Masculinity in the Margins: Race, Gang Violence, and the Code of the Street

Abstract

This study examines the intersection of race, class, and gang violence in Singapore, with a particular focus on the structural dynamics linking racial minorities, street gangs, and institutionalized Chinese secret societies—the archetype of organized crime in the city-state. By integrating race as both an ideology and a system of social relations into the study of gang formation, this research sheds light on why and how racial minorities become disproportionately involved in gang violence. The study revealed that beyond economic marginalization, racialized hierarchies embedded within gang contexts shape the motivations, participation, and mobility of minority individuals in both street gangs and the broader criminal underworld. Drawing on the concept of racialized masculinity, it is argued that racial minorities mobilize their gender and racial resources to compensate for status disparities resulting from structural exclusion in both legitimate and illegitimate spheres. In a postcolonial, multiracial society, like Singapore, where racial and class marginalization intersect, gang affiliation emerges as a means of negotiating power and social standing. The findings contribute to scholarship on race, crime, and social stratification while informing policies aimed at addressing racial inequalities and reducing gang violence.

1. Introduction

The years 2021 and 2022 constitute a notable deviation from Singapore’s longstanding reputation as a highly orderly and low-crime society, with the occurrence of several high profile knife- and gang-related incidents. These incidents, which generated significant public and media attention, prompted the Minister for Home Affairs and Law to address the issue of youth involvement in violent crimes in Parliament, where he described contemporary secret societies as being “largely made up of loosely organized street gangs, comprising mainly of younger members who flit between different gangs” (Parliament of Singapore 2021b). Statistical evidence provided in Parliament further elucidates the prevalence of youth gang-related offences: between 2016 and 2020, an average of 150 youth offenders annually were reported to have committed crimes with secret society undertones (Parliament of Singapore 2021a). Furthermore, cases of rioting and serious hurt linked to secret societies averaged 112 per year during the same period (Parliament of Singapore 2021a). Despite statistics showing that the number of people aged 21 and below arrested for rioting has steadily dropped by 67.5% from 462 in 2011 to 150 cases in 2020, cases of those arrested for causing grievous hurt surged during this period (Cheng 2022). During this time, too, there had been a 24.2% increase in violent cases from 62 to 77 involving youths aged 21 and below (Cheng 2022).

The year 2022 was notable not only for the rise in knifing incidents and heightened concerns about youth gang violence but also for an unprecedented parliamentary disclosure by the Minister for Home Affairs and Law. For the first time, the Minister acknowledged the disproportionate representation of racial minorities within Singapore’s criminal justice system, marking a significant moment in public discourse on crime and racial disparities. Although he stopped short of detailing the extent of this disparity, this marked a departure from the state’s longstanding practice of withholding race-based criminal justice data—except in the context of drug consumption offenses, where Malays, one of Singapore’s two principal racial minority groups, have been persistently over-represented. This rare moment of transparency added another layer of complexity to the discussions on crime, race, and justice in the city-state’s multiracial and multireligious context. Compounding this situation were at least two high-profile gang violence incidents involving racial minorities, as both perpetrators and victims, which tragically resulted in fatalities in 2023 and 2024 (Devaraj 2024; Alkhatib 2024). A forthcoming study by Ganapathy et al. also revealed that racial minority youths aged between 18 and 21 were disproportionately involved in and convicted of violent offences in the Singapore State Courts. These local data are generally reflective of global patterns. In her study of London homicides between 1999 and 2005, Fitzgerald (2009), for example, found that in the 10–17 age group, Black young men constituted 58% of victims while in Mark Jackson’s research, which examined homicides in London between 2000 and 2010, it was revealed that African Caribbean males accounted for 32% of all homicide victims, with 15-to-19-year olds comprising 56% of that total (Jackson 2010). That study also found that the largest group of homicide perpetrators in the capital was African Caribbean men, lending credence to Pitts’ observation that “gang involvement in England is determined, as much by historical, religious, social and demographic and economic factors as skin colour or ethnicity” (Pitts 2020).

