an argumentative essay on the topic poverty is the cause of crime

IELTS Mentor "IELTS Preparation & Sample Answer"

• Skip to content
• Jump to main navigation and login

Nav view search

• IELTS Sample

IELTS Writing Task 2/ Essay Topics with sample answer.

Ielts essay # 1399 - poverty is the reason behind most crimes, ielts writing task 2/ ielts essay:, some people think that poverty is the reason behind most crimes., to what extent do you agree or disagree.

• IELTS Essay
• Writing Task 2
• Agree/Disagree Essay
• IELTS Writing Task 2
• Opinion Essay

IELTS Materials

• IELTS Bar Graph
• IELTS Line Graph
• IELTS Table Chart
• IELTS Flow Chart
• IELTS Pie Chart
• IELTS Letter Writing
• Academic Reading

Useful Links

• IELTS Secrets
• Band Score Calculator
• Exam Specific Tips
• Useful Websites
• IELTS Preparation Tips
• Academic Reading Tips
• Academic Writing Tips
• GT Writing Tips
• Listening Tips
• Speaking Tips
• IELTS Grammar Review
• IELTS Vocabulary
• IELTS Cue Cards
• IELTS Life Skills
• Letter Types

• Privacy Policy
• Cookie Policy
• Copyright Notice
• HTML Sitemap

We use cookies to enhance our website for you. Proceed if you agree to this policy or learn more about it.

• Essay Database >
• Essay Examples >
• Essays Topics >
• Essay on Youtube

Expertly Crafted Argumentative Essay On Crime And Poverty

Type of paper: Argumentative Essay

Topic: Youtube , Crime , Social Issues , Poverty , Police , Video , Clip , Web

Published: 03/08/2023

ORDER PAPER LIKE THIS

Prager, in his article, delves into the ideas of poverty and how it relates to crime in the economy. He starts off by describing several scenarios of his ideas of what poverty entails by describing his paternal grandparents who were immigrants living in such a small apartment such that none of the children ever had their own rooms. He further explains that most of the American population that are considered poor by societal standards own essential items such as a refrigerator, a stove, a television, and even a fridge. They are, therefore, able to provide for their material things such as food, and thus, it cannot be assumed that they would engage in crime in search of food. In the video by the people’s sheriff, the media seems to have greatly contributed to the society images of the urban areas such as those of poverty and violence, which resulted in crime. According to Prager, the poor who commit crimes do not do so out of lack of basic amenities. Therefore, he believes that those who claim poverty causes violence lack an in-depth understanding of the entire situation and that a person’s value system are what determine their moral behavior and not their economic status. In the video posted by Ted Talks, Nadelmann believes there is clarity that there has been stereotyping of the poor in the society that they are likely to engage in crimes due to their economic status. I, therefore, agree with the writer, that a person’s values, especially their spiritual values are what influence their behavior in society. For instance, if one lacks morals, they are likely to engage in immoral behavior such as crime since their conscience will be clear. According to the people’s sheriff clip, the surrounding circumstances do not influence people’s behavior, but their internal beliefs influence their character. The show, Last Week Tonight, expounds on the glaring facts regarding income inequality in America and how the situation is sprawling out of control. The host, Oliver, highlights the fact that the richest people are approximately 16 times richer than the poorest in America. This poses a great challenge of maintaining peace in future as it might lead to conflicts. Radly, a reporter, speaks about Militarization of America's Police Force in Fergurson where a child was shot dead by police and the community erupted in riots and protests (VICE). However, the reaction of the police was extreme with them showing up with sniper rifles and ready for war irrespective of the fact that the residents were peacefully demonstrating. This clearly shows that the police force had a prejudgment of the community and, therefore, only expected violence from the residents. This extends to the elected officials who enact ordinances that prohibit certain acts such sleeping on the streets or in your car, as well as begging for money. According to Carpousis, the homeless, who frequently go hungry or if they are lucky get one meal a day, are being harassed by the police due to laws that criminalize being homeless. Johnson speaking on the UC Davis Pepper Spray articulately describes the steps that led to the police using pepper spray on students who were demonstrating. Regardless of the fact that the students were yet to cause any violence, the police were already of the mind that the only way the situation could be rectified was through violence. There are several 911 conspiracy theories, some of which insinuate that the American government knew about the attack and might have even orchestrated it so as to fuel war (Davis 9/11 Truth). All the above-reviewed videos indicate that there is a common misconception that because some people are less privileged, they are likely to engage in acts of crime and that they should be treated with violence to silence them. For cohesive co-existence between citizens and the police force and even between citizens, there needs to be respect accorded to all.

Works Cited

Carpousis, Alexander. “Criminalization of Poverty.” Online video clip. YouTube. YouTube, 5 May 2015. Web. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=plqNvAHpd5E Davis 9/11 Truth. “ICE.” Davis 9/11 Truth, 12 April 2016. Web. Retrieved from http://davis911truth.org/911-conspiracy/ice/7 Johnson, Tim. “UC Davis Pepper Spray - What Really Happened.” Online video clip. YouTube. YouTube, 28 November 2011. Web. Retrieved from http://youtube.com/watch?v=hhPdH3wE0_Y LastWeekTonight. “Last Week Tonight with John Oliver: Wealth Gap (HBO).” Online video clip. YouTube. YouTube, 13 July 2014. Web. Retrieved from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LfgSEwjAeno Prager, Dennis. “Poverty Doesn’t Cause Crime.” National Review 18 November 2014. Web. Read more at: http://www.nationalreview.com/article/392865/poverty-doesnt-cause-crime-dennis-prager TEDTALKS. “Ethan Nadelmann: Why we need to end the War on Drugs.” Online video clip. YouTube. YouTube, 12 November 2014. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uWfLwKH_Eko The People’s Sheriff. “Demonizing the Inner City - Ideology and the Urban Poor - Capitalism Needs Poverty.” Online video clip. YouTube. YouTube, 29 September 2011. Web. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pebSQW7FCzw VICE. “Radley Balko on the Militarization of America's Police Force: VICE Meets.” Online video clip. YouTube. YouTube, 28 August 2014. Web. Retrieved from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uTWy8tjTiTw

Cite this page

Share with friends using:

Removal Request

Finished papers: 2066

This paper is created by writer with

ID 278274807

If you want your paper to be:

Well-researched, fact-checked, and accurate

Original, fresh, based on current data

Eloquently written and immaculately formatted

275 words = 1 page double-spaced

Get your papers done by pros!

Other Pages

Web browser case studies, rolo essays, whitefield essays, tice essays, munster essays, barbul essays, rock star essays, renaissance europe essays, religious customs essays, buff essays, world cultures essays, elaborating essays, inhabitancy essays, free report on urban planning park open space and recreation, free critical thinking on homework 2, poverty and crime course work sample, example of report on developing recommendations to enhance the work environment, globalization essay 2, quest for career vocation the big kahuna movie review sample, peer follow up response research paper example, service obstacles course work sample, physical sciences research paper examples, essay on autobiography 3, multicultural literature in mathematics research paper example, essay on is sweden a women friendly state, essay on political science and course number, example of essay on communication and culture, free book review on the omnivores dilemma, how can you translate your knowledge into a talking course work example, essay on facilitator 4, outcomes of the use of niv versus invasive mechanical ventilation in the management research paper examples, example of poynor blog entry article review, classic hollywood and a clockwork orange essay sample, course work on fall prevention and its significance to nurses, course work on statistical interference and variance, occupational exposure to bloodborne pathogens standard research papers examples, example of essay on renewable energy, free couse essay example, automated healthcare referral system for specialty treatment research paper template for faster writing, expertly written essay on ethical approach in moral decisions to follow, triangle fire and industrialization essay you might want to emulate, prison reform research paper, hiv aids among african american women a sample research paper for inspiration mimicking.

Password recovery email has been sent to [email protected]

Use your new password to log in

You are not register!

By clicking Register, you agree to our Terms of Service and that you have read our Privacy Policy .

Now you can download documents directly to your device!

Check your email! An email with your password has already been sent to you! Now you can download documents directly to your device.

or Use the QR code to Save this Paper to Your Phone

The sample is NOT original!

Short on a deadline?

Don't waste time. Get help with 11% off using code - GETWOWED

No, thanks! I'm fine with missing my deadline

Law and Crime

Crime causes poverty, a reversal of the conventional wisdom.

Posted December 24, 2014

Social scientists and public officials have long identified poverty as a “root cause” of crime or, at least, as a significant “risk factor.” Such a causal linkage was made by Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius (121-180 A.D.), who declared, “Poverty is the mother of crime.”

During the 1960s, Attorney General Ramsey Clark emphasized that the United States government needed to combat crime by improving the deplorable conditions under which impoverished people were living. What followed was a plethora of social programs aimed at doing just that. Although many citizens benefited and improved their lot in life, crime remained an intractable problem.

What may not be apparent is that crime causes poverty .

Consider the costs of establishing and operating a small business in a rundown inner city neighborhood. An entrepreneur saves for years and finally amasses funds sufficient to establish a hair salon. She has paid for schooling to learn the skills to become a beautician, and she has honed them working for other people. Now she can rent space, purchase supplies and a stylist’s chair or two, and begin fixing women’s hair in her own shop. By careful management of her finances, she is able to invest additional sums in her business and expand the services she offers. A break-in and robbery occur, setting her back enormously. While awaiting costly repairs, she loses revenue and customers every day. She has to spend additional sums to tighten security. Having had a small profit margin as she struggled to maintain her salon, she now slides into the red or may not be able to re-open at all, thus losing the source of her livelihood.

Consider what has transpired in inner city areas rocked by social unrest. It can take years, even decades, for businesses to return to neighborhoods that were burned and looted. Such was the case during the 1968 riots in Washington, D.C., following the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. Recently, damage occurred to businesses in Ferguson, Missouri after a grand jury did not indict a white police officer for killing a young black man.

It is not peaceful protestors who threaten the livelihoods of small business owners. It is criminals who seize upon an opportunity when there is social disorder. In the name of a cause, they strike -- destroying property belonging to fledgling entrepreneurs. Having begun to emerge from poverty, these merchants are plunged back into it when criminals demolish overnight what they have worked so hard to build.

Stanton Samenow, Ph.D. , an expert in criminal behavior, was the author of many books including Inside the Criminal Mind .

• Find a Therapist
• Find a Treatment Center
• Find a Psychiatrist
• Find a Support Group
• Find Teletherapy
• United States
• Brooklyn, NY
• Chicago, IL
• Houston, TX
• Los Angeles, CA
• New York, NY
• Portland, OR
• San Diego, CA
• San Francisco, CA
• Seattle, WA
• Washington, DC
• Asperger's
• Bipolar Disorder
• Chronic Pain
• Eating Disorders
• Passive Aggression
• Personality
• Goal Setting
• Positive Psychology
• Stopping Smoking
• Low Sexual Desire
• Relationships
• Child Development
• Therapy Center NEW
• Diagnosis Dictionary
• Types of Therapy

Understanding what emotional intelligence looks like and the steps needed to improve it could light a path to a more emotionally adept world.

