Global Gangs: Street Violence across the World

4. Of Marginality and “Little Emperors”: The Changing Reality of Chinese Youth Gangs

85 4 Of Marginality and “Little Emperors”: The Changing Reality of Chinese Youth Gangs Lening Zhang Youth gangs and gang-­ related crime in China were rare and were not considered a social problem during the 1950s and 1960s. The nation had very low crime rates and was even viewed as a “crime-­free” society (Fairbank 1987; Rojek 1996). Official statistics indicate that China had only five to six criminal cases per one hundred thousand inhabitants annually during this time period (Dai 2001). However, since the nation implemented economic reform in the late 1970s, the situation has changed dramatically. The crime rate climbed to 356 per 100,000 inhabitants in 2005 (Zhang, Messner, and Liu 2008). As total crime rose significantly, so did youth offenses. According to official statistics, offenses among youths aged fourteen to twenty-­five years old accounted for about 20 percent of total crime in 1952 but reached 74 percent in 1989 (Bakken 1993; Wong 2001). Chinese studies have also indicated that gang-­ related crime accounts for between 60 and 70 percent of the total youth offenses in recent years (Wang 2005; Wang 2006; Zhen 2001; Zhang and Tu 2005). China’s Department of Justice reported that Chinese police forces cracked down on about thirteen thousand gangs involved in some one hundred thousand gang-­ related criminal cases nationwide during the three-­ year period from 2004 to 2006 (People’s Daily 2009). At a more local level, the police department of Zhejiang Province reported that a 86    lening zhang crackdown on 567 youth gangs involved 2,265 gang member arrests in 1985; this increased to 3,150 youth gangs and 11,845 gang member arrests in 2002 (Zhang and Tu 2005). Chinese studies furthermore suggest that youth gangs in China are becoming more violent, more organized, more sophisticated, and involved in a broader range of criminal activities than in the past (Wang 2005; Zhang 2001; Zhang and Tu 2005). Not surprisingly, perhaps youth gangs and gang-­ related crime have widely come to be perceived as a social problem of public concern in contemporary China. This chapter first examines the formation and characteristics of Chinese youth gangs, in particular, relative to Chinese legal statutes, and explores a range of possible explanations for gang formation and evolution linked to the particular social context of contemporary Chinese society. Using available information, the chapter further discusses possible future trends, more specifically in light of China’s continuing economic reforms, which have grown deeper and broader since the late 1990s. It concludes with a discussion of China’s control strategies regarding youth gangs. Youth Gangs in China Although the colloquial Chinese phrase for “youth gangs”—­ qing shao nian fan zui tuan huo, which literally translates as “youth crime gangs”—­ is generally understood to refer to loosely connected groups of youths aged between fourteen and twenty-­five who engage in collective criminal activities,1 the legal categorization is much more vague. There are three related but distinct conceptions of collective crimes in the Chinese criminal justice system (Guo and Ma 1981; He 2002; He 1993; Wei and Guo 2000). The first is co-­offense, which refers to crimes committed jointly by at least two persons. The second is organized crime, which refers to crimes committed by a group of persons characterized by well-­defined organizational structure and rules, definite organizational objectives, and relatively permanent members. The third is gang crime, which refers to crimes committed by three or more persons and by youths in particular. The gang differs from the criminal organization in several respects. Compared to groups responsible for organized crime, a gang is characterized by less organization, limited cohesion, impermanence, shifting of marginality and “little emperors”    87 membership, and diffuse role definition.2 In the Chinese legal definition of a gang, two criteria must be met: (1) it must be a group consisting of at least three people and (2) it must be involved in illegal activities. This latter requirement of criminal involvement is consistent with the widely accepted conception of gangs in the United States (Esbensen and Huizinga 1993; Spergel 1990). As Spergel explains, “the principal criterion currently used to define a ‘gang’ may be the group’s participation in illegal activities” (179). A number of studies have addressed some common characteristics of Chinese youth gangs (Guo and Ma 1981; He 1993; Wang 2005; Wang 2006; Wen and Zhang 2003; Zhang 2001; Zhang and Tu 2005; Zhou, Liu, and Wang...