiction creates. Central to this configuration of the there of addiction is the specific way in which this experience is constructed. Perhaps in its more general sense the experience of addiction may be viewed from the related categories of labor and play. Within this context, labor becomes the effort needed to locate and purchase the drug, while play reflects those periods of actual intoxication. Though each of these categories configures a different relationality for beingin-the-world-as-addict, each remains inseparably connected to this specific manifestation of the there. The experience of addiction, therefore, “generally” resembles more traditional examples of play and labor, insofar as each are in constant relation to the other bound by a very specific structuring of responsibility, which this type of beingwith requires. Such a manifestation of being-in-the-world-as-addict is perhaps most powerfully witnessed within the context of opiate addiction. For the heroin addict or any individual physically addicted to opiates, the relationship between the labor and play of addiction manifests itself in very specific ways. The initial introduction to the drug, though perhaps viewed as potentially dangerous by the novice

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user, if continued use ensues, is often not configured from the vantage of threat. However, once this relationship becomes more serious and physical addiction has occurred, the configuration of labor and play become much more pronounced. Now, the “play” of heroin use is inseparably connected to the labor that is required for the continuation of this relationship. Once physically addicted, the experience of “play” becomes firmly beholden to the demands of the labor of addiction. As a result, every aspect of this manifestation of “play” is inseparably situated by this request responsibility. To be in a relationship with the drug is also to be in a relationship to this larger context. The immediate experience of drug use is now foreshadowed by the labor that will be required in the morning. “If I use tonight, will I be able to use tomorrow, or will I need to go to work?” “If I don’t have anything tomorrow, will I be sick?” In each of these examples, the demands of the labor of addiction impose itself on its play, which requires that the user never loses sight of their “responsibility” for the continuation of this “relationship.” As we have seen in other configurations of being-with, also present within this there is a manifestation of the they-self. When placed within the context of being-in-the-world-as-addict, the phenomenology of labor becomes relatable to the they of the experience of addiction. From this perspective, the specifics of this labor are constructed by what they say and what they allow. As a result, various aspects of criminality are now viewed as legitimate insofar as they become instrumental in the acquisition of the drug. Included within this manifestation of the they is not only the purchase of the drug, but also the rules by which this type of being-in-the-world is validated. However, as a result of the criminality this relationship requires, the manifestation of the legal they is always present. Being-in-the-world-as-addict always discovers itself within the inbetween of two very different and overlapping manifestations of the they-self: the they of addiction and the they of the law. As a result, the being-with of addiction is confronted by two competing and contradictory sets of validation, which require an absolute fidelity that the other attempts in some way to negate. Though the addict is

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certainly well aware of the possible legal and health-related implications of continued drug use, this fact is rarely sufficient to guarantee the cessation of their relationship with the substance. Perhaps a clinical example will be helpful to clarify this tension. While working in a clinic for the treatment of co-occurring disorders, a client reported the following history. He stated that he had prior involvement with the legal system concerning an arrest for heroin. He said that he had received a sentence of four to seven years for his drug-related crime, and had served the totality of that sentence. However, he added that he was actually incarcerated for 15 years for that crime. When asked to explain, he stated that he had been returned to the penitentiary on four different occasions for technical violations of parole related to continued drug use. On his last return to the penitentiary, he was informed by the prison authorities that he would not be granted another parole date and would be required to “max out” the existing 18 months of his sentence. The rationale provided was that he had already served double his “max,” due to his numerous technical violations, and it was therefore reasoned that he would be “better off” if he simply completed his sentence in the penitentiary. On completing his sentence, he did seek out counseling and was able to remain drug-free. As this example shows, the individual struggled with the in-between of two different and overlapping manifestations of they, each of which imposed two very different sets of demands on the possibilities for being. Though it is certainly true that the client’s relationship to his ongoing addiction seemed to take precedence over the demands of the legal they, this alternative manifestation of the they was never absent from this context. It is also interesting to note that his decision to finally end his relationship with heroin occurred after he finally completed his sentence and could no longer be returned to the penitentiary on a technical violation of his parole. Once free from any further involvement with parole, he freed himself from his addiction as well. Such self-destructive examples of being-with are, unfortunately, rather common within this phenomenology.

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Take, for example, the tragic experience of overdose that leads to the death of the user. In the aftermath of such an episode one could perhaps reasonably anticipate that those individuals or associates closest to the victim, who shared in the use of heroin, would decide that it was time to stop or seek help to do so. Unfortunately, it is more likely that those same individuals would attempt to seek out the person who sold the victim the drugs, for the simple reason that “if the dope was good enough to kill him, it must be the bomb.” In another example of an overdose episode, the client reported that once he had been revived by medical staff and released from hospital, he returned home immediately and used again! When asked about this he replied, “Don’t worry Dave, I only used half as much.” When the there of being-in-the-world is configured by the powerful reality of addiction, neither incarceration nor the possibility of death seems to be necessarily sufficient to upend the individual from this manifestation of being-with. To be a being-in-the-world-as-addict is to be in relation to others who are “most like me;” however, also included within this manifestation of the there is the experience of the drug itself and the “demands” it imposes on the user. In fact, it could be easily argued that the relationship of addiction, that is, the user’s “relationship” with their specific drug of choice, is itself a type of being-with, a type of thrownness that is predicated on the there of the physical body and the phenomenology this experience reveals. In its most general sense, the phenomenology of addiction reflects the user’s physical and psychological experience of their drug of choice. For the alcoholic, the emptiness of existence is “filled up” by this relationship with the substance. The cocaine addict experiences a sense of euphoric power and virility while the heroin addict retreats to a place of anesthetized calm. In each of these examples, the substance initially provides for its user that which is currently absent from dayto-day experience. However, as these “relationships” move forward, the demand of the addictive process becomes more pronounced, and the requirements of this being-with much more exacting. The potential chance of criminal conviction and incarceration or the potential threat of personal harm or death now no longer evoke the same degree

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concern, and have little influence on the user’s desire to terminate this relationship. Even as the lived-consequences of continued drug use steadily increase in both severity and potential lethality, this behavior often continues unabated. But the question remains, what makes this type of being-with so powerful for the user? Though the easiest way to answer this question would be to focus on the biochemical realities of addictive substances, it would simply not be sufficient to reveal the relational attachment the user has to their drug of choice. If this were merely a biochemical problem, one could reasonably assume that once the addictive substance had been purged from the body, the possibility for a return to active addiction would cease as well, but this is certainly not the case for a majority of individuals battling some form of addiction. In fact, the current absence of the substance is often experienced as a temporary condition that will be resolved once the individual can again obtain their drug of choice. Though currently drug-free, the focus remains on that moment when this “object of desire” can once again be embraced. It would not be unusual, for example, during a clinical session to listen to a client describe their experience of using heroin. During these narratives, the client will go to great detail in describing every moment of the experience from start to finish, every step in the process thoroughly described with loving detail. If one were to remove the obvious references to the use of the drug, one would think that the client was describing a recollection of the foreplay that took place before a powerful episode of love making with their partner. Ironically enough, that is exactly what is being described. This type of relationality as it emerges within the experience of heroin use and addiction was accurately and powerfully described in the film Requiem for a dream (2000). In that film, the viewer is introduced in a highly realistic depiction of the phenomenology of addiction. The film’s two main characters, Marion, played by Jennifer Connelly, and Harry, played by Jared Leno, are in love and also actively addicted to heroin. As the plot unfolds, we witness the various means the characters must employ to continue their relationship and their active drug use. As their plans for a future