• Coronavirus Disease 2019
• Affective Forecasting
• Neuroscience

• Thesis Statement Generator
• Online Summarizer
• Rewording Tool
• Topic Generator
• Essay Title Page Maker
• Conclusion Writer
• Academic Paraphraser
• Essay Writing Help
• Topic Ideas
• Writing Guides
• Useful Information

230 Research Topics on Poverty: Argumentative, Solutions, Cause & Effect Topics about Poverty

Extreme poverty has been a hot-button issue for ages. Many of us expected the 21st century to become the era when the problem of drastic income inequality would be resolved. But the COVID-19 pandemic threw these initiatives back . Poverty has become as widespread as a hundred years before. Will we ever make the Earth a prosperous place for all?

This article features 230 poverty essay topics. They tackle every social, economic, psychological, and political aspect of this controversial issue. For your convenience, we grouped them according to the paper genre. Discrimination and limited access to education, malnutrition, health problems, mental disorders, and hunger are only some of the spheres you can debate.

🔝 Top 15 Poverty Essay Topics

• 📝 Topics & Issues to Cover in a Paper

🪙 Research Topics on Poverty

• 🗣️ Argumentative Essay Topics
• ➡️ Cause & Effect Essay Topics on Poverty

💡 Poverty Solutions Essay Topics

🧸 child poverty essay topics, 🌎 poverty in america essay topics, 🔗 references.

• Ending poverty in all its forms around the globe is our goal No.1.
• What does it mean to be poor?
• The pandemic can teach us a new lesson in fighting poverty worldwide.
• Child poverty essay: Lifelong ramifications.
• How does poverty measurement impact public opinion?
• Why does Africa remain to be the least developed country?
• Do we oversimplify when dividing people into wealthy and poor?
• Why should economics study the phenomenon of poverty?
• Poverty in America: An essay on its dynamics.
• How is deprivation linked to crime levels?
• Does overpopulation cause poverty?
• It is a myth that wealthy people are often obese.
• Fighting poverty is what all of us do throughout our lives.
• Can free education for all be a measure to eliminate poverty?
• Globalization will end poverty in developing countries.

📝 Topics & Issues to Cover in a Paper

Some poverty essay topics are too broad to prepare compelling argumentation. We have explored these directions to guide your research.

Defining Poverty

When the financial resources in a community are lacking, the basic needs of some people are not met. These circumstances do not allow poor people to enjoy an acceptable standard of life. They may not have a roof above their heads or may not be able to afford clothes and food. But the lack of income also causes many psychological and sociological consequences. Children of the poor have a higher probability of physical and mental health issues than their peers. They are also more likely to abuse substances and have problems with the law.

Measuring Poverty

The US Bureau of Census is responsible for calculating poverty rates in the US. They usually exclude anyone living in a mental health facility, prison, military quarters, and school dormitories. They do not count children under 15 years, either.

The World Bank established a new goal to eliminate extreme poverty in one generation starting in 2013. By 2030, They planned to decrease the number of the world’s population who live on $1.90 per day down to 3%. Measuring poverty shows which strategies work and which should be put aside. It also guides emerging countries in their development strategies to adapt to the rapidly changing world economy.

Poverty Facts & Statistics

• In 2018, four out of five individuals below the poverty line resided in rural areas.
• In 2020, extreme poverty rates rose for the first time over the last two decades. It happened due to the COVID-19 pandemic, military conflicts, and climate change.
• 97 million people crossed the poverty line because of the pandemic.
• Children make up 50% of the poor global population.
• 70% of the global poor above 15 have no or only primary school education.
• More than 40 % of the poor live in countries affected by conflict and violence. Over the next decade, the number is predicted to peak at 67%. Meanwhile, only 10% of the world’s population lives in such countries.

What Can Be Done About Poverty?

• At the moment, money is the best measure to reduce poverty . Investing in the markets of emerging countries could spur their economic growth. However, investors are often unwilling to do so, as these nations often struggle to sustain economic growth.
• The second way of problem-solving is education. It gives safety and support to children from low-income families (as they often suffer from domestic violence or sexual abuse). It also increases their future employment opportunities. But most importantly, it creates a culture of learning in families, and the next generations will benefit from it.
• The origin of poverty and the divergence of concepts depending on the context.
• Comparison of poverty concepts by UN, the World Bank and the EU.
• The difference between the definition of poverty in the EU and other world organizations.
• The difference between the UN definition of poverty and other world organizations.
• The World Bank’s definition of poverty differs from other world organizations.
• Aspects affecting the measurement of poverty.
• How Poverty Changes.
• When poverty is recognized as global?
• General level of development of the state affects the spread of poverty.
• Is poverty just an economic factor?
• When is a person recognized as poor determined?
• Poverty at the individual, local, national and global levels.
• Poverty hinders cognitive function.
• Poor people are often more susceptible to severe illness.
• Economic stability is paramount for a poor household.
• The rising cost of living makes poor people less able to afford things.
• Rising costs can push into poverty and others into poverty.
• Stress factors caused by poverty.
• Children living in poverty have lower cognitive thinking.
• Education in the US educational system is focused on students from more affluent families.
• Conditions in schools in poor areas prevent children from learning in a safe environment.
• High crime rate among children with low resources.
• Children from low-income families have higher rates of teenage pregnancy.
• Relationship of gender to poverty or location.
• In poorer countries, girls have lower completion rates.
• Most often, children end up in orphanages because of family poverty.
• Cultural factors can negatively affect productivity and perpetuate poverty in a state.
• Women are the group suffering from the highest levels of poverty after children.
• People living in poverty have an increased chance of getting a disability.
• Many women become victims of human trafficking.
• The most common form of survival is prostitution due to economic desperation.
• As poverty decreases, fewer incidents of violence will occur.
• Poverty Reduction Strategies.
• The improvement of cities and states can affect the reduction of the level of poverty of the population.
• Access to basic human needs is a way to fight poverty.
• Effect of deworming children on improving education among poor children.
• The fight against corruption is the same as the fight against poverty.
• Debt relief for countries can reduce countries poverty levels.
• Emigration from developing countries perpetuates poverty in them.
• Access to contraceptives directly impacts the poverty of the population and the country’s economy.
• Basic income is more effective in fighting poverty than the minimum wage and unemployment benefits.
• Reducing bureaucracy and increasing economic freedom would significantly reduce poverty.
• Greater access to markets brings more income to the poor.
• Road infrastructure directly affects poverty.
• Poverty causes environmental degradation.
• Climate change can hinder poverty reduction.
• Is spirituality the engine of poverty?
• Voluntary poverty.
• Climate change and poverty.
• Increased mortality due to poverty.
• The socio-economic gap between the poor and the rich.
• Is poverty linked to nationality?
• Religion and poverty.
• The influence of geographical location on the spread of poverty.
• Anti-poverty organizations and their strategies.
• Long-term consequences of poverty.
• Discrimination against the poor.
• Short-term and long-term strategies in the fight against poverty.
• Is it possible to get out of poverty, and what affects it?
• Your actions against poverty.
• Maintenance by the state of an adequate standard of living.
• The emergence of poverty as a social phenomenon.
• Is globalization exacerbating poverty?
• Social isolation of the population.
• Is poverty a choice?
• Health care for the poor.
• Human rights against poverty.
• Global poverty.
• Does moral poverty exist?
• Children’s perception of poverty.
• Poverty makes children grow up earlier.
• Digitalization help fight poverty.
• Does migration perpetuate poverty or fight it?
• Poor women are expected to marry early.
• Family planning prevents the spread of poverty.
• Development of poverty.
• Your understanding of poverty.
• Are there countries where there is no poverty?
• Political programs to combat poverty.
• What factors can exacerbate poverty problems?
• Poverty as a result of a natural disaster.
• Sustainable Development Goals: “No Poverty”.
• Dynamics of poverty levels.
• Are the poor themselves to blame for poverty?
• Ideological representations of poverty.
• Poverty is a result of discrimination.
• Do shelters for the poor help in the fight against poverty?
• Does a non-working family equal a poor family?
• Impact of the pandemic on the spread of poverty.
• Lack of medical care for the poor.

🗣️ Argumentative Essay Topics on Poverty

• Differences in prices between countries to adjust for purchasing power.
• What is extreme poverty?
• Measuring poverty: the monetary value of human consumption.
• The difficulty of measuring global poverty: difference between countries.
• International poverty line.
• Is poverty linked only to wealth?
• Industrialization and the fight against poverty: victory or even greater gap.
• Population growth leads to more poor people in the world.
• Growth of the global middle class and reduction of extreme poverty.
• Poverty forecast in 2030.
• Extreme poverty cannot be ended.
• The concentration of poverty in Africa.
• Countries that have reduced poverty: India, China, Ethiopia, Ghana.
• A growing global middle class and the stagnation of the world’s poorest people.
• Has modernity not reached the poor countries?
• The expansion of social protection policy helps to get rid of extreme poverty.
• Progress in the fight against all poverty lines.
• Importance of poverty reduction in developed countries.
• The demographic factor in the spread of poverty.
• Adjusting to Rising Costs of Living: Increasing or Reducing Poverty?
• Change in the international poverty line over time.
• Is it possible to eradicate extreme poverty?
• Multidimensional poverty: the diverse nature of poverty.
• Africa is the continent with the poorest people.
• Are there no poor people in rich countries?

