Doctoral Dissertation: "Transnationalizing Gangs: Expertise, Advocacy, and the Politics of Policymaking"

2007年，美国政府将帮派列为跨国问题和对美国的威胁，美国打击墨西哥和中美洲犯罪团伙的战略。几十年的社会科学研究证明，“帮派”是一种地方特有的、以社区为基础的现象（Thrasher，1927; Whyte，1943;刘易斯，1961; Vigil，1988）。美国政府雇员、非政府组织的倡导者和学术界帮派专家通过协作决策进程为该战略做出了贡献，该进程借鉴了不同机构的知识。通过将帮派命名为美国外交政策中的跨国问题，这一系列行动者正在重新定义帮派问题，进而在美国形成拟议的解决方案，墨西哥，中美洲和更远的地方。 在12个月的时间里，研究人员将研究《战略》出现的微观政治，以分析排除其他制定问题及其解决办法的方式而将帮派作为跨国威胁的逻辑。她将与三类人（政府官员，倡导者和帮派专家）合作，并将使用三种方法（半结构化访谈，参与者观察和文件分析）。人类学家传统上在社区工作，研究帮派暴力如何以及为什么会出现和延续（守夜2003）。我们对帮派不了解的是社会过程，通过这个过程，他们被命名为政策问题。 政策框架特别重要，因为它们形成的解决方案对帮派成员和受帮派暴力影响的社区具有强大的物质影响。 这项研究将有助于理解框架帮派作为一个本地问题与本地解决方案框架帮派作为一个跨国问题，需要跨国解决方案的转变。美国政府最近与墨西哥和中美洲谈判了5亿美元的安全和援助计划，其中跨国帮派被列为主要目标。 帮派在政策上的跨国化影响了有加入帮派风险的青年、帮派成员本身、受影响的社区以及美国更大的公民社区，中美洲和墨西哥。

In 2007, the U.S. government named gangs as a transnational problem and a threat to the U.S., in "The U.S. Strategy to Combat Criminal Gangs from Mexico and Central America." Decades of research in the social sciences evidence "gangs" as locally-specific, neighborhood-based phenomena (Thrasher 1927, Whyte 1943, Lewis 1961, Vigil 1988). US government employees, advocates with non-governmental organizations, and academic gang experts contributed to the Strategy through a collaborative policymaking process, which drew upon knowledge from diverse institutions. By naming gangs a transnational problem in U.S. foreign policy, this set of actors is redefining the gang problem and in turn is shaping proposed solutions in the U.S., Mexico, Central America and beyond. For twelve months, the researcher will examine the micropolitics of the emergence of the Strategy in order to analyze the logic which produces gangs as a transnational threat at the exclusion of other ways of framing the problem and its solution. She will work with people in three categories (government officials, advocates, and gang experts) and will use three methods (semi-structured interviews, participant observation, and document analysis.)Anthropologists traditionally work in neighborhoods to examine how and why gang violence emerges and is perpetuated (Vigil 2003). What we do not understand about gangs is the social process through which they have been named and framed as a problem in policy. Policy framings are particularly important because they shape solutions that have powerful material consequences for gang members and communities affected by gang violence. This research will contribute to understanding the shift in framing gangs as a local problem with local solutions to framing gangs as a transnational problem in need of transnational solutions. The US government recently negotiated $500 million in security and aid packages with Mexico and Central America in which transnational gangs were named as a key target. The transnationalization of gangs in policy impacts youth at risk of joining gangs, gang members themselves, affected communities, as well as the larger community of citizens in the U.S., Central America, and Mexico.