It is against this backdrop that this research seeks to examine the interrelated issues of racial disparity within the criminal justice system, the involvement and motivations of racial minorities in gang violence, the structural relationships between street gangs and the more institutionalized Chinese secret societies—considered the archetype of organized crime in Singapore, and, importantly, the racialized hierarchies embedded within gang contexts in the city-state. Incorporating race as both an ideology and a system of social relations into the study of gang formation can deepen our understanding of why and how racial minorities become disproportionately involved in gang violence. This knowledge is crucial for informing strategies to prevent such violence.

2. Racial Disparity in the Criminal Justice System: Unpacking Structural Inequality and Crime

The global over-representation of racial and ethnic minorities in the crime and penal statistics has been a persistent area of inquiry in criminology. Various theoretical frameworks have been proposed to explain these disparities, particularly in the US context. The sentence should read as such: Among these is Piquero and Brame’s (2008) “differential involvement thesis” which suggests that African Americans engage in higher rates of criminal behavior, particularly offences that necessitate formal criminal justice intervention, and are more likely to continue offending into adulthood compared to their White counterparts. In contrast, their “differential criminal justice system selection hypothesis” highlights systemic biases, such as discriminatory judicial practices, biased law enforcement, and racial profiling that disproportionately result in the arrest, conviction, and incarceration of minorities (see also Hindelang 1978; Chambliss 1994; Tonry 1995; Zimring and Hawkins 1997). Michael Tonry (1995), in his influential book, The Malign Neglect, referred to this strand of argument as pointing to the “systematic racial subordination”. A striking example of this can be seen in the UK, where the Metropolitan Police Service’s use of the Gangs Matrix in 2018 to identify “gang nominals” led to 89% of those on the “suspect list” being from Black or minority ethnic social groups. This prompted Amnesty International UK to release a report in the same year, critically characterizing the Gangs Matrix as “…part of a racialised war on gangs, triggered by the Conservative government after the riots in 2011, that stigmatised Black youngsters and violated human rights”. Echoing the report is Williams and Clarke (2018)’s tendentious observation that the “…the gang has been appropriated by the state as an ideological device that drives the hypercriminalisation of Black, mixed, Asian, and other minority ethnic (BLACK) communities…“With particular reference to collective punishments, we suggest that ‘gang-branding’ is critical to the development of guilt-producing associations that facilitate the arrest, charging, and prosecution of countless numbers of BLACK people for offences they did not commit”. This statement was clearly reminiscent of Paul Gilroy (2008)’s “myth of the Black criminality” thesis of the 1970s that put forth the view that Black crime was a social and political construction borne out of racist stereotypes and that Black young people were no more criminal than any others.

In the absence of publicly available race-based criminal justice data in Singapore, except for drug abuse statistics, it is challenging to document racial bias in the justice system or the lack of thereof. Nonetheless, the theoretical framework generated in this research and based on empirical data lends greater support for the “socio-economic subordination” argument (Tonry 1995), a perspective that argues that the consequences and convergence of macro-historical, structural, and cultural processes related to colonialism, capitalism, urbanization, ethnic integration, and socioeconomic marginalization have all combined to produce a racialized criminal class among the racial minority groups in Singapore, despite the phenomenal success these ethnoracial communities in particular and the country in general have had achieved over the last 60 years since achieving independence in 1965 (Goh 2022). This “neo-colonial” framework (Tatum 2000) has inspired a number of influential works in the local context; most notable amongst them is the recent publication of Ganapathy (2024), who studied the genesis and evolution of a mono-ethnic Malay–Muslim prison gang in Singapore; its very formation in prison is in itself a manifestation of marginality. Drawing inspiration from Puffer (1912), Thrasher (1927), and Whyte (1943), and later researchers, such as Cloward and Ohlin (1960), Yablonsky (1962), Klein (1971), Hagedorn and Macon (1988), and Vigil (1988) from the “interstitial” period (Decker et al. 2013), where the themes of ethnoracial and cultural diversity and conflict, cultural isolation, discrimination, social alienation and exclusion, loss of structure in neighborhoods, and marginalization had dominated the discourse on gangs, Ganapathy posited that “a direct consequence of the structural marginalisation of certain segments of racial minorities in Singapore has been the racial disparity in crime in general and the disproportionate involvement of visible minorities in gangs in particular” (Ganapathy 2024), a view that resonates with and is deeply entrenched in gang studies, particularly in the US and UK.