➡️ Cause & Effect Essay Topics on Poverty

• The economic crisis in a country leads to an increase in poverty.
• Consequences of hunger for children and youth.
• The poverty of children is only the concern of parents.
• Most of the poor are from incomplete families.
• Historical barriers in the fight against poverty.
• Racial and ethnic gaps in poverty rates.
• Physical and mental well-being of poor children.
• Access to health care for poor families.
• Inadequate education exacerbates the vicious cycle of poverty.
• Children living in poverty are at greater risk for behavioral and emotional problems.
• Poverty breeds violent behavior in children.
• Poverty contributes to the spread of hard-to-treat diseases.
• Mortality of children in poor families.
• Protecting children from poor families.
• The prevalence of poverty among children in developed countries.
• Depression and poverty: children suffer from mental illnesses like adults.
• Family conflict as a cause of child homelessness.
• Homelessness harms children who are more prone to mental and physical illness.
• How does the labor market affect child poverty?
• Early pregnancy can lead to homelessness .
• Discrimination against LGBT people increases the level of homelessness among young people.
• Poverty contributes to the spread of STIs .
• Violent crime among the poor.
• Are violence and poverty inseparable?
• Substance abuse among children from poor families.
• What are the poverty solutions to stop hunger in the US?
• Reducing poverty through education – the US providing global solutions for emerging nations.
• How education helps break the cycle of poverty – evidence from the US communities.
• Providing water for communities overarched by bottled water producers – how does this help reduce poverty?
• Water resources and poverty among Native Americans – determining points of intersection.
• Clean water as a source of health and prosperity – how to preserve the national water resources of the United States?
• Basic health care – how free services affect global poverty.
• Why should basic medical care become a human right to overcome poverty?
• How do health insurance programs reduce poverty in the United States?
• Weaknesses in US health insurance programs: solutions for poverty alleviation.
• Empowering women to stop the poverty loops – solutions through micro-financing.
• Empowering women to reduce poverty – solutions for communities in the US.
• Global poverty and women’s power: three stories of entrepreneurship.
• How hunger and poverty affect the mental development of children – the need for immediate global solutions.
• Ensuring adequate nutrition for children and mothers to end poverty – lessons from Hawaii and Haiti.
• How can the American economy overcome poverty and hunger through macroeconomic solutions?
• The activities of international environmental organizations that led to poverty alleviation: the brightest victories.
• Fighting global warming to end poverty – how does planting trees improve living standards?
• Green energy and poverty alleviation – US macroeconomic solutions.
• Combating cycles of violence to overcome poverty – the US experience.
• Domestic violence as a factor in the growth of populations’ poverty.
• Violence against women – hotlines and other ways to help break cycles of poverty.
• Economic methods of overcoming poverty – international experience.
• Business and CSR practices as a means of influence in societies with low standards of living.
• Federal financing to reduce poverty – why is this a bad solution?
• Overcoming child homelessness as a way to end child poverty.
• Protecting orphans and securing their future through free education programs.
• Adoption programs as a way to combat child poverty among orphans.
• Work with refugees and assessment of child poverty in Europe and the US.
• Migrant children and stigmatization – how social institutions can avoid offensive meanings.
• Migration and the provision of education services – challenges related to overcoming child poverty.
• The health sector and overcoming child poverty: five important practices.
• Child nutrition in schools to overcome child poverty – stability and ways of implementing support programs.
• Child marriage and child poverty – how the mother’s age affects the well-being of children.
• Provision of education services for women as a way to overcome child poverty.
• Should free medicine for children become a right, not a privilege?
• How does the civilized world fight against child poverty that results from environmental disasters?
• Overcoming the consequences of global warming – programs of child poverty elimination.
• Overcoming child poverty with the involvement of parents – what programs exist in the US?
• Child support grants: three ways to overcome mistrust.
• Why does child poverty reduce the civilizational development of society?
• What are the five main consequences of child poverty?
• How does child poverty affect the economic development of countries?
• What is child poverty: studying the main determinants.
• Child poverty among the better-off sections of the US society – how do misleading concepts lead to social problems?
• Education of civilizational, moral, and cultural values to overcome child poverty – three ways of development.
• The ethical side of the issue of child poverty – why is society obliged to help?
• How preservation of cultural values leads to child poverty – lessons from national minorities.
• Why state control over culture and consciousness can lead to child poverty – the examples of the People’s Republic of China and North Korea.
• Propaganda as a way to reduce child poverty – the effectiveness of the approach.
• Poverty and national minorities – statistics and future trends.
• Overcoming poverty through healthcare services: interaction with vulnerable groups.
• Poverty and homelessness as consequences of unsuccessful political vectors – the American experience.
• Unemployment and poverty among non-citizens – ways to overcome the crisis.
• How has the pandemic deepened the crisis of poverty and unemployment in the US?
• Poverty and professions with the least demand on the labor market in the US: gaps and new opportunities.
• Democrats and Republicans – differences in approaches to overcoming poverty.
• Five successful democratic (republican) initiatives to overcome poverty.
• Conservatives in power and overcoming poverty – successes and failures.
• The top three policies of Donald Trump that led to the deepening of the poverty crisis in the US.
• Overcoming poverty in the US – the story of three presidencies (to choose from).
• Geographical prerequisites of regional poverty in the US – historical experience.
• Poverty crisis in the post-lockdown period – new ways of social development.
• Regional poverty in the US – solutions for selected regions.
• Is there a link between defense capability and poverty in the US?
• How science can help overcome poverty – the experience of American farmers in the mid-20th century.
• How big business harms the economy – the top 3 negative consequences of the work of unconscious producers that deepen the poverty crisis.
• How unconscious consumption of Chinese goods harms the US economy and deepens the poverty crisis.
• How can the United States overcome the unemployment crisis by stimulating small and medium-sized businesses?
• What inhumane manufacturing practices of the mid-to-late 19th century continue to exacerbate the poverty crisis in the United States?
• How are new technologies deepening the crisis of poverty and unemployment in the US?
• Why does the consumer society accelerate the decline of the economy and lead to poverty in the US?
• How can social science education programs help address the poverty crisis in the US?
• Three bright health care initiatives that help fight poverty in the US.
• Social determinants of poverty – how does the individual’s environment add to the creation of the poverty loop?
• Poverty Overview | The World Bank
• Poverty in the United States: 2021 | US Census Bureau
• Rural Poverty & Well-Being | US Department of Agriculture
• Child Poverty | UNICEF
• How Is Poverty Measured? | Institute for Research on Poverty
• What Is “Deep Poverty”? | Center for Poverty & Inequality Research
• Poverty Facts | University of Michigan
• LGBT Poverty in the United States | The Williams Institute

• Latest News
• North & East
• Environment
• International
• Social Love
• Horse Racing
• World Champs
• Commonwealth Games
• FIFA World Cup 2022
• Art & Culture
• Tuesday Style
• Food Awards
• JOL Takes Style Out
• Design Week JA
• Black Friday
• Relationships
• Motor Vehicles
• Place an Ad
• Jobs & Careers
• Study Centre
• Jnr Study Centre
• Supplements
• Entertainment
• Career & Education
• Classifieds
• Design Week

Poverty is the root cause of crime, Lisa

Dear Editor,

Lisa Hanna wrote two insightful articles recently in the Jamaica Observer about personality disorders and the impact on crime and violence in Jamaica. This is not the first time Hanna has spoken about these issues.

In 2013, as minister of youth and culture, Hanna raised the issue of mental disorders and the impact on behavioural problems among children in Jamaica at a Gleaner forum.

Hanna does have a point, but the deeper issue and root cause of crime, violence, and antisocial behaviour is poverty. Youth going before the courts and into State centres are primarily coming from poor communities. How many are from middle class, educated families?

We cannot ignore the socio-economic factors at the very root of these problems. Poverty, which equates to a lack of basic resources, will generally lead to poor education, inadequate parenting skills, and lack of family values, which creates other problems. It’s a vicious cycle which feeds into mental disorders and antisocial behaviour.

Providing counselling with scientific approaches might offer some benefits in specific cases, but this is hardly enough (or practical) to deal with the problem at a national level over the long term.

We must provide outlets to enable more individuals to break the cycle of poverty. I’ve always maintained that culture and sports are tools at our disposal which have been underutilised. We need investments in sports and culture to provide regular and ongoing mentorship, training, and programmes to hone skills and talent and nurture social interaction and self-worth. We need ongoing opportunities, not just seasonal ones. Sports and culture will provide a distraction, they relax and de-stress.

There are countless studies on the causes of crime and violence from people very qualified to speak on these topics. In Jamaica, we don’t need anymore studies or statistics or quotes from consultant psychiatrists and professors to tell us what we already know. What is needed is meaningful solutions aimed at reducing poverty and creating equality and economic opportunities.

I don’t believe anyone is surprised to know that most criminals experience violence and abuse as children. We also know that criminals tend to be young males and repeat offenders. We know that crime has an economic cost; it is an impediment to development. We also know that Jamaica has one of the highest murder rates in the world and our violent tendencies is well known throughout the Caribbean.

But we are still not using what we already know to help curb crime.

Why does Barbados, for instance, a country with one of the highest gross domestic product (GDP) per capita in the region and a highly educated population have virtually no crime?

The questions we should be asking, 60 years post Independence, is: What have we done over the decades to deal with the cycle of poverty and the link to crime in Jamaica?

Government has a responsibility to keep people safe and stimulate the economy to enable greater equality. Too many of our citizens live in extreme poverty, they become marginalised and invisible to those on the outside and ultimately many become criminals.

Until there is greater social and economic intervention and equality, with specific projects with specific goals, we will continue to use Band-Aid fixes and continue to write about the topic.

There are many people who endured mental issues as youth who were able to break the cycle and improve themselves economically and otherwise. Others are not so lucky, and they remain stuck and in need of help.

We have enough studies and statistics to know that Jamaica has a very serious socio-economic problem at the root of criminality which requires urgent attention.

[email protected]

HOUSE RULES

• We welcome reader comments on the top stories of the day. Some comments may be republished on the website or in the newspaper; email addresses will not be published.
• Please understand that comments are moderated and it is not always possible to publish all that have been submitted. We will, however, try to publish comments that are representative of all received.
• We ask that comments are civil and free of libellous or hateful material. Also please stick to the topic under discussion.
• Please do not write in block capitals since this makes your comment hard to read.
• Please don't use the comments to advertise. However, our advertising department can be more than accommodating if emailed: [email protected] .
• If readers wish to report offensive comments, suggest a correction or share a story then please email: [email protected] .
• Lastly, read our Terms and Conditions and Privacy Policy

• Privacy Policy
• Editorial Code of Conduct

An official website of the United States government

The .gov means it’s official. Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

The site is secure. The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

• Publications
• Account settings

Preview improvements coming to the PMC website in October 2024. Learn More or Try it out now .

• Advanced Search
• Journal List
• HHS Author Manuscripts

Urban Poverty and Neighborhood Effects on Crime: Incorporating Spatial and Network Perspectives

Corina graif.

Department of Sociology and Criminology, The Pennsylvania State University

Andrew S. Gladfelter

Stephen a. matthews.

Department of Sociology and Department of Anthropology, The Pennsylvania State University

Research on neighborhoods and crime is on a remarkable growth trajectory. In this article, we survey important recent developments in the scholarship on neighborhood effects and the spatial stratification of poverty and urban crime. We advance the case that, in understanding the impact of neighborhoods and poverty on crime, sociological and criminological research would benefit from expanding the analytical focus from residential neighborhoods to the network of neighborhoods individuals are exposed to during their daily routine activities. This perspective is supported by reemerging scholarship on activity spaces and macro-level research on inter-neighborhood connections. We highlight work indicating that non-residential contexts add variation in criminogenic exposure, which in turn influence offending behavior and victimization risk. Also, we draw on recent insights from research on gang violence, social and institutional connections, and spatial mismatch, and call for advancements in the scholarship on urban poverty that investigates the salience of inter-neighborhood connections in evaluating the spatial stratification of criminogenic risk for individuals and communities.

Introduction

Since the beginning of the 20th century, urban scholars have extensively studied the role of urbanism and poverty in increasing crime. Rapid urban growth and population mobility together with stark socioeconomic differentiations across the urban space were, from the early years of the Chicago School, associated with the breakdown of social control and increased crime ( Zorbaugh 1929 ). Classic ecological studies showed that neighborhoods with high poverty near commercial and industrial districts exhibited the highest levels of delinquency and criminality ( Shaw and McKay 1942 ). These levels persisted over decades even when neighborhood population groups changed dramatically, indicating that structural conditions like neighborhood poverty contributed to delinquency and crime above and beyond individual disposition.

