Ecuador legalized gangs. Murder rates plummeted.

From Wikidelphia
Jump to navigation Jump to search

 https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2019/3/26/18281325/ecuador-legalize-gangs

This approach appealed to David Brotherton, a sociologist at the City University of New York who’s been arguing since the 1990s that US policy wrongly pathologizes gang members.

  • So in 2017, a decade after Ecuador legalized gangs, he headed over there to conduct ethnographic research on major groups like the Latin Kings and Queens.
  • It turned out they’d undergone a stunning transformation.
  • The members were still very active in their gangs, but these were functioning more like social movements or cultural groups.
  • Previously violent Latin Kings were working in everything from catering to crime analysis.
  • And they were collaborating with other gangs they’d warred with in the past.

See Also