As Thrasher’s (1927) classic work notes, “[t]he gang becomes a substitute for the family, the school, and other social institutions which have failed to function adequately in the lives of these boys”. (Thrasher 1927, p. 6). Similarly, in William Foote Whyte’s Street Corner Society (1943), he portrays the gang as an informal social system that provides identity, loyalty, and mutual aid, particularly for young men who may not receive sufficient emotional or material support at home. He notes that, “[f]or many of these boys, the gang serves as a family, offering the support and solidarity they do not find at home” (Whyte 1943, p. 258). These theorizations of gangs have worked themselves into the operational definitions of gangs, such as the one offered by Howell (1998, p. 4), that a gang is “(1) a self-formed group united by mutual interests, (2) that controls a particular territory or enterprise, (3) uses symbols in communication, and (4) is collectively involved in crime”. Scholarship examining youth gangs in Singapore has widely adopted the Eurogang definition, which states that “a street gang is any durable, street-oriented youth group whose involvement in illegal activity is part of its group identity” (Klein and Maxson 2006, p. 4).

3. Literature Review

Sociological studies have broadly demonstrated how socialization practices within the family unit are associated with positive and negative developmental outcomes. Research has shown that children who had been exposed to criminal violence and other forms of antisocial behaviour in the familial and community context were more likely to demonstrate such behaviors themselves during later stages of their lives, especially during adolescence when social bonds with (positive) significant others are weakened (Milaniak and Widom 2015). Furthermore, inadequate family management, characterized by a lack of clear and consistent rules, ineffective supervision, or the use of harsh and abusive disciplinary methods, has been shown to heighten the risk of criminal violence (Liu and Miller 2020). Class differentials are key, as they impact not only the quality and content of socialization but also the accumulation and endowment of social and cultural capital (Bourdieu 1986) that affect other aspects of socialization, such as educational achievement, parental supervision and aspirations for their children. Hagan (1994) notes that in disadvantaged communities where efficacious social and cultural capital are absent, parents are less able to provide the necessary support, resources, and opportunities for their children. Terming the systemic disadvantaging of communities as “capital disinvestment processes”, Hagan (1994, p. 81) was of the view that these processes were “destructive of social and cultural capital and often produce deviant subcultural adaptations”.

There is a considerable amount of criminological evidence that suggests that informal mechanisms of social control operating within close-in institutions of the family and school play an important role in preventing youth gang violence (Hirschi and Stark 1969; Gottfredson and Hirschi 1991). Conversely, poverty and inequality undermine the ability of informal social controls to contain delinquent behaviour and criminal violence (Kramer 2000). Examining the relationship between social deprivation, family and community processes, and gang violence from a sociological perspective, Currie (1998) observed the following: “For there is now overwhelming evidence that inequality, extreme poverty, and social exclusion matter profoundly in shaping a society’s experience of violent crime. And they matter, in good part, precisely because of their impact on the close-in institutions of family and community”. Kramer (2000) noted that the absence of social support and informal social control leads to “infliction of social and psychic pain on young people and the development of negative attitudes and emotions that can easily lead to violence”. Referring to the loss of efficacious and meaningful social networks fostered by the church, the Labour Party, and the business community in the UK, Loic Wacquant (2002) describes the “collapse of the ghetto”, a process that characterizes the increasing abandonment of poor neighborhoods by the more affluent residents, local businesses, and industries leading to the erosion of both informal social control and informal social support (Pitts 2020).

