In-Text Documentation

In 1984, the Modern Language Association (MLA) presented guidelines for in-text documentation. This system allows the researcher to cite a source within the body of the paper without using footnotes and endnotes. For books and periodicals place pertinent information, including the author's last name and the page number within parenthesis immediately following the material presented.

Book:

During the Cultural Revolution the lives of at least 20 million people were dramatically disrupted. Some people were fired from their jobs while others were arrested or sent to labor farms (Gibney 296).

Periodical: two authors

Prof. Dobashi, the newly elected president of Hokusei Gakuen University in Japan, reports that faculty frequently lecture from 20 to 30 year old notes. Few students attend classes, and class discussion is rare (Smith and Hause 55).

Source with the author's name mentioned within the sentence:

Gibney believes that the destructive forces of Mao's regime were similar to those of Stalin in the Soviet Union (297).

Discussion and Conclusion

The contractor arrangement bears great significance in the context of the inter-gang relationships. This system not only governs gangs that share the same organizational title, but also gangs that are active within the same area. In other words, if a particular assignment became available, all gangs that had connections to the agent were entitled to place bids for the same contract, regardless of their organizational titles. A WC side and a 4C side could be bidding on the same assignment simultaneously as long as the Dai Lo’s are acknowledged by the agent. Yet, this system should not be mistaken as a coordinated division of labor or an organizational structure. Instead, similar to Hawala (Passas 1999), the contractor arrangement is highly informal and is purely based on personal and individual relationships with very little organizational rules behind. Consistent with the evolution of the Triad structure described by Chu (2000), the agents and the Dai Lo’s are related only by informal interpersonal ties and shared economic interests instead of an organizational structure or formal relations. The personal ties reach beyond the boundaries of gangs and organizations. As one informant told us, “It does not matter whether the gang is a WC side or a Bamboo Tong, it is all about money”.

More significantly, as mentioned by Chu (2000), the organizational structure of the Hong Kong Triads have gradually evolved into a much more structurally simplified form, and organizational identity has fallen secondary to economic interests. Individuals from different organizations are observed to cooperate in various illicit and legitimate economic ventures, instead adhering to the highly segregated organizational identities. Our findings are consistent with Chu’s observations. Under the contractor arrangement, organization identity and structure are outweighed by economic interests. Flexibility is greatly enhanced when a rigid organizational structure and identity is literally nullified to the lowest level of a local gang. Each local gang operates independently to pursue its economic interests. The gang is therefore free to operate beyond the organizational affiliation instead of being constrained by a highly petrified and complex organizational structure. In other words, the organizational affiliation is in reality rendered meaningless. As the matter of fact, several of our respondents referred their gangs literally and symbolically as “the company”. Therefore, the nature of the gang is changed from a strictly criminal entity to a largely economic entity using criminal methods in achieving economic goals. Financial reward became the primary interest of the gangs and their members, instead of the traditional ideals of fealty, friendship, righteousness, valor, masculinity and so forth. As Granovetter (1973) argues, weak ties among individuals effectively increase the reach of the network, thus maximizing potential contacts for reward seeking actions. A strong and rigid organizational structure among Asian criminal organizations, as often viewed by the authorities, is in reality impractical and constricting to gangs as business entities. In the case of the contractor arrangement, the cumbersome and constraining organizational structure is virtually abandoned in favor of a symbolic affiliation. Gangs and the agents are thus free to maximize their economic interests across organizational boundaries, and the network for potential financial backers and agents is greatly expanded. Business opportunities can be sourced beyond the organization, and thus considerably increasing potentials for financial gain of individuals within and beyond the gangs. As repeatedly mentioned by our informants, Taiwanese gangs are all about money. Economic interests supersede any other concerns. Therefore it is rather unsurprising that an efficient and effective contractor arrangement is developed to optimize financial reward in the illicit economy.

