Outlaw Motorcycle Clubs

Outlaw motorcycle clubs (OMCs), also referred to as outlaw motorcycle gangs (OMCGs), such as the iconic Hells Angels MC, emerged as a subculture after World War II in the United States, being attractive to a number of veterans. The clubs were originally outlaws from the motorcycle club community rather than the law. The “1%” patch that distinguishes these clubs as outlaw motorcycle clubs dates back to the infamous Hollister riot in 1947 during the Annual Gypsy Tour motorcycle rally organized by the American Motorcycle Association (AMA), following which AMA is said to have stated that 99 percent of motorcyclists were law-abiding and that the riot was caused by the 1 percent of deviant law-breakers. The AMA has denied this statement, but the 1% patch has since been worn as a badge of honor, and outlaw motorcycle clubs came to be known as “One Percenters.” The subculture grew over the following decades, as clubs established chapters in new localities in the United States and in the 1960s began their transnational expansion, which accelerated in the 1980s and 1990s. Simultaneously, they became a powerful figment of popular culture and have ever since straddled the fine line between fact and fiction, reinforcing their “power mystique.” The most influential outlaw motorcycle clubs, such as Hells Angels MC, Outlaws MC, and Bandidos MC, have morphed into strong transnational organizations, counting thousands of members worldwide. These clubs have, through skillful self-commodification and branding, inspired the global growth of the 1% subculture and a worldwide proliferation of outlaw motorcycle clubs with the same organizational structures, laws and by-laws, core values, and marks of distinction: the three-piece patches consisting of a club logo, top rocker with the name of the club, and bottom rocker with location, along with the 1% patch. OMCs have been connected to a broad specter of illegal and criminal activities and are considered organized crime groups by law enforcement agencies worldwide. Considerable resources are channeled into the fight against these groups. Despite the size of the phenomenon, criminological research on outlaw motorcycle clubs has been limited and is still dominated by studies from United States, New Zealand, and Australia, albeit growing recently in Europe. This bibliography includes references to key works from criminology and related disciplines, such as anthropology of crime, as well as literature concerned with the policing of OMCs. While there are numerous accounts of OMC life written by (ex-)members and undercover agents that can be of interest to researchers, this bibliography summarizes only high-quality research.

Making Sense of Stigmatized Organizations: Labelling Contests and Power Dynamics in Social Evaluation Processes

How do social audiences negotiate and handle stigmatized organizations? What role do their heterogenous values, norms and power play in this process? Addressing these questions is important from a business ethics perspective to improve our understanding of the ethical standards against which organizations are judged as well as the involved prosecutorial incentives. Moreover, it illuminates ethical concerns about when and how (the exploitation of) power imbalances may induce inequity in the burdens imposed by such social evaluations. We address these questions building on two event-based case studies involving Hells Angels Motorcycle Club Norway, and contribute to organizational stigma theory in three ways. First, social evaluations of a stigmatized organization by multiple audiences are found to interact, collide and combine in a labelling contest. Second, we show that labels employed in this contest are pushed to either negative extremes (‘moral panic’) or positive extremes (‘moral patronage’). Finally, we show when and how power represents a double-edged sword in social evaluation processes, which can be wielded either to the benefit or to the detriment of the actors under evaluation.

Under my Thumb?

Der Inhalt dieses Songs aus dem Jahre 1966 beschreibt die wechselseitigen Abhängigkeiten und kleinen Grausamkeiten eines jungen Paares. Im gleichen Jahr wurde während einer Live Performance dieses Stücks durch die Rolling Stones im kalifornischen Altamont das gewaltsame Ende der vorher eher beschaulichen Hippie-Ära eingeleitet. Durch den Mord eines Zuschauers durch das „Security-Personal“ der Hells Angels erlangte dieser Song traurige Berühmtheit. Begleitet sein Thema heute als Soundtrack unser neues aktuelles Leben?

EXTORTION RACKET SYSTEMS AS TARGETS FOR AGENT-BASED SIMULATION MODELS. COMPARING COMPETING SIMULATION MODELS AND EMPRICAL DATA

Extortion racketeering is an industry not only practiced by mafia, but also in groups such as hells angels. It occurs in a complex setting of criminals, victims, police and society, and its framework is set up by legal norms as well as informal norms of the actor groups involved. The paper presents two agent-based simulation models which differ with respect to the decision making mode, which is either stochastical with fixed probabilities or deliberative where decisions depend on utility considerations and norms learned during the process. The central research questions of the paper — beside the question how extortion racket system can be appropriately modeled — concern the divergence of the results of the two model versions, the comparison of the input parameter combinations, the motivations of input parameters and the validation of the results by comparing them to available empirical data.