Identity, Situational Elements, and Responses to Drug Debt

• Date: 01 February 2020
• DOI: 10.1177/0022427819866495
• Published date: 01 February 2020
• Subject Matter: Articles

Article

Identity, Situational

Elements, and

Responses to

Drug Debt

Timothy Dickinson

1

Abstract

Objectives: This study examines illicit drug sellers’ explanations of how their

identities and attendant responses to drug debts are influenced by the

situational elements of accounts, relationships with customers, and their

business concerns. Methods: The study draws from data gathered from in-

depth interviews with 33 active drug dealers operating in St. Louis, Missouri.

Informants were recruited using a snowball sampling de sign. Data were

analyzed using qualitative methods. Results: Drug sellers explain their self-

views as “drug sellers” and ideal responses to debts as associated with the

amounts and types of drugs they sell and their relationships with suppliers

and customers as a whole. They suggest that deviations from these iden-

tities and responses are due to accounts (in the case of sellers that use

violence), relationships with specific customers, and business concerns.

Conclusions: The results add complexity to understanding of the connection

between drug market structure, sellers’ identities, and their conflict man-

agement. Results also suggest the connection between culture and drug

market violence is more nuanced than previously suggested. This study also

1

Department of Criminal Justice, University of Texas at El Paso, El Paso, TX, USA

Corresponding Author:

Timothy Dickinson, Department of Criminal Justice, University of Texas at El Paso, 500 W.

University Ave., 2300 Randolph Dr., Education Bldg., Ste. 111, El Paso, TX 79968, USA.

Email: tedickinson@utep.edu

Journal of Research in Crime and

Delinquency

2020, Vol. 57(1) 66-104

ªThe Author(s) 2019

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DOI: 10.1177/0022427819866495

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adds to criminological understanding of how accounts can deescalate con-

flict by altering identities of offending parties and grievants.

Keywords

drug market conflict, drug debts, friendship, accounts, drug dealing

Criminologists have long noted that many illicit drug sellers use violence

when settling disputes (e.g., Fagan and Chin 1990; Goldstein 1985; Gold-

stein, Brownstein, and Ryan 1992). It is argued that one reason underlying

this violence is that victimized or aggrieved drug sellers perceive a lack of

access to formal mediation mechanisms and are therefore compelled to take

matters into their own hands when resolving conflict (Jacobs 1999; Jacobs,

Topalli, and Wright 2000; Jacques and Wright 2011; Reuter 2009; Wright

and Decker 1997). Extant research has also posited that drug sellers use

violent “self-help” (Black 1983) for two other reasons. First, they use it as a

means to project social identities as “hard” persons who cannot be victi-

mized or “exploited with impunity” (Jacobs 2004:296). They also do so in

order to facilitate their own self-identification as these types of persons

(Pearson and Hobbs 2001; Reuter 2009; Topall i, Wright, and Fornango

2002; see also, Anderson 1999; Bourgois 1995).

A smaller body of research has argued that some illicit drug sellers are

reluctant to use violence and instead employ other forms of conflict man-

agement for one or more reasons. Some sel lers, particularly those with

middle-class backgrounds, fear drawing the attention of the police to their

illicit trade (e.g., Adler 1993; Jacques and Wright 2008, 2011; Taylor 2007).

Drug sellers may also reject violence to avoid projecting a violent reputa-

tion that may lead to social censure from customers and others who abhor

violence. Finally, sellers may be unaccustomed to violence in general and

see it as inconsistent with their self-identities (e.g., Jacques and Wright

2015; Mohamed and Fritzsvold 2010). Rather than resorting to violence,

these sellers use strategies such as avoidance, fraud, negotiation, tolerance,

and theft when responding to conflict (e.g., Belackova and Vaccaro 2013;

Hoffer 2006; Jacques 2010; Taylor and Potter 2013).

These bodies of literature suggest that drug sellers’ identities may play a

role in how they manage conflict. Some drug sellers wish to project iden-

tities as violent persons, whereas others want to avoid being seen in this

light. Similarly, some drug sellers self-identify as persons for whom vio-

lence is an acceptable recourse to conflict, whereas others do not. Identity,

Dickinson 67

however, is a fluid construct subject to situati onal influences (see, e.g.,

Goffman 1959; Lofland 1969). For instance, Anderson (1999) has argued

that African American residents of disadvantaged, urban communities are

prone to alter their identities, or “code-switch,” when subjected to the situa-

tional influence of moving betweenprivate and public contexts.One possible

situational element that may influence illicit drug sellers’ identities, and thus

how they respond to conflict, is c ustomers’ ver bal accounts—or t he excuses

and justifications they give for their misdeeds. In short, accountscan alter the

course of a confl ict by changing h ow grievants ide ntify themselve s or the

person(s) providing the account(s)(Scott and Lyman 1968). This, in turn, can

then shape the way in which the grievant responds to the conflict (Fritsche

2002; Goffman 1959, 1971; Orbuch 1997).

Prior research on illicit drug sellers and users has highlighted that they

commonly give and receive verbal accounts in various types of conflictual

situations (see, e.g., Adler 1993; Hoffer 2006; Williams 1989). What has

received little criminological attenti on is the relationship between these

accounts, drug sellers’ identities, and their reactions to conflict. Thus, the

initial focus of the present study was to investigate drug sellers’ explana-

tions of whether and how receiving verbal accounts from customers chan-

ged their self-views and, in turn, how they treated these customers. In the

course of exploring this research question through conversations with

active, illicit drug sellers, however, it emerged that they also explained their

identity shifts and attendant behavioral changes as tied to two other situa-

tional elements as well: their relationships with specific customers and their

own business concerns.

Owing to this, the aim of this study is to examine drug sellers’ own

descriptions of how their identities, and thus their actions, change given

the presence of three situational elements: customers’ verbal accounts, sell-

ers’ relationships with customers, and sellers’ business concerns. In doing

so, it contextualizes the connection between the structure of illicit drug

markets, the fluidity of drug sellers’ identities, and the ways in which drug

sellers respond to conflict. The examination first has implications for crim-

inological understanding of what forces may shape drug sellers’ identities.

Tied to this, the study also offers insight into how the dynamic nature of

offenders’ identities may influence their decisions when in conflict. More

broadly, it also contributes to understanding of the etiology of violence in

illicit drug markets by further specifying some of the concepts that may

either encourage or discourage various types of conflict management

among illicit drug sellers. Finally, it also adds to knowledge of the functions

of verbal accounts among offenders.

68 Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency 57(1)