An additional consideration is the notion of embeddedness of economic activity in gangs, organized crime and criminal organization. Historically, Triads and Taiwanese gangs emerged out of revolutionary organizations and evolved into criminal organizations, economic activities was only embedded as a secondary form of action to organizational identity and culture (Chin 1990; 2003; Chu 2000). While the pursuit of material wealth was still a significant individual and collective goal, symbolic and abstract organizational values were even more important to the entire organization and the members. Power and dominance in their territories, in addition to being a vital resource to secure the clientele and market, bear an extremely significant symbolic meaning. However, along with the work of Zhang and Chin (2003), and Chu (2000), this paper has shown the symbolic aspects and organizational features of the Taiwanese gangs in Southern California were rendered nonexistent by strict economic action. Therefore, economic functions that used to be embedded in gangs and criminal organizations gradually evolved to replace the primary action of criminal organizations. The question then must be asked: are the same processes observable in other gangs and criminal organizations?

Furthermore, the nature of gang involvement among Taiwanese immigrant youths in Southern California also favors the contractor arrangement. A highly organized structure is extremely difficult to maintain in these gangs given active gang involvement is found to be ephemeral in nature. According to our respondents, typically lower level gang members maintain brief periods of active gang involvement. The average time of active gang membership is less than two years (Pih and Mao, 2005). A vast majority of gang members were only involved during high school. They soon cease their active involvement once they enter universities and pursue legitimate careers and financial interests. Even the Dai Lo’s we interviewed insisted they only ran their gangs until their mid-twenties. Because of this highly fluid and ad interim basis of enlistment among Dai Lo’s and lower rank members, a stable organizational structure among these gangs are impractical. As illustrated earlier, illegitimate business referrals are strictly personal in nature. The business network therefore is only maintained by individual relationships instead of any bureaucratic structure. Since personnel changes are frequent, sustaining the business network becomes difficult if not impossible with a rigid bureaucratic structure. Instead, the contractor arrangement allows for a contract-by-contract basis of operation, which tremendously optimizes the possibilities for both the illegitimate entrepreneurs and the gangs to generate financial gains.

Lastly, the contractor arrangement functions to minimize potential violence caused by economic competition. Economic competitions among gangs very often cause violent clashes and gang wars. (Chin 1990; 1996; Fagan 1989; 1996; Levitt and Venkatesh 2000) Gang wars are extremely costly, and it is in the interest of the gangs to avoid confrontations and violent clashes unless absolutely necessary. The contractor arrangement prevents the potential violence in the competition. To increase financial gain, the gangs must undercut other competition economically, instead of the expansive option of using force. The significance of turfs is also diminished because the business of the gang does not require a permanent base of operation. Owning a turf would only place limitations on the business potentials and increases the necessity of using force in protecting the turf. In order to be competitive, the gangs must lower their demand on the share of profit. In other words, the mode of operation is very similar to a contractor in legitimate economies. Time and again we hear from our informants ‘it is all about business’.

Similar to the Triads in Hong Kong and Chinese gangs in Canada (Zhang and Chin 2002; Chu 2000; 2002; Lee 2003), name sake affiliations and the organizational identity retain little symbolic meaning to the members and also the actual operations of these gangs. As the contractor arrangement and the social organization of the gangs illustrate, Taiwanese gangs in Southern California operate foremost as functionally independent economic units in the illicit and legitimate economy rather than criminal organizations. These gangs are not offshoots of transnational Taiwanese criminal organizations, nor are they highly coordinated criminal conspiracies. As such, future research should direct focus and effort on the social and cultural environment that engender gangs and gang members, the nature and extent of criminal acts and economic activities, and direct comparison of different ethnic gangs and their members. As demonstrated by this study, viewing gangs as strictly criminal or deviant enterprises could be constraining in gaining a full comprehension on gangs, gang activities, gang members, and the illicit market. An economic and network approach towards gangs and gang activity could potentially yield further meaningful knowledge.

In the next phase of this project we intent to collect specific data for a formal network analysis. In particular, we are interested to test Granovetter’s notion of the Strength of Weak Ties (1973) against the network connections between different gang Dai Dai Lo’s, Dai Lo’s, agents, financial backers, and local business owners. We will examine the impact of the contractor arrangement in the shape and extent of the network. We also plan to expand our sample beyond Southern California through our connections. We would like to investigate the interpersonal connections and networks between individuals operating in different parts of the United States and foreign countries. Results will provide further understanding of Taiwanese gangs in Southern California and organized crime in general.

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