Cryptomarkets, systemic violence and the ‘gentrification hypothesis’

Safer scoring? Cryptomarkets, social supply and drug market violence.

BACKGROUND Cryptomarkets are digital platforms that use anonymising software (e.g. Tor) and cryptocurrencies (e.g. Bitcoin) to facilitate trade of goods and services, most notably illicit drugs. Cryptomarkets may reduce systemic violence compared with in-person drug trading because no face-to-face contact is required and disputes can be resolved through a neutral third party. In this paper, we ...

Systemic violence in drug markets

Even without the protection of the state and courts, illegal drug markets are generally peaceable. However occasionally specific markets exhibit high levels of violence. This essay examines the sources that might generate such violence, some internal to organizations (successional and disciplinary), some between organizations (territorial or transactional) and others between drug dealers and th...

The Impact of Construction and Gentrification on an Outdoor Trans Sex Work Environment: Violence, Displacement and Policing.

The objective of this study was to investigate how environmental and structural changes to a trans outdoor work environment impacted sex workers in Vancouver, Canada. The issue of changes to the work area arose during qualitative interviews with 33 trans sex workers. In response, ethnographic walks that incorporated photography were undertaken with trans sex workers. Changes to the work environ...

Two Cheers for Gentrification

Gentrification and community fabric in Chicago.

Critical authors of gentrification point to its deleterious impacts on displaced residents. Research on the nature or actual forms of impacts has not advanced much, however. This paper attempts to specify impacts on low-income racial/ethnic groups (Latinos in particular) in five Chicago neighbourhoods, with a particular focus on neighbourhood-based fabrics of support and advancement. Limited in...