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together slowly unravel and the increasing grip of addiction becomes more pronounced, their attempts to obtain their drug of choice become more desperate and more dangerous. For her part, Marion resorts to prostitution to “earn” the money needed for Harry to buy more drugs. Harry, so focused on becoming a dealer himself, refuses to address the worsening pain in his arm, which is the result of an infected abscess that is becoming more serious by the day, a fact that does not dissuade him from using this same arm to administer his drug. With each of these characters the viewer witnesses the extremes of the phenomenology of addiction. Harry is ultimately arrested in his failed attempt to purchase the drug, and must have his infected arm amputated, while Marion is left in New York without any way to obtain heroin. The film powerfully concludes with Marion talking to Harry on the phone, who is in hospital recovering from his surgery. Though she is desperate for Harry to return, she realizes that he will not, and must do what she will to continue her addiction. The scene ends with Marian lying on a sofa in her apartment holding a picture of Harry in her hand. On the backside of that photograph is the phone number of a drug dealer, who will only sell to women and only in exchange for sex. She seems momentarily torn by the decision she must make, but seems to accept that Harry will not return to her and clutches the reverse side of the photo, realizing that it is the only way to continue her relationship with heroin. She appears to fall into a contented sleep, secure in the knowledge that her relationship with heroin will continue regardless the “specifics” required to do so. What we witness with this cinematic depiction of the phenomenology of addiction is a realistic account of how the shared event of heroin use ultimately evolves into an exclusive relationship with the drug. Initially Harry and Marion share the experience of drug use as a central aspect of their relationship. As the availability of the drug becomes scarcer, each individual becomes more willing to do what they must to support their habit. What begins as a shared relationship with the drug now becomes a desperate individual attempt to continue to be a being-in-the-world-as-addict no matter the cost.

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What this discussion has attempted to explore is the way in which being-in-the-world embraces the there of its existence and finds itself situated within a specific manifestation of world. Whether this is reflected as a being-in-the-world-as-addict or as a being-in-theworld-as-criminal or as a being-in-the-world-as-car-thief, being’s relationality to the world takes up its possibilities from that point of view. This is not to argue that this relation to the world exclusively configures the possibilities for being; rather, its intent is to recognize the predominate “structure” of this type of experience. However, though it is true that more specific manifestations of being-in-the-world may reflect a highly regimented relationality with the world, such a stance does not necessarily exhaust the potentiality for being. What we witness with the phenomenology of addiction or various types of criminal behavior is a type of being-with that remains more or less exclusively focused on a particular way to be. The there of this type of thrownness finds itself in relation to a specific manifestation of the they that seeks to negate any other possibilities for being. The circumstances encountered by this type of being-in-the-world, be these psychological in nature or the result of economic, political, or social marginalization or some combination of the same, help to more firmly connect human experience to a configuration of beingwith that helps to validate the meaning of that existence. As we see in the phenomenology of addiction, the individual experience of the drug can become so overwhelming that the user will do whatever is necessary to continue this type of being-in-the-world. However, if this exclusivity were insurmountable, then the cessation of substance use would also be impossible. What is seen in the phenomenology of desistance or the phenomenology of “recovery” is an emerging possibility for being-inthe-world that no longer exclusively defines the potentiality for being by the narrow requirements of the criminal lifestyle or the demands of addiction. As Maruna’s (2001) research powerfully reflects, the ability to desist from subsequent criminal behavior is to not only find oneself in a “different” world where criminal behavior is no longer pursued or validated, but to have an experience of being-with that allows for the

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possibility to be like others are allowed to be. However, these possible moments of transformational potentiality will always be contingent on the there of human existence and its ability to recognize another possibility for being. The phenomenology of addiction portrayed in Requiem for a dream or in the clinical example of the individual discussed above, each in their own way share one rather obvious fact: the inability of the user to end their relationship with the drug. With each of these examples, the desire to use heroin continues unabated even as the consequences of continued use become more and more onerous. Though the individual being seen in psychotherapy was ultimately able to end his relationship with the drug, it was only after he had given the state an extra seven years of his life, and only after the state refused to grant him another parole release. What these examples of being-in-the-worldas-addict reveal is a more general “structuring” of human experience to which being-in-the-world-as-addict seeks to address or confront. As a result, the manifestation of being-in-the-world-as-addict reveals a more general constitutive element to the meaning of being, which is the phenomenology of strain.

The experience of strain In its most general sense, the phenomenology of strain is concerned with the ways in which negative experience evokes some manner of response from the individual that is intended to address the circumstances of a given event. From the perspective of criminological theory, the experience of strain has been studied relative to its relationship to the production of criminal behavior. In its initial formulation, strain theory was employed to explain the onset of criminal behavior resulting from the unsuccessful pursuit of certain desired or targeted goals, or as the result of the influencing effects of structural inequalities, be they either economic or political in nature (Polizzi, 2011b). In 1992, Agnew and White, in their important article, “An empirical test of general strain theory,” provided a more generalized

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conceptualization of this theory, which moved beyond its purely structural focus as this related to the production of criminal behavior. “Strain theory focuses on negative relationships with others; that is relationships in which others do not treat the individual as he or she would like to be treated” (Agnew and White, 1992, p 476). By theorizing the conceptualization of strain in this way, the authors were able to retain the structural implications of this experience as it relates to the production of crime, while also recognizing the intrinsic relationality of human existence. Perhaps the most important implication of this expansion of traditional strain theory was the way in which it offered the possibility for a more integrated or unified recognition of the relationality of human existence and social world. From this perspective, the experience of strain reflects the breakdown of social relationships located within various types of social contexts (Polizzi, 2011a). As a result, strain theory now recognized not only the relational implications of social structure to subjective response, but also included the specific influence of interpersonal interactions as this related to the onset of criminogenic behavior. However, regardless of the theoretical promise this new configuration of strain theory seemed to offer, it still retained an overtly positivist frame of reference that still recognized social world and subjective experience as two distinct and discrete philosophical categories. Agnew expanded this more individualized formulation of strain by introducing his concept of story lines in 2006. From this perspective, story lines reveal the subjective experience of strain as this relates to the production of criminal behavior. How an individual perceives the sudden onset of a negative or unexpected event is determined by the specific meaning and context reflected in their narrative. These narratives emerge at the onset of some type of unexpected event, and ultimately lead to some manner of criminogenic response from the individual. However, rather than reflecting a sudden transformation of normal modes of behavior, story lines reveal that moment when a person’s particular perspective of their social world becomes so threatened that a different type of response appears necessary.

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During the onset of an experience of strain, be this the sudden loss of a relationship, the sudden death of a loved one, or some other painful and unexpected life-changing event, the world and your place in it is suddenly thrown into question. The there of your existence is no longer familiar, and your ability to be like those around your loses its certainty. “I am now a being-in-the-world-as-humiliated, as-victim, as-economically-vulnerable….” Your normal ways of taking up your world are no longer valid and your ability to pursue your projects thwarted. Former strategies successfully employed in the past are now no longer successful, which now requires a different set of possibilities for being-in-the-world; it is from this perspective that the story line is presumed to emerge. However, the sudden emergence of a story line as it relates to the experience of strain and the subsequent use of criminogenic behavior employed to address this situation is not an isolated event; rather, it comes to reflect a continuation of a certain manifestation of livedexperience from which the event of crime is inseparably connected. To argue that a story line emerges as a result of the onset of an unexpected and unresolved event, and is somehow unconnected to “normal” experience, is to disconnect the flow and meaning of human existence from its unified engagement with the world. Though it is certainly true that the sudden manifestation of strain may upend one’s normal comportment and engagement with the world, the strategies used to resolve this event simply manifests a different and perhaps more “focused” way to be. An example of this process may be helpful to clarify this point. While working in a maximum security penitentiary in the northeastern US, I was told the following story about one of the individuals housed in the block that I was assigned to monitor. This individual entered the penitentiary for a conviction of “Grand Theft Auto,” and was serving a sentence of two to four years for that crime. However, during the course of serving his sentence, he was convicted on two separate occasions of homicide, and received two sentences of “Life without the Possibility of Parole.” With each of these violent acts, the same story line was present: the victims of these crimes were killed

