The Social Order of the Slum: Ethnicity and Territory in the Inner City.

TLDR

The study is set in Chicago’s high‑delinquency New West Side, where Suttles lived for three years and interacted with Italian, Mexican, Puerto‑Rican, and African‑American residents. Suttles argues that slum residents develop local behavioral norms that supersede mainstream moral standards, and the book seeks to explain how these norms arise. The book offers a theoretical framework and concepts that document the social order of the slum and guide future research.

Abstract

While he did the research for this book, Gerald Suttles lived for almost three years in the high-delinquency area around Hull House on Chicago's New West Side. He came to know it intimately and was welcomed by its residents, who are Italian, Mexican, Puerto Rican, and Negro. Suttles contends that the residents of a slum neighborhood have a set of for behavior that take precedence over the more widely held moral standards of straight society. These arise out of the specific experience of each locality, are peculiar to it, and largely determine how the neighborhood people act. One of the tasks of urban sociology, according to Suttles, is to explore why and how slum communities provide their inhabitants with these local norms. The Social Order of the Slum is the record of such an exploration, and it defines theoretical principles and concepts that will aid in subsequent research.