Dons, yardies and posses: representations of Jamaican organised crime

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Focusing on representations of Jamaican organised crime, this project aims to connect arts and humanities approaches with social science and policy-oriented perspectives on transnational criminal organisations. The accelerated flows of capital, goods and people facilitated by globalisation have allowed criminal organisations to expand and develop into transnational networks. Rooted in political violence and electoral turf wars, Jamaican gangs played a central role in the growth of the international illegal drug trade in the 1980s. Jamaican organised crime remains a pressing concern of the Jamaican government, and also presents a significant security threat to the US and the UK, which are major consumer markets for cocaine and key locations in the transnational movement of Jamaican gangs.A deeper understanding of Jamaican organised crime is necessary in order for the problem to be effectively addressed. Existing academic debate in this area has been contained within the social sciences. There has been no sustained focus on the question of representation, despite the fact that Jamaican gangs have since the 1980s acquired global notoriety through the media, film, music and popular fiction, and also increasingly feature in literary fiction and criminal autobiography. There is therefore a need for enquiry into the complex relationship of cultural and media narratives to social science and policy perspectives on Jamaican organised crime in the Caribbean, Europe and North America.This network will advance research on Jamaican organised crime by exploring the multidirectional relationships between a.) literary, visual, cinematic, popular music and media representations of Jamaican organised crime; b) social science research on Jamaican organised crime; and c.) policies aimed at combating Jamaican organised crime. It will contribute to the AHRC highlight notice's emphasis on innovative areas of cross-council enquiry by bringing together arts, humanities and social science researchers to collaboratively address the following key questions:- How do literary and visual texts, films, popular music and media reports frame the causes, consequences and control of Jamaican organised crime? - How do cultural and media representations of Jamaican criminal gangs engage with, popularise, contest and complicate social science and policy perspectives?- How do social science analyses of Jamaican organised crime and related policies in Jamaica, Europe and North America reflect the influence of these various kinds of representations? As well as crossing disciplinary boundaries, the network will initiate cross-sector conversations between academics, writers, artists, a filmmaker, creative industry professionals, and public and voluntary sector representatives. In doing so it will generate new perspectives on representations of Jamaican organised crime relevant for academics, policy-makers and practitioners. It will also cross national boundaries through its concern with the global circulation of cultural and media narratives, academic theories and policies, and through its focus on connections between key urban sites in Jamaica, the US and the UK, such as downtown Kingston, Brooklyn, Brixton and Handsworth. An international range of participants is a necessary basis for the network's investigation of the transnational dimensions of Jamaican criminal gangs and their representation.Networking activities will consist of three two-day workshops in Leicester, Amsterdam and Kingston focusing on the following themes: 'gangsta culture'; gangs and governance;urban spaces and transnational connections; Each workshop will incorporate a public-facing event relevant to the workshop theme involving writers, a filmmaker and artists. The network's findings will also be communicated via peer reviewed publications, a project webpage hosted by the University of Leicester, an online exhibition, a blog, and social media platforms.