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as a result of the sexual advances they directed toward this individual. Seemingly absent or perhaps less immediately significant for the perpetrator was the obvious fact that he was serving a relatively short sentence, which would be greatly affected by a subsequent conviction of murder. However, this obvious factor had little sway concerning his violent response to this event; sadly, a result that is not at all surprising. What this brief vignette reveals is the way in which individual story lines are firmly situated within larger narrative structures, which are fundamentally implicated within the specific ways the experience of strain is resolved. The way in which someone experiences, for example, social humiliation or personal loss is predicated on the way in which the meaning of that event or situation is perceived. However, such experiences never occur as a socially isolated moments and are therefore always influenced by the specific social context from which they emerge. (Polizzi, 2011a, pp 1057-8) In this example, the onset of homosexual advances by the victims seemingly “justified” the horrific violent response by the perpetrator. Regardless of the actual meaning these actions held for the individual, the need to violently address and resolve this situation was undeniably driven by the larger cultural context of penitentiary life and the meaning given to those involved in homosexual behavior. The emergence of this violent story line becomes manifest within the larger cultural narrative of the inmate-they, which fundamentally “disapproves” of such behavior. From this perspective, overt expressions of homosexual desire must be violently confronted, if the target of this affection is to be free of homophobic suspicion. Though the murderous actions of this inmate ultimately lead to two new convictions, it also revealed his “fidelity” to those behaviors sanctioned by this manifestation of the they. Story lines, then, reflect not only the specific response of a given individual to a specific situation, but a specific response that emerges within a specific social context defined or dominated by a specific

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configuration of the they. Though it is certainly true that the emergence of a story line reflects an ongoing and unresolved negative individual experience, it is an experience that remains situated within a specific relationship to the they. As a result, the emergence of a story line reveals a set of anticipated responses that emerge over time within the confines of an unfolding experience. In certain situations, the story line may resolve without the onset of a criminogenic response. However, in more thematically configured social contexts, the story line may ultimately come to reflect an expected and “validated” resolution to this ongoing situation. The character of Marion depicted by Jennifer Connelly in the film Requiem for a dream provides once again a powerful example of this process. With the character of Marion, we are provided a realistic presentation of being-in-the-world-as-addict that is related to a specific experience of strain, which in turn manifests within a specific story line concerning her ongoing relationship with heroin. Marion, a disaffected young woman raised in Manhattan by affluent parents, turns to her boyfriend Harry for the love and support she was unable to experience elsewhere. From this perspective, the lack of unconditionally given love leads her to Harry and ultimately heroin, and becomes the strategy by which this existential pain may be addressed. As Marion becomes more connected to regular heroin use, her being-in-the-world-as-addict becomes more pronounced. As her addiction intensifies, her story line reflects a more desperate attempt to obtain her drug of choice. As her desperation increases, so does her willingness to do whatever is necessary to continue her relationship with heroin. Though Marion’s story line reflects a unique experience of the phenomenology of addiction, it retains a more general connection to the they of this process. To be in a relationship with heroin requires the ability for the user to be able to obtain the drug at the price determined by the seller. Initially, heroin is readily available, and Harry and Marion have no difficulty obtaining the drug to support their habits. As their financial resources become more and more strained, Marion is forced to engage in a sex for money episode with her psychiatrist to procure the cash necessary for Harry to purchase more of the drug. Though

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Marion is clearly emotionally damaged by this sexual encounter, her story line justifies her actions insofar as it allows her to continue to use. However, after a collection of unanticipated setbacks concerning their ability to purchase the drug and to support their addiction, Marion is required once again to do what is necessary to support to continue this addictive experience. The strain of the sudden unavailability of heroin and Marion’s diminishing trust in Harry’s ability to take care of her once again results in the need to trade sex for drugs. However, within this new thematic twist of the story line, Marion is now trading sex for drugs with a seller who will only provide the drug under this type of arrangement. At this point in the film, Marion must struggle with two types of strain. On the one hand, there is the strain evoked by the realities of heroin addiction, and on the other, the strain evoked by the actions needed to purchase the drug. As Harry drifts further and further from her, and is no longer able to “take care of her,” another suitor is needed to fill his role. As stated earlier in this chapter, the film ends with Marion resigned to the fact that her heroin addiction will only continue if she continues to agree to sell herself for her drug. What becomes most powerfully evident within this very familiar depiction of the phenomenology of addiction is the strain that is evoked by the potential fear of the loss of this relationship with the substance. To be a being-in-the-world-as-addict is first fueled by a unique experience of being-with that has helped to construct substance use as a solution to an emerging story line of emotional, physical, or psychological strain. However, as the addiction moves forward, another experience of strain becomes manifest, which is focused on the potential emotional and physical consequences of ending one’s relationship to the substance. It is at this stage of the addictive process that an individual is most likely to employ a criminogenic story line by which to justify those actions necessary to continue in one’s addiction. However, this story line does not necessarily need to be overtly criminogenic to achieve the same result; such a possibility is exemplified in the following account.

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When I initially began my career as an addictions counselor, a number of clients repeated a very similar story concerning their involvement with inpatient treatment. On the surface one could perhaps reasonably assume that the individual entering an inpatient facility for heroin addiction actually wanted to end their use of heroin. Unfortunately, more often than not this was not the case. For some of these individuals, the inpatient experience was employed for the purpose of allowing them the possibility to continue to use in the future. It was reasoned that the inpatient experience became necessary because the expense of their habit was becoming too difficult to manage. By going into an inpatient program they could get “detoxed” from their addiction to heroin, which, on their release, would allow them to use at a more “reasonable” cost. What we witness in this account is a process by which the experience of strain related to continued heroin use evokes a story line of “rehabilitation” that actually provides for the promise that this relationship will be able to continue. Within this context, what becomes unexpected or suddenly unmanageable is the escalating cost of the drug and the potential fear that the user will not be able to continue this relationship. By formulating this manner of story line relative to the onset of this experience of strain, the individual “safeguards” the desire to continue to be a being-in-the-world-asaddict. The phenomenology of gang membership reveals a similar constitutive dynamic as this relates to the experience of strain, beingin-the-world-as-gang-member and the story lines that emerge from this type of being-with. In its most general sense, being-in-the-world-as-gang-member emerges as a “response” to various experiences of strain that leave the individual alienated, marginalized, or threatened. It is also important to recognize that the manifestation of the experience of strain is always constitutive to specific social contexts that validate gang membership as a solution to these unwanted experiences of emotional or physical vulnerability. As a result, being-in-the-world now becomes a being-in-the-world-as-gang-member, which in turn evokes a specific configuration of the they that now imposes certain thematic

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stipulations on the narrative content of individual story lines. How the individual gang member responds to the experience of strain is often greatly influenced by the imposing requirements of this manifestation of the they, and its demand that the individual judge how they judge. Taken from this perspective, the introduction of gang membership is the result of something that occurred prior to this joining. In discussing the production of crime, Quinney (2000, p 21) makes the following observation: What is important in the study of crime is everything that happens before crime occurs. The question of what precedes crime is far more significant to our understanding than the act of crime itself. Crime is the reflection of something larger and deeper. Quinney’s observation is particularly insightful as this relates to the phenomenology of gang indoctrination and membership and the subsequent behavior that follows from such associations. If one was to seriously explore the historical beginnings of the Bloods, Crips and MS-13, one highly salient factor would be recognized: each of these street gangs coalesced around the shared experience of violence. The Bloods and Crips formed as a result of the general atmosphere of anti-black racism and the specific instances of regular violent attacks perpetrated by white motorcycle gangs in the Los Angeles area in the late 1960s and 1970s. In an attempt to fend off these violent encounters, individuals banded together to provide a unified response that was ultimately successful in addressing the original problem. Tragically, once the immediate threat had been defeated, these same groups ultimately turned on each other, beginning a “culture of violence” that continues to this day. A similar history situates the beginning of the now notorious street gang MS-13. The initial history of MS-13 begins in El Salvador during that country’s bloody civil war, waged from the mid-1970s to the early 1990s. As a result of this culture of violence, which was in part funded by a massive amount of US military aid provided to prevent the spread