In the late-20 th century, industrial restructuring and suburban flight has exacerbated the spatial differentiation of resources and concentration of unemployment among the low-skilled. In The Truly Disadvantaged , Wilson (1987) noted that unemployment and poverty clustered and that together these ‘concentration effects’ weakened family bonds and institutional ties, undermining the formal and informal capacity for crime control. Scholars today refer to areas of high poverty as areas of concentrated disadvantage . The Great Recession of 2008 added greater strain to struggling low-income urban communities across the country and recent studies increasingly connect economic distress (e.g. foreclosures) to higher crime ( Ellen et al. 2013 ; see Arnio and Baumer 2012 for an exception).

Building on a century old tradition of research, research on neighborhoods and crime in the past decade has shown remarkable growth. More than 250 articles were published on this topic in 2012 alone ( Figure 1 ). The scholarship on place, space, and geography in relation to crime exhibited similar trajectories. Combined, this literature demonstrates that neighborhood poverty and related social and economic conditions are closely related to multiple indices of criminal exposure and offending. Specifically, studies find that neighborhood poverty and associated structural factors continue to predict multiple crime-related outcomes, including: individuals’ exposure to violence ( Bingenheimer et al. 2005 ; Sampson et al. 1997 ); risk of victimization ( Burchfield and Silver 2013 ); adolescent violent crime ( De Coster et al. 2006 ; Zimmerman and Messner 2010 ); aggression ( Molnar et al. 2008 ); arrests for violent behavior (Ludwig et al. 2000); domestic violence ( Benson et al. 2003 ); incarceration ( Rodriguez 2013 ); and recidivism ( Kubrin and Stewart 2006 ). With few exceptions, these patterns tend to hold in multiple cities and in nationally representative studies.

Yearly Publication Count by Keyword Combination for the Past 10 Years Based on ISI Web of Science Search Results

Most studies implicitly assume that exposures to risk (e.g. criminal offending or victimization) are sufficiently represented by attributes of the neighborhood of residence. Chaix (2009) refers to this as the "residential trap." However, the residential focus ignores the fact that individuals' routines, in the aggregate, expose them to different neighborhoods on a daily basis. Few studies have examined the implications of routine exposures to multiple, non-residential neighborhood locations for crime. In this paper, we address this gap and advance a case for the idea that a more complete understanding of neighborhood effects on crime will greatly benefit from moving beyond the traditional focus on residential exposure to research based on an individual’s exposure to networks of neighborhoods . In building our argument, we draw on classic and modern theorizing on neighborhood effects and the spatial differentiation of poverty and crime, and integrate it with re-emerging literature on activity spaces, inter-neighborhood connections, and social and institutional networks.

Neighborhood effects on crime

In this section, we review some of the core mechanisms and associated theoretical perspectives that have been proposed to account for observed neighborhood effects. We discuss issues related to the definition of the neighborhood, scales of spatial exposures, and the spatial clustering of neighborhood disadvantage across urban environments.

Internal neighborhood mechanisms

Several major theoretical perspectives shed light on some of the possible mechanisms underlying the neighborhood effects on crime. First, one of the oldest theoretical perspectives, social disorganization, posits that ecological conditions like socioeconomic disadvantage, racial heterogeneity, and residential mobility, erode neighborhood social control and facilitate crime ( Shaw and McKay 1942 ). Social control largely operates through local ties to other individuals and institutions (Bursik and Grasmick 1993). A later extension of this theory proposes that independent of social ties, collective efficacy—a combination of social cohesion, trust and the ability of neighborhood residents to realize common goals and values—reduces neighborhood crime ( Sampson et al. 1997 ). Second, a perspective that is gaining increasing traction recently, routine activities states that crimes are most common when motivated offenders intersect in time and space with attractive targets in the absence of guardianship ( Cohen and Felson 1979 ). Often, routine activities components are assessed through measures such as unemployment rate (a proxy for motivated offenders) and time spent out of the household (low level of guardianship). Third, subcultural theories propose that local value structures can promote crime ( Fischer 1975 ), the focus being on "urban," "street" and a "southern" culture of violence. Finally, relative deprivation or strain approaches suggest that socioeconomic standing relative to peers or neighbors may influence offending behavior ( Merton 1938 ). In empirical tests of these theories, indicators of social disorganization and routine activities are found to exhibit the strongest and most consistent effects on crime (for a meta-analysis, see Pratt and Cullen 2005 ). Valuable reviews of social disorganization research and related theoretical thinking on neighborhood effects together with important suggestions for future directions are offered by Sampson et al. (2002) and Kubrin and Weitzer (2003) .

The main social mechanisms have been summarized by Sampson and collaborators (2002) under four categories: social ties and local interactions , referring to local interpersonal networks of friends and kin and neighborly exchanges; norms and collective efficacy , based on different dimensions of culture, social cohesion, trust, and social control ( Sampson et al. 1997 ); institutional resources , which include neighborhood organizations, family wellbeing support centers, youth centers and the like; and routine activities ( Cohen and Felson 1979 ), referring to the mix of residential, commercial or industrial land use and also the pattern of daily routine activities which facilitate access to local desirable targets by potential offenders living outside the neighborhood. The latter encompasses spatial mismatch theory ( Kain 1968 ), which highlights the distance between home and workplaces among population subgroups, a phenomenon also understood as institutional isolation (Wilson 1987).

These dimensions of neighborhood processes, while analytically distinct, are empirically related. Yet few studies have examined the nature and extent of these relationships. Sampson and Graif's study (2009b) is an exception that investigated the social networks of friends and kin and reciprocal exchange, collective efficacy (the ability of residents to realize common goals), culture (norms of conduct for different age groups), institutional engagement (neighborhood activism, involvement in local organizations, schools, and churches) and neighborhood leader contacts within and outside the community. They concluded that "as residents seem to disengage and are more cynical in disadvantaged communities, community leaders become more intensely involved in seeking resources, often from afar" ( Sampson and Graif 2009b , p. 1601). Independent of disadvantage, another study found that internal community network structures are positively associated with trust among leaders and among residents ( Sampson and Graif 2009a ). When networks extending outside the community shape the density of internal networks ( Sampson 2012 ), we might expect additional improvements in trust and other dimensions of social order. This literature implies important, yet understudied, relationships between the private or parochial levels of control and the external, public level ( Hunter 1985 , detailed below) with consequences for control of crime especially in disadvantaged communities.

Despite great advancements on the theoretical and empirical testing of neighborhood level mechanisms, we agree with Kubrin and Weitzer's (2003 , p. 387) assessment that "compared to the large number of studies on the effects of intra-neighborhood factors on crime, surprisingly little attention has been given to the role of exogenous determinants, and very little is known about the connections and interactions between internal and external factors. This would be a fruitful avenue for future research, and would rightly expand the scope of social disorganization theory in a more macro direction." Below, we present important recent developments relevant to bridging the internal-external mechanisms gap and offer additional suggestions for the future.

Neighborhood definitions and scales of spatial exposures

Over 40 years ago, Hunter and Suttles (1972) stressed the importance of multiple scales of measurement. They identify four scales: the “face-block," where residents tend to know each other; the " defended neighborhoods, " the smallest areas with distinct identities recognized by outsiders and insiders; the “ community of limited liability, ” where local participation depends on residents' attachment to community; and the “ expanded communities of limited liability,” a large geographic area in which groups of residents come together only when needed to gain larger traction on specific political or economic decisions. Importantly, each of these traditions uses pre-defined, administratively-bounded areas. Since the 1970s much of the measurement of neighborhoods in crime research spanned the meso-to-macro scales, from census tracts ( Graif and Sampson 2009 ) to community areas ( Sampson and Graif 2009a , 2009b ) to counties ( Messner and Anselin 2004 ). More recent studies have made important advances at the micro-level too, illustrating the importance of local network groupings ( Hipp et al. 2012 ), blocks ( Hipp 2007 ) and street segment dynamics ( Weisburd et al. 2004 ) in shaping crime.

A limited but growing number of studies, however, have adopted a different framework altogether—eliminating dependence on administrative boundaries. These researchers define neighborhoods egocentrically, as the geographic context around an individual's residence or around a block independent of neighborhood administrative boundaries ( Hipp and Boessen 2013 ). The features of the surroundings that are closest geographically to the focal residence are assumed to be most influential ( Tobler 1970 ). Work in geography also has used kernel density analyses and routines that treat the world as a continuous surface ( Matthews 2011 ). A major advantage of these analytic frameworks is an acknowledgment that access to resources is often facilitated by geographic proximity (e.g. access to youth services may decrease delinquent behavior) independent of artificially defined neighborhood boundaries.

The bounded neighborhood approach and the respondent-centered approach fed recurrent debates about the "proper" definition of the neighborhood. We believe this is a false dichotomy that may distract from thinking in an integrative way about local social processes. Similarly, the debates over the correct geographic scale of the neighborhood mask an important point: certain features of the surrounding non-residential areas may matter above and beyond the residential neighborhood, however defined. We revisit the four types of mechanisms noted by Sampson and colleagues (2002) with respect to the immediate neighborhoods of residence in the first column of Table 1 . Additionally, we expand further to illustrate how these types of processes may interact in shaping individuals' victimization experiences and offending behavior with features of a) the broader area surrounding the immediate neighborhood of residence (the extended neighborhood, column two) and b) the neighborhoods frequented as part of peoples' daily routine activities (e.g. the neighborhood of workplace or of close friends, column three). These examples may be translated into research hypotheses in future studies.

Examples of Neighborhood Mechanisms from Extended Spatial and Network Perspectives

The spatial embeddedness of neighborhoods

It has long been shown, in multiple cities, that poverty and crime are both associated with each other and exhibit spatial clustering ( Peterson and Krivo 2010 ). In addition, social processes like neighborhood trust and collective efficacy also cluster in space, and the spatial covariation between poverty and neighborhood processes remained strong over the past four decades ( Sampson and Graif 2009a ). Moreover, the associations between neighborhood poverty and crime tend to be similar for multiple neighborhoods that are geographically proximate to each other, even though they vary from one section of the city to another ( Graif and Sampson 2009 ).

Given the progress in highlighting the ecological levels of covariation between poverty and crime, it is surprising that advances in our collective understanding of spatial dynamics at the ecological level have not been integrated into the analytical framework of neighborhood effects on individuals (for an exception, see Sampson et al. 1999 ). This gap is related to the fact that we still know little about the processes underlying observed spatial clustering ( Kubrin and Weitzer 2003 ). These patterns are in part attributed to measurement issues and in part to processes of contagion or diffusion, whereby nearby crime activity spills over neighborhood boundaries ( Anselin et al. 2000 ; Tita and Griffiths 2005 ). Other processes assumed to explain clustering are residents' daily movement and increased exposures to risk factors in nearby neighborhoods. To the extent that effects of spatial proximity are in large part due to overlapping activity spaces, a more general form of interdependence—which transcends geographic proximity while subsuming some aspects of it—may be inter-neighborhood connections forged as a result of individuals’ frequent movement (e.g. daily commuting) across space.

