Advanced Search

Journal Navigation

Journal Home

Subscriptions

Archive

Contact Us

Table of Contents

Click here to sign up for SAGE Journal Email Alerts today!

Sign In to gain access to subscriptions and/or personal tools.
Crime & Delinquency
This Article
Right arrow Full Text (PDF)
Right arrow References
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
Right arrow Email this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Similar articles in Web of Science
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Add to Saved Citations
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrowRequest Permissions
Right arrow Request Reprints
Right arrow Add to My Marked Citations
Citing Articles
Right arrow Citing Articles via Google Scholar
Right arrow Citing Articles via Scopus
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by Holmes, M. D.
Right arrow Articles by Muñoz, E. A.
Right arrow Search for Related Content
Social Bookmarking
Add to CiteULike   Add to Complore   Add to Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us   Add to Digg   Add to Reddit   Add to Technorati   Add to Twitter  
What's this?

Minority Threat, Crime Control, and Police Resource Allocation in the Southwestern United States

Malcolm D. Holmes

University of Wyoming

Brad W. Smith

Wayne State University

Adrienne B. Freng

University of Wyoming

Ed A. Muñoz

University of Wyoming

Numerous studies have examined political influences on communities' allocations of fiscal and personnel resources to policing. Rational choice theory maintains that these resources are distributed in accordance with the need for crime control, whereas conflict theory argues that they are allocated with the aim of controlling racial and ethnic minorities. Existing research more consistently supports the conflict argument, but important issues remain unaddressed. The authors tested that approach by examining allocations of police resources in large cities in the Southwest, the yet-to-be-studied region in which the majority of Hispanics reside. The analyses included the key variables from the rational choice and conflict perspectives, as well as proximity to the border between the United States and Mexico. Minimal effects existed for percent Hispanic, an important conflict theory variable. However, Anglo-Hispanic income inequality and proximity to the border had effects consistent with that perspective. Class divisions within the Hispanic community may explain this pattern of findings.

Key Words: Policing • race-ethnicity • conflict theory

Crime & Delinquency, Vol. 54, No. 1, 128-152 (2008)
DOI: 10.1177/0011128707309718
Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Complore Complore   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us   Add to Digg Digg   Add to Reddit Reddit   Add to Technorati Technorati   Add to Twitter Twitter    What's this?