NCJ Number
175523
Journal
International Journal on Minority and Group Rights Volume: 4 Issue: 3-4 Dated: 1996/97 Pages: 301-327
Date Published
1997
Length
27 pages
Annotation
An ethnography of a London (England) community (Euston) is the basis for analyzing the causes of conflict among ethnic groups of juveniles from 1991 to 1995.
Abstract
To understand what is happening among the adults in the community, this study provides an overview of the ethnic mix in the community. The core of the study focuses on Somers Town, the area immediately east of Euston. By the 1990s there was still a core of the old Somers Town ethnics, but they had been increasingly moving out, partly because they were finding it difficult to obtain housing, since those defined as having greater need had preferential access to council-controlled flats (the Camden Council is now largely responsible for determining who lives where in this community that lacks privately owned property). Among those from overseas housed in Somers Town have been Cypriots, West Indians, West Africans, and Turks. Notably, since the 1970s there have been many settlers from Sylhet, an area of peasant farming in northeast Bangladesh ("Bangladeshis"). Bangladeshis have increasingly been moved into council accommodations in the Regent's Park Estate and in Somers Town. There have been conflicts between Bangladeshi and white youth and between Bangladeshis and blacks, which began in the early 1990s. This study provides an overview of confrontations in schools, youth clubs, and the street for the periods 1991-92, 1992-93, 1993-94, and 1994-95. The major problem concerning inter-ethnic violence involves the stereotypical reactions by both local adults and outsiders, i.e., the media and anti- racists. The study concludes, however, that the violence among ethnic youth in these periods is less significant than drug abuse and the long-term effects of unemployment in determining the futures of these youth. 14 footnotes