Blog #7: Drug Gangs are 'Taking Control of Parts of British Cities' Warns UN Professor Hamid Ghodse

Migration is at an all time high in the UK with a recent report stating that it found an increase in social inequality, emerging cultures of excess, migration, as well as a shift in traditional values which are all being considered the “key threats to social cohesion” and the rise in drug and gang issues. The UK’s recent uproar in drug problems and fractured communities have been seen as the result of migration, creating a “vicious cycle of social exclusion”. The problems have begun to be so much more severe that UK authorities are trying to figure a way the crackdown on the rise of multicultural gangs and drug problems by using other countries like the US, Brazil, and Mexico as examples, countries who have seen gangs and drugs as a result of high migration. UK reports state that migration in the UK is widening the gap between the rich and the poor, immigrants are becoming faced with a future with limited opportunities and are increasingly disengaged from the “wider” society, causing them to be engaged in socially harmful behaviors like drug dealing and abuse. Because migration creates a sense of “dislocation” in the community as well as vulnerability, it leads to a rise in the people involved with illicit drugs by means of coping with their dislocation, according to a report from INCB.
In many articles about migration that I have written about thus far have involved violence, crime rate increase, and some kind of broken social cohesion in the affected area. Migration has a lot of great attributes that come along with it, however, when there is a mix of cultures and ethnicity there always tends to be some kind of ethnocentric issue that creates barriers between people with different cultures and backgrounds, causing major conflict with the issue of migration. It has been a known fact that with a rise in population comes a rise in crime. Yet, it seems as if in this case the UK is being a little too quick to strictly blame immigration for the rise in gangs and drugs. It is important to analyze and know where immigrants are coming from in order to determine if they are coming from a place that has a highly known drug smuggling problem to ensure they are properly processed into the country safely. However, it is not always necessary to blame an influx in population on migration as population increases also come from reproduction, and the idea of trying to stop the issue by attacking and focusing on migrants may not completely stop the problem. Although some immigrants may be involved in the higher crime rates, drug abuse, and gangs, it is important to understand that “locals” are very much involved as well and like in plenty of other places, migration causes hostility amongst the “locals” and can also result in anti-immigrant gangs, or xenophobic gangs like the ones that formed in Russia. Migration may have a little bit to do with the issues the UK is experiencing, however the UK authorities could to be trying to go about solving the issues all the wrong ways. 


http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2012/02/28/drugs-gangs-violence-liverpool-birmingham-un-chief_n_1305954.html