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of Communism in Central America, a large influx of immigrants fled that country to re-locate to the US (Dunn, 2007; Kovacic, 2007-08). On their arrival in the US, they soon realized that they were once again the targets of violence. Due to the lack of sufficient economic resources, many of these immigrants settled in the marginalized neighborhoods of East Los Angeles and soon became the victims of gang-related violence. Given that these individuals were new to these neighborhoods, they were highly vulnerable to attack based on the fact of their lack of neighborhood gang affiliation. In the absence of such neighborhood “protection,” they could be attacked with impunity by existing gangs, who could do so without fear of retaliation. That situation soon changed. Unwilling to go to the police due in large part to the socially constructed meaning of law enforcement in El Salvador, these individuals responded in a very familiar way: with violence. What we witness with the emergence of this group is the slow transformation from a being-in-the-world-as-displaced-immigrant to a being-in-theworld-as-victim, to a being-in-the-world-as-gang-member. As their experience becomes more and more defined by the constant presence of violence, these individuals become more and more willing to use violence as a way to defend themselves from these attacks, and, much like the Bloods and Crips before them, come to exemplify the very kind of violence that made their creation necessary. Just as was witnessed by the configuration of being-in-the-worldas-addict, the presence of an initial experience(s) of strain begins the transformative process that results in being-in-the-world-as-gangmember. Once gang affiliation becomes validated as the appropriate response to this experience of strain, individual story lines emerge from within a more or less shared thematic point of reference. The experience of violence that becomes central to this manifestation of thrownness in turn elicits a response that is specific to that reality. By so doing the they-self of the gang is validated, which then imposes a specific meaning on what it means to be affiliated to such a group. From this perspective, the phenomenology of strain emerges as the result of the failure of various story lines rendered incapable of

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addressing the severity of this reality. Once the they-self of the gang had been established, the behavior of those now configured by this specialized example of being-with become defined by what they will validate and what they will not, by how they judge and how they act. Whether this is recognized by the unquestioning involvement of gang members in criminal activity or the use of violence against those that in some way have violated the prohibitions of membership, the employment of story lines is now fabricated and ritualized by this manifestation of they. Though it is obviously true that the experience of strain is something that is a commonly shared aspect of human existence, the meaning of these experiences is certainly not shared, and is always in relation to a variety of social contexts. How the phenomenology of strain becomes vulnerable to a possible criminogenic resolution of the anxiety it imposes is in part related to the social context from which these examples of lived-experience are located. The confluence of individual choice and thrown locality are inseparably implicated in this resolution. If the requirements of being-with are less onerous, and its context more benign, the how of this interaction retains a large degree of open-ended possibility. However, when the experience of thrownness is configured by various aspects of economic, political, or psychological marginalization, the choices by which to resolve the immediacy of strain becomes less fluid and more determined by the dictates of an uncompromising they. As Quinney profoundly observes, it is far more important to focus on those aspects of existence that precede the act of crime rather than the act itself. From a phenomenological perspective, such a project requires a more thorough understanding of the relationship between the experiences of being-in-the-world-as-marginalized and the choices such an existence often requires. It should hardly be surprising that an experience fractured by the violence of poverty and various forms of social marginalization results in a type of being-in-the-world that is constructed by the same. If we are truly interested in understanding criminal behavior, we must be equally interested in honestly exploring the structural implications that make that type of being possible.

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Whether this process is applied to the exploration of white-collar crime or its more visible manifestations within our communities, it must be viewed as a being-in-the-world-as-someone, which can neither deny the specific implications of that being, nor the potential that its presencing must by definition leave unrecognized or lived.

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SOME CLOSING REFLECTIONS In the previous two chapters, the discussion focused on the two different aspects of Heidegger’s concept of being-in-the-world: that is, the reality of the social world and its inseparable connection to the presencing of a human being. By focusing our discussion in this way, the distinction of a human being’s unity with the world could be more thoroughly explored without concluding that either of these co-constituting aspects of being-in-the-world can ever be configured as separate or discrete philosophical categories. To be a being-inthe-world is to discover a fluid phenomenology that emerges from this unified phenomenon. When this project is applied to the social construction of crime and criminal behavior, a similar phenomenology is revealed. When one explores the phenomenology of the social construction of crime and criminal behavior, what becomes immediately apparent are the various ways in which individual existence and social context become powerfully configured within this meaning-generating process. The very foundation of the construction of social knowledge is situated within not only a given set of human experiences, but must also include the contextual ground from which these socially constructed meanings are engaged and lived. Perhaps stated more simply: there is no subjective construction of experience absent that is not situated within a social world(s) that is separate human experience. As Quinney has observed, the production of crime is always the “result” of something else, of something that has come before the actual

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act of crime; it is this “something else” that helps to reveal not only the phenomenology of this individual act, but a phenomenology that always reveals the social world as well. It is often incorrectly argued that phenomenology, given its overly subjectivist stance, is simply incapable of taking up the reality of the world in this constructive process. From this point of view, individual perceptions or the “mineness” of Dasein are constructed as isolated events that are somehow closed off to the contextual realities of the social world. Individual perception becomes a self-contained in-itself, whose perspective of the world emerges from an isolated perceptual field. Though Heidegger did discuss the mineness of Dasein, he did so simply to recognize the constitutive aspects of being-in-the-world. The how and there of being, though individually distinct to a specific ontic configuration of one’s thrown existence, still finds itself in a shared world: that is, as a being-in-the-world-with-others-along-side-things. How one takes up my world is fundamentally predicated on the specific there of one’s existence. These ontic characteristics, whether identified as economic, historical, political, or social, all impose a demand on the meaning of being, which becomes articulated within the ontic manifestation of being-in-the-world. The phenomenology of the social construction of crime is the manifestation of that ontic reality. When the topic of criminological focus is gang-related street violence, white-collar crime, or various types of criminal behavior related to the use of addictive substances, the fact of these individual acts is never separate from the ontic manifestation of a social world that is inseparably implicated in their performance. To be a being-inthe-world-as-gang-member, for example, is to reveal a very specific phenomenology that emerges from an immediate there of human existence. However, this there is never a socially isolated event, and always implicates a variety of ontic configurations of social existence, which are presenced by a variety of manifestations of the they. To find oneself within a social context that is defined by unemployment, violence, and hopelessness is to reveal an existence that is marginalized and without many options. To find oneself within a corporate environment that minimizes the implications of unethical

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business practices is to potentially require that one ignores one’s own moral principles in the name of profit or the organization. The reality of being-in-the-world must therefore begin from that vantage point and struggle with a variety of manifestations of the they that seeks to provide a meaning for being. Whether these socially constructed meanings reflect the need to remain law-abiding in the face of unrelenting poverty, or to take up a criminal lifestyle as a response to the same, the meaning of being remains inseparable from these ontic presencings of the social world. However, it is also necessary to recognize that the fact of this reality is not of one’s making, and therefore requires an equally forcible exploration of those existing social structures that are always implicated in these choices for being. To focus on the act of crime without also addressing those conditions that are fundamental to its phenomenology is to guarantee that these contexts will continue to produce such human action. Though it is certainly true that being-in-the-world may employ a variety of strategies by which to address the realities of the thrownness of human existence, such an attempt does not imply that such contexts be allowed to continue unchanged. The experiences of strain, particularly those examples that lead to some type of criminogenic response, reveal how this phenomenology not only describes the subjective configuration of these experiences, but also how the social world gives these experiences their meaning. Any discussion of strain that fails to recognize the specific social context of that experience also fails to recognize the most significant aspects of that event. Though it is certainly possible to establish certain general categories by which to study and measure the onset of strain, these factors are almost removed from their specific context. For example, I previously explored the phenomenology of strain within the context of a maximum security penitentiary, and I retell a portion of that account here (Polizzi, 2011a). The target of that study concerned an individual being regularly seen in psychotherapy. During one of these sessions, the client reported that he had been informed by his family that his sister had been murdered during a home invasion, with a suspect in custody awaiting trial.

