Social problems are often caused by allocation of resources. These problems are often exacerbated in dense, constructed environments. In many cases, social spaces are constructed to isolate social problems. William Julius Wilson, an African American sociologist, is most noted for his theories on the black urban "underclass," where life chances for blacks are now more a function of their "economic class status" than of "race relations" (Wilson 1). In the Easy Rawlins era after the Watts Riots in Los Angeles, race relations were the primary reason for oppression and the anger in blacks such as Rawlins: "the angry voice in my heart that urged me to go out and fight after all the hangings I had seen, after all of the times I had been called nigger and all of the doors that had been slammed in my face" (Mosley 18). In ghetto communities in urban areas, like South Central Los Angeles, social isolation occurs that segregates blacks and condenses poverty and stems more from dire poverty than racism. This separation from other communities and lack of economic opportunities often leads to crime, drug abuse, and other social ills in such communities, like the rise of violent drug trafficking gangs.
Such a community is clearly depicted by "Monster" Kody Scott, now known as Sanyika Shakur. A former gangster turned black revolutionary, in Monster: The Autobiography of an L.A. Gang Member Shakur tells the urban story of gang existence in South Central Los Angeles. Shakur maintains that because of the "expansion of the mores, customs and philosophies" of different gang entities ("sets"), gang banging will never be stopped from without" (79). Instead, gang banging will only end in Shakur's view, when gang members believe their wars can end because their sets are no longer necessary. In Shakur's story of gang life in South Central Los Angeles, we see how social isolation and the lowest socio-economic status of community mem...