Non-residential neighborhoods and routine activity spaces

Individuals routinely travel outside the neighborhood of residence for leisure and work. Pathways of movement across large distances may increase variability of access to resources, institutions, information, and people in ways that may affect crime. Furthermore, much of the time spent in the neighborhood of residence is spent inside the home, when the objective risk of committing crime or being victimized is arguably low (Bureau of Labor Statistics 2013). Despite increasing calls for definitions of neighborhood context that take into account individuals' daily activity patterns ( Cagney et al. 2013 ; Matthews 2011 ; Matthews and Yang 2013 ), most social science literature still relies on census tract of residence as the operational definition for the neighborhood of influence. However, research on the journey to crime indicates that up to 70 percent of crimes are committed by individuals outside their neighborhood of residence ( Bernasco 2010 ; Wikström 1991 , p. 213-223). Moreover, compared to violent crime, property crimes are committed further away from offenders' neighborhoods of residence (White 1932). Additionally, Bernasco (2010) finds that locations where offenders lived in the past are more likely to be chosen as the location of current offending. Evidence on the importance of non-residential contexts in the study of crime is thus becoming increasingly more salient.

The argument that researchers need to focus on relevant contexts other than the neighborhood of residence is not new to sociology (e.g. Foley 1950 ). McClenahan (1929) was one of the first to argue that urban residents' activities are rarely located within the immediate vicinity of the home. Routine activity patterns have been shown to matter for individuals' outcomes. Inagami and colleagues (2007) suggest that the negative effects on health of living in disadvantaged neighborhoods may be confounded and suppressed by exposure to non-disadvantaged, non-residential neighborhoods in the course of routine daily activities (i.e. grocery shopping). More recently, both qualitative and quantitative research in sociology has highlighted the importance of nonresidential contexts ( Matthews, 2011 ). Other disciplines too have started to adopt activity space approaches and are beginning to focus on nonresidential neighborhoods ( Cagney et al. 2013 ; Zenk et al, 2011 ). To date however, few studies have assessed the impact of individual activity spaces on the propensity to commit crime or become the victim of crime.

One notable exception is a recent study of youth in a UK city ( Wikström et al. 2010 ), which showed that more than 54% of respondents’ awake time was spent outside their home area ( Figure 2 ). Those with higher propensities for crime were exposed more frequently to criminogenic settings outside their home and school areas and, in such settings, were more likely to become involved in criminal behavior. More than half of the respondents’ crimes were committed at locations central to their routine activities. These findings highlight the importance of designing new studies that do not rely on residential contexts as the only purveyor of contextual effects.

Examples of Cross-Neighborhood Activity Spaces

Source: Adapted from Wikström et al. 2010 . With kind permission from Springer.

Networks of neighborhood exposures

The work on the importance of non-residential neighborhoods on crime and victimization provides some evidence for the necessity to study neighborhoods not as isolated, independent places but rather as parts of a larger, interconnected network of places. This type of perspective also has roots in earlier sociology, geography, and planning (see Matthews 2008 ). In the early sixties sociologists wrote about the “community without propinquity” or spatially dispersed communities ( Webber 1963 ) . Later Wellman (1979) discussed “community liberation”, extended social networks, and long distance communications such as “networks in the global village” ( Wellman 1999 ) which provides a bridge to the “new mobilities research” paradigm ( Larsen et al. 2012 ). We reintroduce and emphasize the idea that neighborhoods are part of a larger system of resource exchanges, in the form of networks, between places.

Our network perspective also draws on Hunter’s (1985) discussion of the importance of three core types of relational networks in shaping neighborhood social control. The “private” social order refers to intimate informal primary ties within a neighborhood (e.g. kin and friends) which can control crime through the threat of social disproval or other forms of deprivation. The “parochial” order is given by the broader connections with local institutions such as schools, churches, or community organizations, characterized by weaker attachment than the primary networks but nonetheless important. Finally, the “public” social order describes a community’s connections to external organizations and institutions that facilitate the mobilization of resources, mediate the ability of local networks to control local crime, and sometimes even enable the foundation of local institutions (also Taub et al. 1977 ).

The literature to date has predominantly focused on the private or parochial dimension of crime control, with little attention to the public dimension (Bursik and Grasmick 1993). Interestingly, the private and parochial ties often extend across space to create the foundation for public control. In a creative approach to neighborhoods as inter-related friendship networks, Hipp and colleagues (2012) show that while a high proportion of teens’ friends are predictably spatially clustered, many ties cross neighborhood boundaries over large geographic distances. To the extent that individuals’ contextual exposures are defined through their interactions, these findings underscore that a focus on only the administrative area of residence would miss substantial exposures to many friends’ neighborhoods. 1

The extent of between-neighborhood connections in Chicago are investigated in a recent monograph, Sampson's (2012) Great American City , as a function of residential mobility and nominations of influential people. Sampson (2012 , pp. 309-310) finds it surprising "how little neighborhood networks have actually been studied, as opposed to being invoked in metaphorical terms. … [P]rior research is dominated by a focus on individual connections and an “egocentric” perception of social structure. … [R]arely has social science documented variations between communities in social networks, much less the citywide structure."

A recent article by Slocum and colleagues (2013) addresses in part this gap by showing that organizations whose function it is to bridge to the larger community and secure resources for the local residents (e.g. community boards, political groups, economic development centers) are significantly associated with lower violent and property crime, even after controlling for multiple features of the community. Still, few empirical studies exist that show how neighborhoods are connected and more specifically how these ties matter for crime related outcomes. Just as residential neighborhood contexts matter to individuals through their connections with institutions and organizations within it ( Tran et al. 2013 ), similarly, involvement in non-residential neighborhoods may be consequential for criminal behavior or victimization risk.

Broader social phenomena highlight the importance of the interconnectedness of neighborhoods. For example, economic declines have been found to play a role in increasing violence ( Catalano et al. 2011 ; Ellen et al. 2013 ) but the evidence tends to be mixed and little is understood about the underlying mechanisms. We suggest that through plant closures and mass layoffs, recessions may sever critical interaction pathways (i.e. resource exchange in the form of labor) between neighborhoods. Despite a long tradition of research on spatial mismatch in employment prospects ( Kain 1968 ), understanding violence in the context of a neighborhood's connectivity to or isolation from other particularly influential communities in the city is underexplored.

In sum, as individuals move about space and across neighborhoods within urban contexts, patterns of behavior aggregate to create functional ties between sets of neighborhoods. Such ties may turn out to be as important for neighborhood change as spatial proximity is observed to be. In other words, underlying (or complementing) the spatial clustering of poverty and crime among neighborhoods in a city may be a broader network structure of interdependence governed by how people routinely move through the urban landscape. To the extent that communities are connected to others who are successful in dealing with crime, those strategies and tools may be transmitted through such ties (i.e. innovation diffusion).

Methodological considerations in the study of neighborhood networks

The empirical study of "networks of neighborhoods" is relatively new and underdeveloped. While we cannot offer definite approach to the study of neighborhood networks, we provide some guidance based on prior research and the emergence of data and methods to study complex networks. We highlight five relevant macro-level studies and their commonalities and differences along six dimensions: the nodes (neighborhoods) and the ties (relationships between nodes) as units of analysis; the levels of analysis; the type of analysis; the type of data used; and the questions of interest. This information is intended to provide readers with an overview of the types of methodological choices when designing a study of neighborhood networks.

In the networks of neighborhood approach, the nodes, or units of analysis, are frequently a geographic subdivision. In our selected examples, the operational definition of nodes range from administrative definitions of "neighborhoods" of the Paris Commune in the late nineteen century and community areas in contemporary Chicago ( Gould 1991 ; Sampson 2012 ) to tracts ( Schaefer 2012 ) and more complex units like gang turfs ( Papachristos et al. 2013 ). The definition and measurement of the ties between nodes - arguably the main focus of a networks approach to neighborhoods – vary as a function of the research question. In Gould's (1991) study, ties were represented by the number of men living in a neighborhood serving in the same military units as residents of another neighborhood. Papachristos and colleagues (2013) and Schaefer (2012) represented ties as gang violence and criminal co-offending relationships between places, respectively. Sampson (2012) measured ties as nominations by political leaders of people in the city who they believed they could rely on to "get things done" in their community. Thus, the core requirement of a tie is that it represent a form of meaningful interaction or relationship between nodes (see Table 2 ).

Selected Macro-level Applications of a Network of Neighborhoods Approach

The level of analysis is typically macro because of the interest in inter - neighborhood interactions or how neighborhoods are connected. All the studies we selected examined exchanges between macro-level units defined as a neighborhood. Data sources vary depending on the topic of interest, though some common themes emerge from the types of data used. Three of the studies ( Gould 1991 ; Papachristos et al. 2013 ; Schaefer 2012 ) used archival records whereas Sampson (2012) used a prospectively longitudinal survey format to collect data. Other types of data that link places to other places - including but not limited to resource exchange (e.g. financial exchange; commuting to work), criminal exchange (e.g. court records of co-offenders’ neighborhoods of residence; police reports linking offenders’ or victims’ address and crime location), or political exchange (e.g. nominations of "movers and shakers;" political interactions) - can be used to assess neighborhood networks. As an example, one ongoing study (Author 2013) uses police records and administrative data to connect employers’ location and employees’ neighborhood of residence to examine the extent to which commuting to violent neighborhoods increases victimization rates among the residents of a focal neighborhood ( Figure 3 ).

Inter-Neighborhood Networks and Exposure to Violence

Source: Adapted from Author (2013).

The leftmost map represents Chicago’s 77 community areas while the middle and the rightmost maps are network representations of the communities in the highest thirtile (red nodes) and lowest thirtile of violence (green nodes), respectively. Community areas are represented as nodes and situated in geographic space according to the latitude and longitude coordinates of their centroids. Ties between nodes represent workers living in one neighborhood and commuting to the other. The arrows point toward the neighborhood of work and show the extent to which communities of similar violence level are connected to each other or not. This ecological perspective on networks of communities opens the field to new perspectives on age-old questions related to structural embeddedness, selection and exclusion, displacement of crime, and the diffusion of norms relevant for crime control (see also column 3 of Table 1 ).

With respect to modeling and analytical approaches, all of the selected studies use a combination of GIS mapping, spatial, and network analyses. These methods are used to assess how different types of neighborhoods are distributed over space, to calculate the geographic distance between them, and to assess the association between social and spatial distance on the one hand and prevalence of inter-neighborhood connections on the other. The network analyses use two different approaches: a) a nodal approach ( Gould 1991 ) where the outcome and most covariates are modeled egocentrically at the nodal level while the dyadic relationships are only summarized in the form of a network autocorrelation term, similar to a spatial autocorrelation term, and, b) a dyadic and structural approach, using exponential random graph models (ERGMs), where the outcome is at the tie level as are many covariates, but nodal attributes and structural properties of the overall network are also included ( Papachristos et al 2013 ; Schaefer 2012 ).