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During the initial stage of this experience of strain, the client explored the meaning of his loss and the way his sister had died. Though incarcerated, his experience was not that different from anyone who suffers the unexpected death of a loved one, particularly when that passing is due to violence. He explored the sadness of her murder, his anger at the unknown perpetrator, and his frustration given the reality of his incarceration, which made it impossible for him to be with his family at this very difficult time. However, the tone of this experience of strain was soon to undergo a complex transformation. Within a short period of time the alleged perpetrator was arrested, tried, and convicted for this murder. During one of our sessions, the client showed me a newspaper clipping sent by his family, both identifying the young man responsible for this crime, and reporting that his sentence would be “Life without the Possibility of Parole.” After showing this news clipping, he asked, “Dave, they’re not going to send that young boy here, are they?” I assured him that it was probably unlikely that the DOC would make such a mistake. My confidence was misplaced and short lived. One morning, while waiting to see my next client, I received a call from the case manager of my assigned block that one of my regular clients was requesting that I come to his cell and speak with him immediately. When I asked the individual on the other end of the line what was going on, she informed me that this individual had reported to her that while attending his regular GED class, he was shocked to realize that the individual who had been convicted of murdering his sister was sat just two rows across from him in the classroom they now shared. On hearing this, I immediately brought the individual to my office where we discussed the situation. He requested that he be sent to the mental health unit, and was subsequently taken into that clinic. The perpetrator of the murder was immediately sent to administrative custody and was transferred to another correctional facility that evening. When this episode is situated within the phenomenology of strain, a much more complex picture comes into focus. On realizing that his sister’s killer was literally within arm’s reach, his experience of strain took a decided turn. Now the loss of his

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sister became contextualized within an intensifying desire for revenge. Once he realized who this individual was, he became filled with murderous rage. He stated, “Dave, that boy had no idea how close he was to dead.” At that moment he felt that it was his responsibility as a brother and as a Muslim man to personally punish this individual for his cowardly act. However, as he sat at his desk trying to decide what to do, a number of other considerations quickly emerged, greatly complicating his experience. Central to this experience of strain was the simple fact that no one else knew that the killer of his sister was now housed in the same penitentiary. However, once that fact became public knowledge within the inmate community, the possible options by which to resolve this situation would become greatly limited based on the cultural demands of the inmate-they. He shared with me the various options that had gone through his head prior to informing the case manager that he would like to be sent to the mental health unit. He stated that his initial impulse was to simply kill this individual with his bare hands in the classroom, but he also realized that such an act would guarantee that he would spend the rest of his life in the penitentiary, and would never see his family again. He also stated that he could perhaps share this situation with his closest associates, and one of them would perhaps volunteer to do this deed for him. He reasoned that, “One of the brothers may say, look you got numbers, but I got letters, I’ll take care of the boy for you.” However, he quickly stated, “Even if someone would agree to do it, I would not want them to suffer the consequences for me.” He added that it was also possible that these same individuals could say that it was his responsibility as a man to avenge his sister, and if he didn’t, it would raise questions for them about his character, realistically placing his own life in danger. In his mind one thing was certain: he must resolve this situation immediately and before it became known to the inmate community, if a violent resolution of this matter was to be avoided. What this episode clearly reveals is the way in which the phenomenology of strain is connected to a specific social context that is fundamentally implicated in the resolution of this experience.

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To be a being-in-the-world-as-inmate is to inhabit a very specific cultural space that requires a visible fidelity to the dictates of this manifestation of the they. Though this individual ultimately resolved this situation by embracing a strategy that clearly contradicted the expected requirements of the inmate-they, he did so with the clear realization that he must act quickly if this decision was to be successful. Though the circumstances of this experience of strain never actually became publicly known within the penitentiary community, the immediate social context constructed by the inmate-they remained continually implicated in its resolution. If these facts were to become known, the individual would have either needed to resolve the situation in a moment of righteous rage, or suffer the humiliation and shame of not acting appropriately relative to the dictates of inmate-culture. In using the language of Katz (1988), the client was able to find the in-between of humiliation and rage to discover another possibility by which to resolve this situation. The public construction of the phenomenology of strain helps to reveal the struggle that unfolds within human experience concerning the various ways in which these episodes may be ultimately resolved. Though always in some way social in nature, the phenomenology of strain also reveals a degree of potentiality that is never exclusively determined by a singular manifestation of the they. In the above example, though the inmate-they always remained an ominous presence, it was unable to negate all other possibilities by which to take up this painful experience. What is revealed in this episode is the way in which a human being struggles to find its own subjective voice in the face of the self-negating domination of the they. From this perspective, the manifestation of the they evokes certain similarities found in the concept of the apparatus provided by Foucault and Agamben.

The apparatus and the they-self: toward a phenomenology of the “subject” The concept of the apparatus or dispositifs was introduced by Foucault and defined in the following way:

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An apparatus is essentially strategic, which means that we are speaking about a certain manipulation of the relation of forces, of a rational and concrete intervention in the relations of forces, either so as to develop them in a particular direction, or to block them, to stabilize them, and to utilize them.The apparatus is thus always inscribed into the play of power, but it is also linked to certain limits of knowledge that arise from it and, to an equal degree, condition it. (Foucault, 1980, p 195) Agamben (2009, p 12) added to this conceptualization by observing that the apparatus identifies a “set of practices, bodies of knowledge, measures, and institutions that aim to manage, govern, control, and orient—in a way that purports to be useful—the behaviors, gestures, and thoughts of human beings.” As a vehicle of control, the apparatus evokes a similar relationality with that of the they-self provided by Heidegger, insofar as each of these seeks to impose a specific interpretative imperative on the comportment of human being. Whether this is formulated as the apparatus of incarceration and rehabilitation or as the they-self of the penal system and forensic psychotherapeutic programming, each seeks to impose a regime of disciplinary control to define the meaning of human experience and possibility. However, not satisfied with Foucault’s “institutionalized” conceptualization of dispositifs, Agamben sought to expand the meaning of this concept by recognizing it as a fundamental characteristic or dynamic of human existence. Agamben begins his re-formulation of Foucault’s concept of the apparatus by situating human existence within two general categories: living beings and apparatuses (Agamben, 2009). He describes this conceptualization of human existence in the following way: I wish to propose to you nothing less than a general and massive portioning of beings into two large groups or classes: on the one, living beings (or substances) and on the other, apparatuses in which living beings are incessantly captured. (Agamben, 2009, p 13)

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In clarifying his description of the apparatus further, he continues by observing: Further expanding the already large class of Foucauldian apparatuses, I shall call an apparatus literally anything that has in some way the capacity to capture, orient, determine, intercept, model or control, or secure the gestures, behaviors, opinions, or discourses of living beings. (Agamben, 2009, p 14) From this perspective, the relationship between human existence and the apparatus becomes quite similar to that of being-in-the-world and the manifestation of the they-self. In each of these conceptualizations, the human being or being-in-the-world finds itself in a constant struggle with these various strategies of control. Whether the theoretical focus is concerned with the apparatus of addiction or the manifestation of various institutional apparatuses such as the criminal justice system or the various manifestations of the meaning of human being remains in balance. To this end, Agamben introduced a third category to this conceptualization that he identifies as the subject. For Agamben, this third category is described as a constitutive “artifact” which emerges from this incessant struggle between living beings and the apparatus. “I call a subject that which results from the relation and so to speak, from the relentless fight between living beings and apparatuses” (Agamben, 2009, p 14). However, it is important to note that this manifestation of the emerging subject is not the result of a dialectical process that resolves with the subject; rather, the subject is constructed from within the in-between of this encounter, and is presenced based on the force of this struggle. As such, the potentiality for the subject retains a high degree of variability insofar as a living being will always find itself in constant struggle with various manifestations of the apparatus. The example of the individual who was unexpectedly confronted by the presence of his sister’s killer reflects this point. Prior to this individual’s realization that his sister’s killer was now immediately present to him, his day-to-day existence was

