Whither Poverty? Social Disorganization Theory in an Era of Urban Transformation

Although Shaw and McKay (1942) viewed poverty as the most seminal community characteristic related to crime rates, the systemic model of social disorganization theory has been concerned less with the effects of poverty than with mobility and heterogeneity. In fact, theoretically, the role of poverty in the systemic model has remained underdeveloped. Yet, recent empirical findings have suggested that poverty is a strong predictor of neighborhood crime rates, and some findings suggest that poverty conditions the effects of heterogeneity and mobility in directions counter to predictions made by contemporary social disorganization theory. These findings provide the basis for developing a new understanding of the effects of poverty within a systemic model. This paper presents a review of the role of poverty within the contemporary social disorganization model and suggestions for further theoretical development.