In explaining the relationship between marginalized communities and violent crime in the US, De Coster et al. (2006) demonstrated how status characteristics (such as race, poverty, and female headship) limit the residential choices of families to disadvantaged neighborhoods which, in turn, increases the chances of violent behaviour by youths both as a means of achieving material goals but also of attaining status and respect in the neighborhood. Sampson and Wilson (1995) were of the view that the roots of violence lie in broader community structures, and that “racial-ethnic differences in violence are a function of patterns of racial residential inequality in the United States, not causative factors unique to groups (e.g., culture of violence)”. As Bellair and McNulty (2005) noted, “Minority children are far more likely than white children are to grow up in communities that are characterised by high rates of poverty, unemployment, instability, and female-headed households. These disadvantages drain family and social-capital resources that facilitate the social control and socialization of children”. Luckenbill and Doyle (1989) also argued that youths in structural locations with high rates of violence would be more likely to hold cultural values that support or legitimate violence as much as they pick up violence as self-defense (Belgrave et al. 2008). In essence, being separated from mainstream people and institutions limits access and exposure to, as well as identification with, the dominant culture and customs, posing challenges for integration. Social isolation and the ossification of mobility engenders frustration and aggression among poor racial minorities. In this context, as Vigil (2003) notes, “[s]pace becomes a premium among them; places to congregate, shop, and cultivate romantic liaisons, among other social outlets and activities, become contentious issues, potential battlegrounds for conflict”. Importantly, the relationship is not simply unidirectional where racial marginalization causes gang involvement; the “gang experience itself might influence marginalisation” (Freng and Esbensen 2007).

4. Theory

The gang violence literature highlights the following four key theoretical paradigms: social capital (Hagan 1994), social control (Hirschi and Stark 1969), routine activities (Cohen and Felson 1979; Gainey and Payne 2009), and subcultural violence (Wolfgang and Ferracuti 1967). Social capital essentially refers to resources derived from social networks (Bourdieu 1986; Coleman 1990; Putnam 2000). Hagan (1994) links weak social networks and economic disadvantage to crime, as under-resourced families struggle to provide supervision and support, increasing youth involvement in gangs. Consequently, according to Hirschi and Stark (1969) on social control, weak social bonds heighten delinquency risk, a concept that well aligns with Singapore’s collectivist culture, where strong familial ties enhance well-being, reinforce obedience, and reduce social isolation (Koh et al. 2021; Tamm et al. 2018).

Routine activities theory (Cohen and Felson 1979) attributes youth delinquency to the convergence of motivated offenders, suitable targets, and absent guardianship. Sampson and Lauritsen (1990) argue that mere opportunity can drive criminal involvement. Without parental supervision, unstructured youth activities create opportunities for crime, weakening institutional control and increasing the risk of delinquent subculture immersion. This gravitational pull toward an alternative social system with distinct values is central to the subcultural theory of crime (Liu and Miller 2020). Drawing from classic works, such as Cohen (1955), Cloward and Ohlin (1960), Fagan and Jones (1984), and Wolfgang and Ferracuti (1967), this study, too, argues that peer groups provide a context in which violent behaviors are modeled, reinforced, and rewarded (Luckenbill and Doyle 1989).