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fundamentally controlled by the apparatus of the penitentiary and the regime it imposed on him. Included within this incessant struggle was the apparatus imposed by inmate culture, which also sought to control his comportment within the walls of the penitentiary. Within each of these different manifestations of the apparatus, a specific type of engagement and interaction was required, which in turn evoked a slightly different presencing of the subject. With the death of his sister and his subsequent realization that her killer was now with him, yet another version of the subject appears. As the client discussed his perceived options concerning the resolution of this experience within the therapeutic session, a variety of profiles of this subject emerged. At points he seemed to be chiding himself for not being strong enough to simply take matters into his own hands and to “do what needed to be done,” as per the demands of the inmate-apparatus. He was equally aware, however, of the consequences of such a decision, and the likely result that he would spend the rest of his life behind bars. This ultimate realization introduced the third dynamic of this process, which concerned the wishes of his family. “I don’t think my sister would want me to give up my life by killing this kid…. If I did kill him, I would not be able to return home.” The final resolution of this experience of strain reveals the presence of three competing manifestations of the apparatus, all of which were implicated in this creation of the subject. As he engaged with the legal, inmate, and familial manifestations of the apparatus, an emerging subject could be viewed that was able to negotiate the demands of these three competing manifestations of the they that allowed him to come to a degree of closure that was livable for him. In this resulting configuration of the subject, though the presence of all three configurations of the apparatus remained clearly engaged, he was no longer completely constructed by them. The above experience of strain differs greatly from that of the individual who responded violently to the unwanted and public advances of the two inmates whom he ultimately murdered. Within this latter example, the struggle with the apparatus evoked by prison culture is one that renders any public embrace of same-sex desire as

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deviant and worthy of punishment. If he had not violently rebuked these known sexual advances, his own sexuality would be placed into question and would have made him vulnerable to potential physical harm. By being unable to keep these advances private and unknown by the inmate culture, he was “forced” to be compliant to the “dictatorship” of this inmate they. Once identified as being “homosexual” he would have likely been shunned by his current group of associates for the simple reason that any continued interaction with him would cast “doubt” on them as well. As a result, he chose to comply and act as they act. What these above accounts also reveal is in the way in which the emerging subject is constantly configured by the social context from which the struggle with the apparatus takes place. In the extreme environment of the maximum security penitentiary, the possibilities for the subject are clearly limited. Fundamental to these prison confrontations is the degree to which the experience of strain also becomes known to the inmate population. Once the circumstances of the event become public, the apparatus of inmate culture imposes a powerful influence on the way this experience is expected to be resolved. Even with the example of the individual surprised by the unexpected presence of his sister’s killer, the social context is never absent, and is also fundamentally implicated in its resolution. Though the penitentiary setting certainly provides an extreme example of this type of phenomenological process, the social grounding of human action is a constant ontological aspect of human experience regardless of the actual context. Taken from a phenomenological perspective, human action can never be viewed as an isolated event without the influencing presence of the social world. Agamben’s re-formulation of the apparatus powerfully helps to clarify this ontological aspect of human experience that is not exclusively limited to institutional or governmental contexts. As witnessed in the above accounts, human action emerges not only as an immediate response to a given lived-experience, but as a type of “negotiation” with a set of competing social meanings ultimately culminating in the emergence of the subject. The story lines that

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emerge from this process are not the result of background factors and individual decisions; rather, story lines reflect the constructed meaning of one’s social existence and reveal the point from which the social world is lived. A person’s entry into the production of crime is never exclusively situated within the decisions made by that individual. The act of crime is the conclusion of a complex phenomenology initially predicated on a variety of socially constructed suppositions that lead to that result. To argue that human existence is fundamentally social is to therefore also recognize that the social world is articulated within the wide potentiality of human expression. The act of crime, then, can never truly be viewed as a solely individual event or the exclusive artifact of marginalized social structures; rather, it reflect a configuration of both of these constructing processes that retain a degree of uniqueness and unpredictability. We began this brief reflection by describing what was identified as the phenomenology of the social construction of crime and criminal behavior. From this perspective, crime or criminal behavior emerge as a type of being-in-the-world that not only configures a type of human experience, but also reveals the specific confines of a social world that provides a degree of legitimacy to that performance, while at the same time imposing a set of demands on individual experience that are not of its making. As a social event, the act of crime reflects a resolution of one’s marginalized condition, a resolution to the experience of shame, anger, or some other affective experience, as a resolution to one’s narcissistic entitlement or need, as a resolution to one’s current sense of economic, political, or social vulnerability and fear. However, with each of these examples, very specific configurations of the social world are also present and experienced as imposed liabilities on the possibility to be. Just as the social construction of reality reveals the subjective meaning of social existence, the social construction of crime reflects a specific strategy by which this configuration of social knowledge is lived. It is from the social construction of reality that the social construction of crime becomes possible. How one views the meaning of crime will

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likely depend on the way in which social knowledge is employed to resolve this question. Such a process will also likely include the strategies by which the problem of crime is confronted. If, for example, crime is viewed as a result of morally deficient individuals who struggle in the conditions of their own making, it is highly unlikely that any legitimacy will be given to any approach focused on the structural disadvantages often believed to be implicated in the production of crime. If, on the other hand, the meaning of crime is constructed with an exclusive focus on these same economic, political, and social inequalities, the correction of these structural inequalities will be deemed the appropriate solution to this problem. Though traditional criminology has attempted to explain the causes of crime as either the result of specific individual choice or as the consequence of structural inequalities, which help to support the production of crime, it has been less successful in formulating a theoretical approach that is capable of addressing both of these realities of human existence. In part, this failure is due to an over-reliance on quantitative methodological approaches by which to study the phenomenon of crime, while leaving unresolved any clear definitional sense of what it means to be human. The study of crime, if it is to actually comprehend the complex depth of this phenomenon, must be able to recognize the philosophical implications confronted by the ontological fact of being-in-the-world. If we are truly interested in the so-called causes of crime, we must be equally willing to explore the meaning of the whole of human existence, and not just its subjective or thrown configurations.

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REFERENCES Agamben, G. (2005) State of exception (translated by K. Attell), Chicago, IL and London: University of Chicago Press. Agamben, G. (2009) What is an apparatus? And other essays (translated by D. Kishik and S. Pedatella), Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press. Agnew, R. (2006a) General strain theory: Current status and further research. In F.T. Culen, J.P. Wright and K.R. Blevins (eds) Taking stock:The status of criminological theory (pp 101-23), New Brunswick, NJ: Transition. Agnew, R. (2006b) Storylines as a neglected cause of crime, Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency, vol 43, pp 119-47. Agnew, R. (2011) Toward a unified criminology: Integrating assumptions about crime, people, and society, New York: New York University Press. Agnew, R. and White, H.R. (1992). An empirical test of general strain theory, Criminology, vol 30, pp 475-99. Ali,T. (2002) The clash of fundamentalisms: Crusades, jihads and modernity, London and New York:Verso. Anderson, E. (2000) The code of the street (reprint edn), New York: W.W. Norton. Arrigo, B. (2013) Managing risk and marginalizing identities: On the society-of-captives thesis and the harm of social dis-ease, International Journal of Offender Therapy & Comparative Criminology, vol 57, pp 672-93. Arrigo, B. and Bersot, H. (2014) The society of captives thesis and the harm of social dis-ease: The case of Guantanamo Bay. In B. Arrigo and H. Bersot (eds) The Routledge handbook of internal crime and justice studies (pp 256-78), New York and London: Routledge.