Not represented among these examples, but nonetheless an important approach for the future that allows for changes in the network structure over time, is modeling using SIENA ( Snijders 2001 ). A relatively recent development, SIENA is gaining traction in examining longitudinal networks at the individual level but little research so far has made use of it in examining change in a network of neighborhoods. For instance, one type of question that this strategy would help address in the future is whether increases in neighborhood unemployment contribute to subsequent increases in co-offending relationships between any two neighborhoods or whether co-offending occurs before or independent of increases in unemployment. Other types of questions may focus on the diffusion of crime between neighborhoods (how shots fired across neighborhoods may lead to further shootings in retaliation) or on crime displacement (how policing in a neighborhood pushes crime into new places) (Tita and Cohen 2004). In sum, while the macro-level study of networks of neighborhoods is still in its early stages, existing examples are encouraging.

When the primary interest focuses on individual behaviors, experiences, and outcomes related to crime and victimization, studies of neighborhood network effects may combine network analytic tools with more typical approaches to the study of neighborhood effects or peer influences. Just like exposure to a network of delinquent friends affects individuals' attitudes and delinquent behavior, exposure to criminogenic places in which individuals spend considerable time (whether their own neighborhood of residence or outside it) may shape their attitudes and behavior. The mechanisms of peer influence on individual behavior may only in part overlap, if at all, with the mechanisms of place influence. Yet, the methodological advancements in assessing the role of one's network of peers ( Kreager et al. 2011 ) may also be valuable to scholars interested in assessing the role of an individual's network of neighborhoods.

The logic of the typical multilevel approach, for instance, as used in estimating effects of peer groups or of residential neighborhoods on individual attitudes and behavior related to crime and victimization may be also used to estimate the effects of a network of neighborhoods. The core difference consists in assessing criminogenic exposures based not only on where respondents live but based on the neighborhoods they frequent when they hang out with friends, go to school, shop, or commute to work. Exposures to each place can be weighted by the time respondents report (or are observed) to spend there or by another index representing functional ties (e.g. the number of friends they know in each place). GPS, smartphones, and tracking technologies enable collection of data that allows for weighting by the duration of exposure to a place. Alternatively, researchers may account for the time spent in traditional “nodes” such as home, work, and school as captured through activity logs ( Basta et al. 2010 ). To account for individuals' exposures to multiple non-nested places, multiple-membership models may constitute a valuable strategy ( Browne et al. 2001 ).

Related modeling strategies include the use of network lagged variables in hierarchical linear models. This would be similar to the use of spatial lag variables in multilevel analyses (see Crowder and South 2011 ; Sampson et al. 1999 ) but instead of geographic proximity it would model the lag as a function of existing network ties. For different examples of modeling social and spatial networks we direct the reader to Entwisle and colleagues (2007) and Larsen and colleagues (2012) .

Conclusions and directions for the future

In this article, we surveyed classic and recent studies on neighborhood effects and on the spatial stratification of poverty and urban crime. We argue that for a more complete understanding of the impact of neighborhoods and poverty on crime, sociological research would benefit from expanding the analytical focus from the residential neighborhoods to the network of neighborhoods (residential and non-residential) that individuals use during the course of their routine daily activity.

The reemergence of scholarship on activity spaces offers much promise for studies of non-residential contexts and crime. These non-residential contexts may add variation in criminogenic exposure, which would in turn influence their offending behavior ( Wikström et al. 2010 ) and victimization risk. We proposed that non-residential exposures may be thought of as a part of a " network of neighborhood exposures " that includes the neighborhood contexts of the workplace, school, friends' homes, recreation activities, or wherever individuals tend to spend their time on a routine basis.

Our approach is also related to insights on the importance of inter-neighborhood connections over large geographic distances directly or indirectly implied in studies of residential mobility ( Sampson 2012 ), extra-local organizational connections and involvement ( Sampson and Graif 2009a , 2009b ; Slocum et al. 2013 ), daily commuting distances ( Zenk et al. 2011 ), and spatial mismatch ( Holzer 1991 ; Kain 1968 ). We suggest that the criminogenic role of chronic unemployment resulting from the spatial mismatch between the location of jobs and the location of housing may be in part due to the absence of positive externalities of inter-neighborhood connections that may be forged through daily mobility across the urban landscape. We believe that our collective understanding of the causal relationship between neighborhood poverty, inter-neighborhood networks and crime will be greatly advanced by creative designs applied to studies of the recent Great Recession and economic decline more generally. More research is needed on how changes to activity spaces due to plant closures shape neighborhoods and crime and what happens when communities become disconnected as a result of economic restructuring.

Our principal purpose was to highlight the importance of studying how neighborhoods are related across space for advancing our collective understanding of macro-level patterns of neighborhood crime as well as individual attitudes and behavior. However, the study of inter-neighborhood connectivity is important for our understanding of urban stratification across space above and beyond crime. For instance, Krivo and colleagues (2013) , using the Los Angeles Families and Neighborhoods Survey (L.A. FANS) data, found that social inequality is reproduced through daily activities. That is, people living in socioeconomically advantaged neighborhoods similarly tend to conduct activities in (i.e. work, recreation, shopping, dining) neighborhoods that are non-overlapping with those in which disadvantaged populations conduct activities. Individuals from disadvantaged areas rarely enter non-disadvantaged parts of the city.

The comprehensive overview of the state of the field in the last decade and the discussion of the historical and theoretical context of the scholarship on urban poverty, neighborhoods, and crime left little room for addressing other important and recurrent issues in the field such as selection bias, ecological fallacy, and neighborhood change. We recommend several excellent reviews for more detailed discussions on these ( Kim et al. 2013 ; Kirk and Laub 2010 ; Kubrin and Weitzer 2003 ; Matthews and Yang 2013 ; Pratt and Cullen 2005 ; Sampson et al. 2002 ). We differ from previous reviews in our focus on a network approach to understanding neighborhood exposures. We call for new and creative research designs and analytical approaches to understanding urban crime that transcend the typical focus on the neighborhood of residence to include a focus on the broader context of routine activities. We also call for advancements in research on urban poverty that investigate the salience of inter-neighborhood connections in evaluating criminogenic risk for individuals and communities.

Acknowledgments

The first author thanks the Social Science Research Institute and the Population Research Institute at Penn State (NIH grant # R24 HD041025) for support during the writing of this article.

1 While a focus on networks as neighborhoods is valuable, we would also caution that the absence of friendships could alternatively activate criminogenic processes like alienation and anomie.

