On Gang Prevention, an 'Effortless Shift in Perspective'

Published: Thursday, December 11, 2008 6:02 PM PST

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Gang prevention programs don't work. It might be surprising to hear this, especially coming from one of the original commissioners on San Diego's Commission on Gang Prevention and Intervention, but here's why:

At best, prevention programs strive for normalcy, nothing greater. If successful, they may stop something from happening, but they do not create new behaviors in place of the old behaviors.

Typically, prevention programs cast too wide a net. Gang expert Malcolm Klein suggests that such programs cause the issue in question to become perceived as more prevalent than it may actually be, thus normalizing the negative behavior for a larger audience that may not have been otherwise exposed to or affected by the problem.

At worst, prevention programs provide free advertisement for negative behaviors.

If gang prevention programs, in essence, promote negative behaviors, why do law-abiding communities seek to create so many programs that promote gangs?

An effortless shift in perspective can transform the counterproductive nature of prevention programs by asking one simple question: What should promotion programs actually promote? The list is virtually endless: go to college, support a social cause, volunteer, participate in organized sports, or join clubs at school and in the neighborhood.

In contrast to prevention programs, positive promotion programs are successful because:

Positive promotion programs strive for individuals to accomplish something that normally would not occur.

Positive promotion programs offer options where individuals can select activities that best suit their budding interests.

For potential and fringe gang members, positive promotion programs are essential to averting criminal, violent behavior by making productive activities socially acceptable among peer circles otherwise vulnerable to the lure of gang lifestyles. Gangs are a default culture where membership is allowed to flourish only when productive activities are not adequately promoted toward its target audiences.

In sum, any program with gang prevention as its premise is doomed to fail.

However, gang prevention will be the product of all promotion programs that popularize productive behaviors.

Christopher Yanov worked with gang members in the San Diego region from 1996-2001 before starting Reality Changers, a program that targets low-income, inner-city youth and has awarded more scholarships to college bound students than any other single organization in San Diego County for the past three years.

-- CHRISTOPHER YANOV

3 Comments so far on this story...

During the early years of Roosevelt's NRA municpal & Superior Court judges used alternative sentencing methods to relieve what was then refered to as 'juvenile delinquency" during the Great Depression.Prison for violent offenders and professional criminals and the CCC or Civilian Conservation Corps for the others. In later years the Military's best recruiters were local judges, as well, who offered a hitch in the Service or a stint in the County lock-up to those whose youthful activities ran afoul of society's guidelines.In both instances the vocational training they received while in harness complimented the discipline and maturation that eventualy made them contributing members of society, or at least, got them off the streets, out of the neighborhoods and doing something constructive. Could Barack Obama's modernized WPA offer our youth similar 'opportunities'?Nati service in rebuilding the Republic's infrastructure as an alternative to jail? Perhaps what's old could be new again.

Posted by Jack Griffiths | reply to this comment
December 12, 2008 5:30 am

As a fellow commissioner on the Gang Commission, I do want to voice support for the concept of promotion programs. I have been confused in the past by your stance against prevention programs but I do have a better idea of what you mean now however maybe its just me but I always thought that prevention programs WERE promotion programs for healthy behavior. I am still young, just turning 26 last month and remember my friends in high school that got involved in gangs or violent activities as a result of not having other healthy activities to do. That is why I always have believed that the best ways to keep kids out of gangs is to have sports or career enhancement activities. We are already having promotion programs in Linda Vista and I am glad to know that we are on the right track!

Posted by Pepe Cervantes | reply to this comment
December 12, 2008 6:27 am

I often wonder if the people who order, design, and implement these "anti-_" programs ever actually consult with behavioral experts or psychologists. This is a very interesting topic. In his book The Tipping Point, Malcolm Gladwell discusses the failure of the anti-smoking movement/propaganda over the decades. When The Man tells young people what not to do, it makes them want to do it all the more. Study after study shows this, and yet the media is still chock full of "don't participate in behavior X because its bad" ads. Will we ever get a clue?

Posted by aj | reply to this comment
December 12, 2008 10:07 am

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