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Berger, P. (1967) The sacred canopy: Elements of a sociological theory of religion, London: Doubleday. Berger, P. and Luckmann, T. (1967) The social construction of reality: A treatise in the sociology of knowledge, New York: Anchor Books. Calvert, J. (2010) Sayyid Qutb and the origins of radical Islamism, New York: Columbia University Press. Crewe, D. (2013) Becoming criminal: The socio-cultural origins of law, transgression, and deviance, London: Palgrave Macmillan. Dona, M. (2006) Immunity and negation: on the possible developments of the theses outlined in Roberto Esposito’s Immunitas. Diacritics, vol 36, pp 57-69. Dunn, W. (2007) The gangs of Los Angeles, New York: iUniverse. Esposito, R. (2008) Bios: Biopolitics and philosophy (translated by T. Campbell), Minneapolis, MN and London: University of Minnesota Press. Esposito, R. (2011) Immunitas: The protection and negation of life, Cambridge, UK: Polity Press. Fanon, F. (1967) Black skin, white masks, NewYork: Grove Press. [[added reference, okay?]] Foucault, M. (1980) Power/knowledge: Selected interviews and other writings, 1972-1977 (edited by C. Gordon), New York: Pantheon Books. Goffman, E. (1963) Stigma: Notes on the management of spoiled identity, New York: Touchstone. Gordon, L. (1995) Fanon and the crisis of European man: An essay on philosophy and the human sciences, New York: Routledge. Gordon, L. (2013) The irreplaceability of continued struggle. In G. Yancy and J. Jones (eds) Pursuing Trayvon Martin: Historical contexts and contemporary manifestations of racial dynamics (pp 85-90), Lanham, MD: Lexington Books. Griffin, R. (2012) Terrorist’s creed: Fanatical violence and the human need for meaning, New York: Palgrave Macmillan. Gurwitsch,A. (1964) The field of consciousness, Pittsburgh, PA: Duquesne University Press. Gurwitsch,A. (1979/77) Human encounters in the social world, Pittsburgh, PA: Duquesne University Press.

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Hall, S. (2012) Theorizing crime and deviance:A new perspective,Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Hart, W.D. (2013) Dead black man, just walking. In G. Yancy and J. Jones (eds) Pursuing Trayvon Martin: Historical contexts and contemporary manifestations of racial dynamics (pp 91-101), Lanham, MD: Lexington Books. Heidegger, M. (1953/2010) Being and time (translated by J. Stambaugh with D. Schmidt), Albany, NY: State University of New York Press. Katz, J. (1988) Seductions of crime: Moral and sensual attractions in doing evil, New York: Basic Books. Kepel, G. (1991/94) The revenge of God: The resurgence of Islam, Christianity and Judaism in the modern world, University Park, PA: The Pennsylvania State University Press. Kepel, G. (2005) The roots of radical Islam, London: Saqi Books. Kovacic, K. (2007-08) Creating a monster: MS-13 and how US immigration policy produced “the world’s “most dangerous gang”, Gonzaga Journal of International Law, vol 11, no 1 (http://www. gonzagajil.org/content/view/183/26/); see also 8 U.S.C. § 1228 (2006). Lanier, M., Polizzi, D. and Wade, A.L. (2014) Addressing the inherent philosophical and operational dichotomies of corrections from an Epicrim approach. In B. Arrigo and H. Bersot (eds) The Routledge handbook of internal crime and justice studies (pp 565-84), New York and London: Routledge. Leder, D. (1990) The absent body, Chicago, IL and London: University of Chicago Press. Leonard, E.B. (2015) Crime, inequality, and power, NewYork and London: Routledge. Maruna, S. (2001) Making good: How ex-convicts reform and rebuild their lives, Washington, DC: American Psychological Association. Merleau-Ponty, M. (1945/2012) Phenomenology of perception, London and New York: Routledge Mitchell, R. (1993) The society of the Muslim Brothers, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

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Moussalli, A. (1992) Radical Islamic fundamentalism: The ideological and political discourse of Sayyid Qutb, Beirut, Lebanon: American University of Beirut. Natanson, M. (1973) Edmond Husserl: Philosopher of infinite tasks, Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press. Polizzi, D. (2003) ‘The exper ience of anti-black racism: A phenomenological hermeneutic of the autobiography of Malcolm X’, UMI Dissertation Services (UMI No 3069293). Polizzi, D. (2011a) Agnew’s general strain theory reconsidered: A phenomenological perspective, International Journal of Offender Therapy and Comparative Criminology, vol 55, pp 1051-71. Polizzi, D. (2011b) Heidegger, restorative justice and desistance: A phenomenological perspective. In J. Hardie-Bick and Ronnie Lippens (eds) Crime, governance and existential predicaments (pp 12955), London: Palgrave Macmillan. Polizzi, D. (2011c) Phenomenological theory. In C. Bryant (ed) The Routledge handbook of deviant behavior, New York and London: Routledge, pp 129–34. Polizzi, D. (2013) Social presence, visibility, and the eye of the beholder. In G. Yancy and J. Jones (eds) Pursuing Trayvon Martin: Historical contexts and contemporary manifestations of racial dynamics (pp 173-81), Lanham, MD: Lexington Books. Polizzi, D. and Lanier, M. (2012) Crime as dis-ease: towards an epidemiological criminology of the social body, ACTA Criminologica: Southern African Journal of Criminology, vol 25, pp 37-49. Polizzi, D., Draper, M. and Andersen, M. (2014) Fabricated selves and the rehabilitative machine: Toward a phenomenology of the social construction of offender treatment. In B. Arrigo and H. Bersot (eds) The Routledge handbook of international crime and justice studies (pp 233-55), New York: Routledge. Polt, R. (1999) Heidegger:An introduction, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.

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Quinney, R. (2000) Social humanism and the problem of crime: Thinking about Erich Fromm in the development of critical/ peacemaking criminology. In K. Anderson and R. Quinney (eds) Erich Fromm and critical criminology: Beyond punitive society (pp 21-30), Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. Qutb, S. (1953/2000) Social justice in Islam (translated by J. Hardie and H. Algar), Islamic Publications International. Qutb, S. (2002) Milestones, New Delhi, India: Islamic Book Service. Richardson, J. (2012) Heidegger, New York and London: Routledge. Schutz,A. (1932/72) The phenomenology of the social world (translated by G. Walsh and F. Lehnert), Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press. Schutz,A. and Luckmann,T. (1973) The structures of the life-world,Volume 1, Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press. Spinelli, E. (2005) The interpreted world:An introduction to phenomenological psychology, Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Turner, J. (2013) Untangling Islamism from jihadism: Opportunities for Islam and the West after the Arab Spring, Arab Studies Quarterly, vol 34, pp 173-88. Unnever, J. and Gabbidon, S. (2011) A theory of African American offending: Race, racism, and crime, New York and London: Routledge. Wagemakers, J. (2012) A quietist jihadi:The ideology and influence of Abu Muhammad al-Maqdisi, Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. Wenner, W. (1982) Modern Islamic reform movements: The Muslim Brotherhood in contemporary Egypt, The Middle East Journal, vol 36, pp 336-61. Weinberg, D. (2014) Contemporary social constructionism, Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press.

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Newspaper references Murphy, D. (06/20/2015) Beyond Rhodesia, Dylann Roof ’s manifesto and the website that radicalized him. www.csmonitor.com/World/ Security-Watch/Backchannels/2015/0620/Beyond-RhodesiaDylann-Roof-s-manifesto-and-the-website-that-radicalized-him Robles, F. (06/21/2015) Dylann Roof photos and a manifesto are posted on website. www.nytimes.com/2015/06/21/us/dylannstorm-roof-photos-website-charleston-church-shooting.html Robles, F., Horowitz, J. and Dewan, S. (06/19/2015) Dylann Roof, suspect in Charleston shooting, flew the flags of white power. New York Times. www.nytimes.com/2015/06/19/us/on-facebookdylann-roof-charleston-suspect-wears-symbols-of-whitesupremacy.html

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Index

A

B

addiction as a biochemical problem 61 labor and play of 57–58 recovery from 63–64 relationality of 60–63 story lines 68–70 and the they-self 58–59 adolescent perception of incarceration 36–37, 39–40 African American suspects 44–45 African American teenagers, perception of incarceration 36–37, 39–40 African-American offending 9–15 Agamben, G. 81–82 agency 22–23, 54–56 Agnew, R. 16, 20, 22, 24, 64–65 anti-black racism and African American offending 10, 12 and determinism 13, 15, 56 story lines 17 apparatus 80–83 Autobiography of Malcolm C 55–56