• Anselin Luc, Cohen Jacqueline, Cook David, Gorr Wilpen, Tita George. Spatial Analyses of Crime. In: Duffee David., editor. Measurement and Analysis of Crime and Justice. National Institute of Justice; Washington, D.C.: 2000. pp. 213–262. [ Google Scholar ]
• Arnio Ashley N., Baumer Eric P. Demography, Foreclosure, and Crime:: Assessing Spatial Heterogeneity in Contemporary Models of Neighborhood Crime Rates. Demographic Research. 2012; 26 :449–488. [ Google Scholar ]
• Basta Luke A., Richmond Therese S., Wiebe Douglas J. Neighborhoods, Daily Activities, and Measuring Health Risks Experienced in Urban Environments. Social Science & Medicine. 2010; 71 (11):1943–1950. [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Benson Michael L., Fox Greer L., DeMaris Alfred, Van Wyk Judy. Neighborhood Disadvantage, Individual Economic Distress and Violence Against Women in Intimate Relationships. Journal of Quantitative Criminology. 2003; 19 (3):207–235. [ Google Scholar ]
• Bernasco Wim. A Sentimental Journey to Crime: Effects of Residential History on Crime Location Choice. Criminology. 2010; 48 (2):389–416. [ Google Scholar ]
• Bingenheimer Jeffrey B., Brennan Robert T., Earls Felton J. Firearm Violence Exposure and Serious Violent Behavior. Science. 2005; 308 (5726):1323–1326. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Browne William J., Goldstein Harvey, Rasbash Jon. Multiple Membership Multiple Classification (MMMC) Models. Statistical Modelling. 2001; 1 (2):103–124. [ Google Scholar ]
• Burchfield Keri B., Silver Eric. Collective Efficacy and Crime in Los Angeles Neighborhoods: Implications for the Latino Paradox. Sociological Inquiry. 2013; 83 (1):154–176. [ Google Scholar ]
• Bursik Robert J., Jr., Grasmick Harold G. Neighborhoods & Crime. Lexington Books; 1999. [ Google Scholar ]
• Cagney Kathleen A., Browning Christopher R., Jackson Aubrey L., Soller Brian. Networks, Neighborhoods, and Institutions: An Integrated 'Activity Space' Approach for Research on Aging. In: Waite Linda J., Plewes Thomas J., editors. New Directions in the Sociology of Aging. The National Academies Press; Washington, D.C.: 2013. pp. 151–174. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Catalano Ralph, et al. The Health Effects of Economic Decline. Annual Review of Public Health. 2011; 32 :431–450. [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Chaix Basile. Geographic Life Environments and Coronary Heart Disease: A Literature Review, Theoretical Contributions, Methodological Updates, and a Research Agenda. Annual Review of Public Health. 2009; 30 :81–105. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Cohen Lawrence E., Felson Marcus. Social Change and Crime Rate Trends: A Routine Activity Approach. American Sociological Review. 1979; 44 (4):588–608. [ Google Scholar ]
• Crowder Kyle, South Scott J. Spatial and Temporal Dimensions of Neighborhood Effects on High School Graduation. Social Science Research. 2011; 40 (1):87–106. [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• De Coster Stacy, Heimer Karen, Wittrock Stacy M. Neighborhood Disadvantage, Social Capital, Street Context, and Youth Violence. Sociological Quarterly. 2006; 47 (4):723–753. [ Google Scholar ]
• Ellen Ingrid Gould, Lacoe Johanna, Sharygin Claudia Ayanna. Do Foreclosures Cause Crime. Journal of Urban Economics. 2013; 74 :59–70. [ Google Scholar ]
• Entwisle Barbara, Faust Katherine, Rindfuss Ronald R., Kaneda Toshiko. Networks and Contexts: Variation in the Structure of Social Ties. American Journal of Sociology. 2007; 112 (5):1495–1533. [ Google Scholar ]
• Fischer Claude S. Toward a Subcultural Theory of Urbanism. American Journal of Sociology. 1975; 80 (6):1319–1341. [ Google Scholar ]
• Foley Donald L. The Use of Local Facilities in a Metropolis. American Journal of Sociology. 1950; 56 (3):238–246. [ Google Scholar ]
• Gould Roger V. Multiple Networks and Mobilization in the Paris Commune, 1871. American Sociological Review. 1991; 56 (6):716–729. [ Google Scholar ]
• Graif Corina, Sampson Robert J. Spatial Heterogeneity in the Effects of Immigration and Diversity on Neighborhood Homicide Rates. Homicide Studies. 2009; 13 (3):242–260. [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Hipp John R. Block, Tract, and Levels of Aggregation: Neighborhood Structure and Crime and Disorder as a Case in Point. American Sociological Review. 2007; 72 (5):659–680. [ Google Scholar ]
• Hipp John R., Boessen Adam. Egohoods as Waves Washing Across the City: A New Measure of 'Neighborhoods. Criminology. 2013; 51 (2):287–327. [ Google Scholar ]
• Hipp John R., Faris Robert W., Boessen Adam. Measuring ‘Neighborhood’: Constructing Network Neighborhoods. Social Networks. 2012; 34 (1):128–140. [ Google Scholar ]
• Holzer Harry J. The Spatial Mismatch Hypothesis: What Has the Evidence Shown? Urban Studies. 1991; 28 (1):105–122. [ Google Scholar ]
• Hunter Albert J. Private, Parochial, and Public Social Orders: The Problem of Crime and Incivility in Urban Communities. In: Suttles Gerald D., Zald Mayer N., editors. The Challenge of Social Control: Citizenship and Institution Building in Modern Society. Ablex; Norwood, NJ: 1985. pp. 230–242. [ Google Scholar ]
• Hunter Albert J., Suttles Gerald D. The Expanding Community of Limited Liability. In: Suttles Gerald D., editor. The Social Construction of Communities. University of Chicago Press; Chicago, IL: 1972. pp. 44–81. [ Google Scholar ]
• Inagami Sanae, Cohen Deborah A., Finch Brian K. Non-Residential Neighborhood Exposures Suppress Neighborhood Effects on Self-Rated Health. Social Science & Medicine. 2007; 65 (8):1779–1791. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Kain John F. Housing Segregation, Negro Employment, and Metropolitan Decentralization. The Quarterly Journal of Economics. 1968; 82 (2):175–197. [ Google Scholar ]
• Kim Sangmoon, LaGrange Randy L., Willis Cecil L. Place and Crime Integrating Sociology of Place and Environmental Criminology. Urban Affairs Review. 2013; 49 (1):141–155. [ Google Scholar ]
• Kirk David S., Laub John H. Neighborhood Change and Crime in the Modern Metropolis. Crime and Justice. 2010; 39 (1):441–502. [ Google Scholar ]
• Kreager Derek A., Rulison Kelly, Moody James. Delinquency and the Structure of Adolescent Peer Groups. Criminology. 2011; 49 (1):95–127. [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Krivo Lauren J, et al. Social Isolation of Disadvantage and Advantage: The Reproduction of Inequality in Urban Space. Social Forces. 2013; 92 (1):141–164. [ Google Scholar ]
• Kubrin Charis E., Stewart Eric A. Predicting Who Reoffends: The Neglected Role of Neighborhood Context in Recidivism Studies. Criminology. 2006; 44 (1):165–197. [ Google Scholar ]
• Kubrin Charis E., Weitzer Ronald. New Directions in Social Disorganization Theory. Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency. 2003; 40 (4):374–402. [ Google Scholar ]
• Larsen Jonas, Axhausen Kay, Urry John. Mobilities, Networks, Geographies. Ashgate Publishing, Ltd; Burlington, VT: 2012. [ Google Scholar ]
• Ludwig Jens, Duncan Greg J., Hirschfield Paul. Urban Poverty and Juvenile Crime: Evidence from a Randomized Housing-Mobility Experiment. The Quarterly Journal of Economics. 2001; 116 (2):655–679. [ Google Scholar ]
• Matthews Stephen A. The Salience of Neighborhood: Some Lessons from Sociology. American Journal of Preventive Medicine. 2008; 34 (3):257–259. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Matthews Stephen A. Spatial Polygamy and the Heterogeneity of Place: Studying People and Place via Egocentric Methods. In: Burton Linda M., Matthews Stephen A., Leung ManChui, Kemp Susan P., Takeuchi David T., editors. Communities, Neighborhoods, and Health, Social Disparities in Health and Health Care. Springer; New York: 2011. pp. 35–55. [ Google Scholar ]
• Matthews Stephen A., Yang Tse-Chuan. Spatial Polygamy and Contextual Exposures (SPACEs) Promoting Activity Space Approaches in Research on Place And Health. American Behavioral Scientist. 2013; 57 (8):1057–1081. [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• McClenahan Bessie Averne. The Changing Urban Neighborhood. University of Southern California; Los Angeles, CA: 1929. [ Google Scholar ]
• Merton Robert K. Social Structure and Anomie. American Sociological Review. 1938; 3 (5):672–682. [ Google Scholar ]
• Messner Stephen, Anselin Luc. Spatial Analyses of Homicide with Areal Data. In: Goodchild Michael F., Janelle Donald G., editors. Spatially Integrated Social Science. Oxford University Press; New York: 2004. pp. 127–144. [ Google Scholar ]
• Molnar Beth E., Cerda Magdalena, Roberts Andrea L., Buka Stephen L. Effects of Neighborhood Resources on Aggressive and Delinquent Behaviors Among Urban Youths. American Journal of Public Health. 2008; 98 (6):1086–1093. [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Papachristos Andrew V., Hureau David M., Braga Anthony A. The Corner and the Crew: The Influence of Geography and Social Networks on Gang Violence. American Sociological Review. 2013; 78 (3):417–447. [ Google Scholar ]
• Peterson Ruth D., Krivo Lauren J. Divergent Social Worlds: Neighborhood Crime and the Racial-Spatial Divide. Russell Sage Foundation; New York: 2010. [ Google Scholar ]
• Pratt Travis C., Cullen Francis T. Assessing Macro-Level Predictors and Theories of Crime: A Meta-Analysis. Crime and Justice. 2005; 32 :373–450. [ Google Scholar ]
• Radil Steven M., Flint Colin, Tita George E. Spatializing Social Networks: Using Social Network Analysis to Investigate Geographies of Gang Rivalry, Territoriality, and Violence in Los Angeles. Annals of the Association of American Geographers. 2010; 100 (2):307–326. [ Google Scholar ]
• Rodriguez Nancy. Concentrated Disadvantage and the Incarceration of Youth Examining How Context Affects Juvenile Justice. Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency. 2013; 50 (2):189–215. [ Google Scholar ]
• Sampson Robert J. Great American City: Chicago and the Enduring Neighborhood Effect. University of Chicago Press; Chicago: 2012. [ Google Scholar ]
• Sampson Robert J., Graif Corina. Neighborhood Networks and Processes of Trust. In: Cook Karen S., Levi Margaret, Hardin Russell., editors. Whom Can We Trust? How Groups, Networks, and Institutions Make Trust Possible. Russell Sage Foundation; New York: 2009a. pp. 182–216. [ Google Scholar ]
• Sampson Robert J., Graif Corina. Neighborhood Social Capital as Differential Social Organization Resident and Leadership Dimensions. American Behavioral Scientist. 2009b; 52 (11):1579–1605. [ Google Scholar ]
• Sampson Robert J., Morenoff Jeffrey D., Earls Felton. Beyond Social Capital: Spatial Dynamics of Collective Efficacy for Children. American Sociological Review. 1999; 64 (5):633–660. [ Google Scholar ]
• Sampson Robert J., Morenoff Jeffrey D., Gannon-Rowley Thomas. Assessing ‘Neighborhood Effects’: Social Processes and New Directions in Research. Annual Review of Sociology. 2002; 28 :443–478. [ Google Scholar ]
• Sampson Robert J., Raudenbush Stephen W., Earls Felton. Neighborhoods and Violent Crime: A Multilevel Study of Collective Efficacy. Science. 1997; 277 (5328):918–924. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Schaefer David R. Youth Co-Offending Networks: An Investigation of Social and Spatial Effects. Social Networks. 2012; 34 (1):141–149. [ Google Scholar ]
• Shaw Clifford R., McKay Henry D. Juvenile Delinquency and Urban Areas. University of Chicago Press; Chicago, IL: 1942. [ Google Scholar ]
• Slocum Lee Ann, Rengifo Andres F., Choi Tiffany, Herrmann Christopher R. The Elusive Relationship Between Community Organizations and Crime: An Assessment Across Disadvantaged Areas of the South Bronx. Criminology. 2013; 51 (1):167–216. [ Google Scholar ]
• Snijders Tom A. B. The Statistical Evaluation of Social Network Dynamics. Sociological Methodology. 2001; 31 (1):361–395. [ Google Scholar ]
• Taub Richard P., Surgeon George P., Lindholm Sara, Otti Phyllis Betts, Bridges Amy. Urban Voluntary Associations, Locality Based and Externally Induced. American Journal of Sociology. 1977; 83 (2):425–442. [ Google Scholar ]
• Tita George, Griffiths Elizabeth. Traveling to Violence: The Case for a Mobility-Based Spatial Typology of Homicide. Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency. 2005; 42 (3):275–308. [ Google Scholar ]
• Tobler Waldo R. A Computer Movie Simulating Urban Growth in the Detroit Region. Economic Geography. 1970; 46 :234–240. [ Google Scholar ]
• Tran Van C., Graif Corina, Jones Alison D., Small Mario L., Winship Christopher. Participation in Context: Neighborhood Diversity and Organizational Involvement in Boston. City & Community. 2013; 12 (3):187–210. [ Google Scholar ]
• Webber Melvin M. Order in Diversity: Community without Propinquity. In: Wingo Lowdon., Jr., editor. Cities and Space: The Future Use of Urban Land. Johns Hopkins; Baltimore, MD: 1963. pp. 23–54. [ Google Scholar ]
• Weisburd David, Bushway Shawn, Lum Cynthia, Yang Sue-Ming. Trajectories of Crime at Places: A Longitudinal Study of Street Segments in the City of Seattle. Criminology. 2004; 42 (2):283–322. [ Google Scholar ]
• Wellman Barry. The Community Question: The Intimate Networks of East Yorkers. American Journal of Sociology. 1979; 84 (5):1201–1231. [ Google Scholar ]
• Wellman Barry. Networks In The Global Village: Life In Contemporary Communities. Westview Press; Boulder, CO: 1999. [ Google Scholar ]
• White R. Clyde. The Relation of Felonies to Environmental Factors in Indianapolis. Social Forces. 1931; 10 :498–509. [ Google Scholar ]
• Wikström Per-Olof H. Urban Crime, Criminals, and Victims: The Swedish Experience in an Anglo-American Comparative Perspective. Springer-Verlag Publishing; New York: 1991. [ Google Scholar ]
• Wikström Per-Olof H., Ceccato Vania, Hardie Beth, Treiber Kyle. Activity Fields and the Dynamics of Crime. Journal of Quantitative Criminology. 2010; 26 (1):55–87. [ Google Scholar ]
• Wilson William Julius. The Truly Disadvantaged: The Inner City, the Underclass, and Public Policy. Second University of Chicago Press; Chicago, IL: 2012. [ Google Scholar ]
• Zenk Shannon N, et al. Activity Space Environment and Dietary and Physical Activity Behaviors: A Pilot Study. Health & Place. 2011; 17 (5):1150–1161. [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Zimmerman Gregory M., Messner Steven F. Neighborhood Context and the Gender Gap in Adolescent Violent Crime. American Sociological Review. 2010; 75 (6):958–980. [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Zorbaugh Harvey Warren. The Gold Coast and the Slum: A Sociological Study of Chicago’s Near North Side. University of Chicago Press; Chicago: 1929. [ Google Scholar ]

Poverty and Crime Argumentative Essay by Top Papers

Description:

From the paper:, cite this argumentative essay:.

argumentative essay about poverty (Quick guide)

Writers Active

Av. Quality Score

Writers Online

Why choose eddusaver.

