Beggars and Thieves: Lives of Urban Street Criminals [Paperback]

Mark S. Fleisher (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 15, 1995 | ISBN-10: 0299147746 | ISBN-13: 978-0299147747

As the incidence of violent crime rises in the United States, so does the public demand for a solution. But what will work?
    Mark S. Fleisher has spent years among inmates in jails and prisons and on the streets with thieves, gang members, addicts, and life-long criminals in Seattle and other cities across the country. In Beggars and Thieves, he writes about how and why they become and remain offenders, and about the actual role of jails and prisons in efforts to deter crime and rehabilitate criminals. Fleisher shows, with wrenching firsthand accounts, that parents who are addicts, abusers, and criminals beget irreversibly damaged children who become addicts, abusers, and criminals. Further, Fleisher contends that many well-intentioned educational and vocational training programs are wasted because they are offered too late to help. And, he provides sobering evidence that many youthful and adult offenders find themselves better off in prison—with work to do, medical care, a clean place to sleep, regular meals, and stable social ties—than they are in America’s cities.
    Fleisher calls for anti-crime policies that are bold, practical, and absolutely imperative. He prescribes life terms for violent offenders, but in prisons structured as work communities, where privileges are earned through work in expanded, productive industries that reduce the financial burden of incarceration on the public. But most important, he argues that the only way to prevent street crime, cut prison growth, and reduce the waste of money and human lives is to permanently remove brutalized children from criminal, addicted, and violent parents.

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

Fleisher's years of fieldwork spent interviewing inmates and addicts in Seattle and other cities, as well as his experience as a prison administrator, culminate here in an attempt to offer explanations and possible solutions to the ever-increasing crime in America. Fleisher's interviews and firsthand exposure reveal street criminals raised in dysfunctional families, perpetuating cycles of neglect, abuse, and criminal behavior. Although this is no startling discovery, Fleisher's argument that education is a too-late solution is daring and probably true. He demonstrates how prisons often act as havens for potential criminals who get medical care, regular meals, and shelter--more than they would have out on the streets. One of Fleisher's primary solutions envisions prisons as work communities (such as the Prison Blues denim company), where privileges are earned and the prison makes money toward supporting the inmates, relieving some public expense. The gritty accounts in this book are engaging enough, but with the addition of Fleisher's well-thought-out, realistic proposals for change, it becomes more than another urban crime lament. Janet St. John --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

“The most important study of street criminals published in twenty years. After reading this book, I find that neither liberal nor conservative proposals for meeting the growing inner city youth crime problem are persuasive. Likewise, neither conventional family-preservation policies nor more social programs can be taken as serious responses to the crisis. For policy makers, scholars, activists, and average citizens who want to defuse urban America’s ticking crime bomb, this book is truly must reading.”—John J. Dilulio, Jr., author of No Escape: The Future of American Corrections

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Product Details

• Paperback: 352 pages
• Publisher: University of Wisconsin Press (August 15, 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0299147746
• ISBN-13: 978-0299147747
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 2.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #499,233 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Excellent Resource, July 22, 2009

By 

J. Steinmann (Arlington, MA United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Beggars and Thieves: Lives of Urban Street Criminals (Paperback)

Yet another book in the line of "stuff Rory Miller recommends". The last one was psychology. This one is anthropology.

Beggars and Thieves is the culmination of a multi-year anthropological study done by Mark Fleisher. Fleisher, a former prison administrator, spent an enormous amount of time with street criminals, both inside and outside of prison, working to construct a picture of how these criminals are created, and perhaps, to start looking at how they might be treated (or how their criminal tendencies might have been prevented).

After an introduction and overview, the book follows a fairly straightforward pattern, beginning with the childhood of the street criminal, and tracing that life forward until it culminates in old age (provided the criminal gets there). In each chapter, Fleisher includes numerous quotes, stories, and other bits of evidence from his study to help bolster his argument, but also to help create a better picture of the mindset of the people that he's working with. The final chapter of the book brings Fleisher's studies into focus, with a detailed explanation of how Fleisher believes public policy needs to be altered to better address urban crime in America.

While the book is clearly aimed at policy makers, it has a great deal of value for anyone interested in enhancing their personal safety. Fleisher's evidence reinforces the idea that most criminals simply do not think the way the average law abiding citizen does. they are not operating on the same set of values, or even variations on the same set of values, that the non-criminal does. Understanding this mindset, and how it works, is something that everyone working to better the safety of those around them should look into. Definitely worth the read.

1.0 out of 5 stars anecdotes, jargon, and just plain sludge., February 18, 2012

By 

tlk - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Beggars and Thieves: Lives of Urban Street Criminals (Paperback)

Based on Rory Miller's recommendation I bought this book along with several others. It is verbose, rambling, anecdotal sludge. Miller's books are excellent. Im puzzled that someone as insightful and concise as he would suggest such sludge-fests as Beggars and Thieves and The Gift of Fear. Fleisher (and De Becker) both suffer from the lack of a good editor.