Back to Africa Movement 56 al-Banna, Hasan 7 being-in-the-world the “there” of 33, 35 and thrownness 57 as a unified phenomenon 33–34, 53–54, 75 see also Dasein being-with 19, 37–38 of addiction 57, 58, 60–61, 69 the body as 47, 52 and story lines 17 and the they 39, 40, 41–42 being-with-others 34–35 Berger, P. 2, 6 Bios: Biopolitics and philosophy 43–44, 45 black lived-experience 10–12, 13–14 Black skin, white masks 13 blackness, criminalization of 26 Bloods 71 body as cultural artifact 46–49 in disappearance 45 in dysappearance 45, 46

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C

F

choice 23, 54, 55 cognitive dissonance 52 communitas 44, 45 conceptualization of human existence 81–82 containment 44–45 crime as an alien force 43 general theory of 9–10, 12–13 as a manifestation of livedexperience 18, 71, 73–74, 75–76, 77, 85 unified theory of 20–24 criminalization of blackness 26 of the body 46–49 criminalized manifestation of the they-self 41–43 Crisps 71

fabricated self 41–42 face-to-face encounters 30–32 Fanon, F. 13 Farouk I, King of Egypt 7 Foucault, M. 80–81 fragmentation of social existence 44 freedom 54, 55

G Gabbidon, S. 9 gang membership 70–73 general strain theory 16, 64–65 see also story lines general theory of crime 9–10, 12–13 Gravey, Marcus 56 Griffin, Roger 5 guilt, presumption of 14–15

D

H

Dasein 32–37, 76 see also being-in-the-world desistance 63–64 determinism 13, 15, 22–23 detoxification 70 Diallo, Amadour 48 dictatorship of the they 39, 51, 84 dispositifs see apparatus drug use see addiction dysappearance of the social body 45

Heidegger, M. 32, 34 heroin use 59, 61–62, 70 see also addiction human agency 22–23, 54–56 human existence 32–33, 81–82 see also Dasein humiliation 9

I immunitas 44 immunity paradigm 43–45 in-betweens 9, 18, 35, 54, 58–59, 80, 82 incarceration, adolescent perception of 36–37, 39–40 incongruence 29–30 inmate culture 79, 83–84 Italian-American mafia 41–43

E Emanuel African Methodist (EAM) Episcopal Church 50 embodied subjectivity 47 “empirical test of general strain theory, An” 64–65 Esposito, Roberto 43, 45 existence 32–33, 44, 81–82 see also being-in-the-world; Dasein

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INDEX

K

nomos 6

Katz, J. 9 King, Rodney 48

O objective reality 24 objective strain 17 objects of consciousness 26 Oklahoma City Bombing 14 ordered meaning 6 organized crime 41–43 overdose 60

L labor of addiction 57–58 Leder, D. 45 lived-experience 2–4 and determinism 22 and existential threat 8 and social visibility 32 and story lines 18, 19, 20 and strain 16 validity of 2–3 see also black lived-experience living beings 81–82 loss of meaning 6 Luckmann, T. 2

P paradigm of immunity 43–45 phenomenology, compatibility with social construction 1–2 Phenomenology of perception 46–47 play of addiction 57–58 potentiality 53–54, 55, 80 presumption of guilt 14–15 prison culture see inmate culture protection of life 43–44

M made men 41, 42 mafia 41–43 Malcolm X 55–56 marginalization 35–36, 40, 72, 76, 85 Martin, Trayvon 10, 14–15, 29–30, 31, 48 meaning, loss of 6 meaning of being 33, 35 Merleau-Ponty, M. 46–47 mineness of Dasein 76 minority ethnic groups 10–11 misperception 24 motivational context of social interaction 30 MS-13 71–72 Muslim Brotherhood see Society of Muslim Brothers

R race 4 racism 3, 50–52 see also anti-black racism reality, social construction of 4, 33 reciprocal attention 31 reciprocity 13–14, 15, 32, 46–47, 47–48, 51–52 recovery 63–64 rehabilitation 70 relationality 9–10, 30–31, 33–34, 55, 60–63, 65 breakdown of 16 and story lines 17 see also being-with Requiem for a dream 61–62, 68–69 revenge 79 righteous rage 9 Roof, Dylan 50–52

N natural attitude 3 negative relationships 16 see also general strain theory nomic threat 6, 7, 8

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subjectively meaningful reality 2–4

S sacred canopy,The 6 Schutz, A. 30 Scott, Walter 48 Seductions of crime 9 social body 43, 45 social construction, compatibility with phenomenology 1–2 social construction of reality 4, 33 social context of strain 77–80 social existence, fragmentation of 44 social interaction, motivational context of 30 social knowledge 4, 8, 19, 19–20, 33 social reciprocity see reciprocity social relationality see relationality social strain 8 social visibility 14, 30, 31, 32 social world 18–19, 25, 30, 47–49, 65 Society of Muslim Brothers 7, 8, 17 sociology of knowledge 2–3 story lines 16–20, 65–68, 84–85 of addiction 68–70 of gang membership 70–73 strain 64, 66 addiction as 68–69 and gang-membership 70–71 objective 17 social context of 73, 77–80 terrorism as 6, 8 strain theory 64 see also general strain theory street gangs see gang membership structural reality 49–52 Stuart, Charles 14 subject 82–83, 84 subjective coherence 18–19 subjective experience 18–19, 24, 25

T taken-for-granted attitude of lived-experience 3–4 taken-for-granted expectations 30 temporality 18 terrorism 5–8 Terrorist’s creed: Fanatical violence and the need for human meaning 5 theory of African American offending: Race, racism, and crime, A 9 “there” of being-in-the-world 33, 35 they dictatorship of 39, 51, 84 manifestations of 39–45, 51–52, 77 and story lines 67–68, 70–71 they-self 38–39, 81, 82 of gangs 72–73 and addiction 58–59 threat and anti-black racism 31, 40, 45, 52 and the body 46, 47 nomic 6, 7, 8 thrownness 12, 13, 26, 57, 73 of addiction 60–61 and human potentiality 53–54, 55 Toward a unified criminology: Integrating assumptions about crime, people, and society 20, 20–24 truth claims 3–4

U unified criminology 20–24 unified theory of crime 20–24 Unnever, J. 9

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INDEX

V violence 71–73

W white supremacy 51–52 worldliness of the world 34, 35–36

Z Zimmerman, George 15, 29–30, 31, 51

97

It is well known that the social definition of individuals and ethnic groups helps legitimize how they are addressed by law enforcement. The philosophy of the social construction of crime and criminal behaviour reflects how individuals, such as police officers, construct meaning from the perspective from which they emerge, which in turn influences their law enforcement outlook. In the field, this is generally viewed through a positivist frame of reference which fails to critically examine assumptions of approach and practice. Written by an international specialist in this area, this is the first book which attempts to situate the social construction of crime and criminal behaviour within the philosophical context of phenomenology and how these constructions help inform, and ultimately justify, the policies employed to address them. Challenging existing thinking, this is essential reading for academics and students interested in social theory and theories of criminology.

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A philosophy of the social construction of crime

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ISBN 978-1-4473-2732-5

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David Polizzi

Polizzi

David Polizzi is associate professor in the Department of Criminology and Criminal Justice at Indiana State University, USA. He has taught as an adjunct at a variety of Pittsburgh area colleges since 1990. He received his Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology from Duquesne University in 2002 and worked therapeutically with offender populations both in the community and in a maximum security penitentiary setting. He is the Editor in Chief of the Journal of Theoretical and Philosophical Criminology.

A philosophy of the social construction of crime

“There is nobody else who could so commandingly occupy the disciplines of criminology, philosophy and psychology to write such a book. It will become the standard text.” Anthony Amatrudo, Middlesex University

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19/10/2015 09:19