We not only promise a 24/7 support availability and timely delivery of all your papers. You also get a ton of other asuarances that our service comes with.

Satisfaction

Satisfaction guarantee.

Authenticity

100% original papers.

The grade or money back.

Confidentiality

We protect your privacy.

argumentative essay about poverty

Poverty is a dreaded term, and the imagination of its visitation elicits nasty reactions. As a college, high school, or university student, you must be well-versed in how to write an argumentative essay about the causes and effects of poverty. At least mostly, you must create supporting ideas for the poverty causes and effects. It can sometimes be descriptive causes of poverty essays.

Therefore, when asked to write a short essay on poverty, you should first understand your writing type. Writing an excellent poverty essay needs dedication and time. Getting a topic is not guaranteed, as most people have always chosen the best. You can get a topic for your poverty essay with creativity and critical thinking.

Apart from offering free topics for poverty essays in this article, we advise you on how to write such essays. Our custom essay writing service is ready to help when you need help too.

How to begin a poverty essay – an eye-catching introduction

We won’t tire of reiterating that any essay starts with a clear, concise, and sound introduction. Here are some of the questions to ask yourself in the introduction:

• What are the causes of poverty
• What is poverty
• What are the different eradication strategies for poverty
• What are the causes and effects of poverty?
• How many people are affected by poverty globally?

These questions can also be part of the topic ideas for your poverty essay. The introduction of an argumentative essay about poverty should consist of an elaborate poverty essay thesis. The thesis should highlight the gist of the entire essay in either one or two sentences. It helps the reader identify the plan and intention of the essayist when writing a poverty essay. The introduction should also have some statistics. Ensure they are scholarly, recent, and well-referenced. If you write a persuasive or argumentative essay on poverty, follow the right introduction to the poverty essay format.

How to format/ outline a poverty essay

When writing a cause-and-effect poverty, an argumentative or persuasive essay on the causes of poverty, an outline should precede the other sections. Your global poverty essay should begin with a great topic, outline, and introduction. The body paragraph section comes after the introduction. The essay can follow the 5-paragraph format depending on the length of the poverty essay. Each body paragraph should contain one idea. 

Causes of poverty

From the poverty essay titles, poverty causes are a popular theme among students. Although some may think that poverty occurs because people are lazy and don’t want to work hard, the problem is more vital than that. Research scholarly journal articles and books on the subject with these questions in mind:

• What are the historical causes of poverty in your country?
• Why do some groups of people experience poverty more often than others?
• How do businesses promote or reduce poverty in the community?
• How is poverty related to other social issues, such as discrimination, immigration, and crime?

Consequences of poverty

Many essay examples also consider the consequences of poverty for communities and individuals. This theme is particularly central if you study social sciences or politics. Some questions that may give you ideas for this part.

• How is poverty connected to crime and substance abuse?
• How is the psychological well-being of individuals affected by poverty?
• What is the relationship between poverty and world hunger?
• How does poverty affect individuals’ access to high-quality medical care and education?

Government policies

Most countries’ governments have policies to reduce poverty and help those in need. You may address the policies used in your state or compare several different governments in terms of their approaches to poverty. Think about the following: 

• Do laws on minimum wage help to prevent and decrease poverty? Why or why not?
• What are some examples of legislation aimed at reducing poverty?
• Should governments provide financial assistance to those in need? Why or why not?
• How do governments help people who are poor to achieve higher levels of social welfare?

Solutions to poverty

Among the popular poverty essay topics is ‘solutions to poverty.’ You will surely find many sample articles and papers on this subject. This is because poverty is a global problem that must be solved to facilitate development. To get an A in your poverty main body or conclusion, consider the following:

• Is there a global solution to poverty that would be equally effective in all countries?
• What programs or policies proved to be effective in reducing poverty locally?
• What solutions would you recommend to decrease and prevent poverty?
• How can society facilitate the reduction of poverty?

Covering some of these aspects in your essay will help you demonstrate in-depth understanding and required analysis to earn a high grade. Before writing, look around our website for more essay titles, interesting topics, and tips!

Best essay topics on poverty

Effects of divorce and poverty on families

Children are tremendously affected in the event of divorce. In most cases, attention is not given to them as it should be.

Drug, poverty, and beauty’s effects on health

Some serious health outcomes come from frequent drug consumption, poverty, and strict adherence to global beauty trends.

Immigrant children and poverty

Immigrant child poverty has many social predicaments related to several long-lasting schools and linked difficulties.

The problem of world poverty

One needs to find out whether it is possible to satisfy the meaning and exhaustively create a definition for poverty.

The issue of world poverty and ways to alleviate poverty in the world

Poverty is the state of deficiency in a certain amount of money or material wealth

Effects of poverty on college education in the USA

Poverty affects both the lifestyle and living standards of people and college education.

Global poverty and nursing intervention

Poverty and poor health are closely linked. Community nurses conversant with the dynamics of poor health can run successful health promotion initiatives.

Poverty affects an individual .

People work hard to meet their needs. This, however, does not mean an escape from poverty. Poverty can cause extensive damage to one’s life.

Inequality in Australia: poverty rates and globalism

The Australian government will have to take a range of specific measures to address the inequality issue in the realm of the Australian financial and economic environment.

The government of Bangladesh

This essay describes how constitutional, educational, economic, and legal reforms can eradicate absolute poverty and corruption in a developing country like Bangladesh.

The eliminating poverty 

The UN measures poverty based on education, health, shelter, hunger, and utility availability.

How poverty affects early education?

Poverty influences education in a negative way.

School system: poverty and education

this assessment presents examples of differences between the schools that lead to disadvantages in the education system and finally provides a suggestion to help bridge the gap.

Modern slavery, human trafficking, and poverty

Whether through the trafficking of males for forced labor or the sexual enslavement of girls, slavery has had a tremendous effect on modern society.

The orthodox and alternative poverty explanations comparison

Over the years, poverty has become a worldwide concern for economies. This article explores the alternative and orthodox theories of poverty.

Poverty and welfare policies in the United States

In the US, poverty is a primary problem. 

Utilitarianism: poverty reduction through charity

This essay shows that poverty levels can be reduced if wealthy individuals donate a part of their earnings, using the main principles of the utilitarian theory.

Child poverty assessment in Canada

Poverty is not only a problem for children but also a threat to the development of a country.

A national conversation about poverty

The success of every society is determined by cultural practices, values, and tendencies that can address the hurdles affecting its people.

Brazil’s poverty and inequality

Brazil’s poverty has been unresponsive to growth due to the challenges of eliminating inequality. The poverty eradication programs reduced the poverty rate.

Suitable topics for essays on poverty

The following is a list of some suitable poverty essay topics. They can help you brainstorm for the best topics; better yet, you can choose and use them in your essays, theses, dissertations, and research papers.

• Is poverty inevitable?
• What are the most successful nations in eradicating poverty?
• Child poverty and its impacts on growth and development
• Explore the causes and consequences of poverty in india. 
• Which countries have the highest poverty index?
• Real-life examples of poverty
• Is there a nexus between poverty and world hunger?
• The connection between poverty and homelessness 
• Poverty definition essay
• Exploring the American stagnant poverty line
• Poverty as a multifaceted issue
• The impacts of poverty in our society
• Poverty in contemporary society
• How poverty affects aboriginal communities
• State and non-state actors in poverty eradication
• Prejudice and poverty
• How is poverty measured
• Does terrorism cause poverty?
• Human conflict and poverty
• Poverty and crime rates
• How poverty affects the progress of students
• Wars and poverty: a case study of congo, Somalia, and Iraq.
• How the UN nations and the red cross are fighting poverty
• Family planning and poverty
• The role of the great depression on poverty 
• Does poverty in a nation depict poor governance?
• The link between culture and poverty
• Poverty and access to quality healthcare.
• How poverty acts as a factor in human trafficking and prostitution
• Capitalism and poverty

Research titles about poverty

Gay and poverty marriage

Marriage status determines relations between spouses and their relations with the state. 

The vicious circle of poverty

In this paper, the author describes the problem of poverty, its causes, and ways of optimizing the economy and increasing production efficiency.

Poverty relation with immigrants

Poverty-related immigration is usually due to population pressures as the natural land becomes less productive because of increased production and industrial production.

Reduction of poverty in rural areas through ICT

ICT covers all information processing tools. It will be of great importance both for society and for the country.

Trade effect on environmentalism and poverty

This research essay is about the effect of trade on the environment and how trade has contributed to improving living standards.

The US education: effect of poverty

The effects of poverty on education would stretch to other aspects of life.

Is debt cancellation the answer to world poverty?

Debt cancellation is one of the effective approaches to poverty eradication, no doubt about that.

Marriage and divorce: poverty among divorced women

This essay focuses on the possible connection between divorce and poverty among women, given that many women are employed and independent financially.

Aid agencies discuss different solutions to poverty in urban areas.

Urban poverty is a nightmare most governments, cities, and local authorities are facing.

Poverty elimination in perspective 

Poverty has been on the world’s development agenda since time immemorial. This paper explores the possibilities of eliminating the poverty menace.

Federal poverty, welfare, and unemployment policies

The federal policies regarding the above-mentioned areas of public interest will be discussed at length and scrutinized.

Attitudes to poverty: singers arguments

Singer argues that the observation by the rich than helping one poor person can repeat until the rich eventually becomes poor.

Global poverty and human development

Poverty rates are becoming a major issue that could impair the progress of humanity.

Poverty as an ethical issue

We must consider that there are people who control resource distribution, leading to poverty or wealth in the community.

Poverty causes and reduction measures .

Poverty is a global disaster, and many people have insufficient income to satisfy their basic needs.

The cost of saving: the problem of poverty

This remains contributing to the drop in the quality of life and well-being of a major part of the American population.

Conclusion a poverty essay – leaves the audience yearning for more.

Even after writing an excellent poverty essay, it must end. You should have a closing sentence that signals to the reader that the essay is ending. Highlight the essay’s main points and choose the best words when summarizing ideas. You will need to restate the thesis but this time in a reinvented format. Make the conclusion memorable, like the introduction to your essay about poverty. You will score good grades when you balance the introduction, body, and conclusion. 

In case you can’t find a sample example, our professional writers are ready to help you with writing your own paper. All you need to do is fill out a short form and submit an order