Amid rising public concern of knife-enabled crime, this article seeks to review and reframe the contemporary debates on knife crime which remain tied to concepts of fear, protection and fashion. Concepts of social field theory and street capital theory have much to offer in reframing a more contemporary narrative. Through such analysis, knife crime can be redefined as a logical response to the unpredictable asymmetrics of the social field, offering mechanisms for agency and control while providing both a pressure release and opportunity to demonstrate authenticity in ‘The Game’.

Street gangs, by definition, enjoy a special relationship with the street. Prior research shows that some communities are synonymous with gangs and that turf holds a combination of expressive and instrumental value for gang members. As gangs evolve over time and through different levels of organization, however, gangs' relationship with the street changes. This shifting street dynamic is underexplored in prior research, thus, drawing on qualitative data from Scotland and Bourdieu's theory of social field, the current study presents three cases of gangs at different stages of evolution and examines how levels of gang organization affect spatial relationships. As gangs accumulate sufficient street capital to evolve, we find territory is defined less physically and more relationally, with implications for gang research and practice.

The findings have the capacity to further inform police and practitioners about the diverse and evolving nature of drug distribution in Scotland (with a particular focus on the west of the country), so that they may become more effective in improving the safety and wellbeing of people, places and communities.

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To date, there has been a paucity of comparative, qualitative research exploring the nuances of women’s gang involvement beyond the United States. In this article, we seek to address this gap by drawing upon qualitative interviews with small samples of self-nominated female gang members in Los Angeles, California (United States) and Glasgow, Scotland (United Kingdom). The emerging insights indicated that two key models of entry into the “social field” of the gang emerged in the data: a deficit model entry linked to drugs and debt and a credit model of entry where women were considered to bring social skill, expertise, and agency into the gang. Implications in terms of testable hypotheses for future research as well as for future practice are outlined.