The theoretical constructs of social capital, social control, routine activities, and the subculture of violence reviewed above as explanations for gang violence find resonance with the multiple marginality framework posited by James Diego Vigil (2003). Not only does his framework integrate the above constructs, but it also includes the interactive components of sociogenic and psychogenic elements, namely street socialization, and a street state of mind known as “locura” for understanding gang violence. “Locura” is “defined as a spectrum of behaviour reflected in a type of quasi-controlled insanity” (Vigil 2003) that is deeply internalized by some gang members who have acquired infamy for being “stupidly courageous”, but is equally instrumental as a requisite for street survival and as a behavioral standard for identification and emulation (Vigil 2003). An important point Vigil makes is that street socialization precedes the subculture of violence as the former provides the material and symbolic space for the subculture of violence to be learned and practiced. This idea is a derivation from Edwin Sutherland’s (1934) much earlier work and basically suggests that against the backdrop of street violence, it is the subcultural group of youth that act as carriers and mentors for the newcomers in the art of street violence. Vigil’s multiple marginality model thus summarizes the predicament of marginalized segments of the minority populations in the following stark terms:

…small dilapidated home; large family under crowded conditions; precarious family structure with attenuated functions, sometimes marked by violence; unaccommodative school; hostile and aggressive law enforcement; and, in the absence of home and school socialization, street socialization emerges and a multiple-aged peer group becomes a substitute.

(Vigil 2003)

While multiple marginality explains violence among all marginalized groups, it does not fully account for the disproportionality or the distinct nature of violence among racial minorities. Driven by a lack of access to and success in conventional avenues for power and status caused by systemic socioeconomic exclusion, racial minorities, particularly young men, are more likely to engage in what Bennett and Brookman (2008) termed “expressive violence”. Expressive violence, or “protest masculinity” as Connell (1995) described it, is often compensatory, emerging as a means of asserting masculine authority within social groups when hegemonic masculinity cannot be performed through legitimate economic or social avenues (Messerschmidt 1993). Such concepts permeate conceptualizations of gangs where they are seen as an opportunity structure for “capital acquisition” or “masculine capital” that generates status and respect for men in subordinated contexts (Baird 2012, 2021). In economically deprived communities, aggression and dominance also become codified as markers of the transition from boyhood to manhood (Luckenbill and Doyle 1989). The “ganging process” (Baird 2012) has, thus, been “conceptualised as a form of gendered socialisation that insulates boys and young men from the threat of emasculation in the urban margins” (Baird 2021). Violence, in this context, serves not only as a demonstration of power but also as a response to racialized social hierarchies that systematically deny other means of status attainment. This suggests that motivations for violence must be understood within the context of historically entrenched racialized experiences, where structural exclusion does not just create conditions for violence but shapes its very character—making it more expressive, compensatory, and deeply embedded in the struggle for recognition and dominance (Deuchar and Deuchar 2018).

Building on this interactive relationship between class and race, as inspired by Archer’s (2001) notion of racialized masculinity, this research investigates how racial minorities mobilize their gender and race resources in the context of structural (class) and racial marginalization in the legitimate and illegitimate society, respectively, to compensate for their status disparity especially in a postcolonial and multiracial society, like Singapore. This, as the research will argue, better locates the problem of racial disparity in the criminal justice system and the motivations of racial minorities in gang violence as they navigate the racialized hierarchies embedded within gang contexts in the city-state.

5. Methodology

To address the research questions, this study employed a combination of field observations, ethnographic methods, and life-history interviews which proved invaluable for uncovering the hidden and intricate social relations within the gang world. These methods illuminated the ways in which history, class, culture, ethnicity, and institutional forces intersect to shape the daily lives, aspirations, and challenges of gang members. Given the racialized context of gang involvement, which remains underexplored in this region, this approach allowed for a deeper interrogation of social processes that contribute to differential outcomes within the criminal justice system.

Participants were identified through the researcher’s informal and personal networks, as well as referrals from a key informant. Given the ethical constraints surrounding interviews with active gang members and Singapore’s stringent laws on gang-related activities, narratives were primarily gathered from former gang members. Additionally, former law enforcement and custodial officers, some of whom continue to serve as consultants to security agencies, were interviewed to provide critical contextual knowledge, essential for mapping the dynamics of gang activity in the local setting (Pawelz 2018, p. 8). While the primary narratives were indeed drawn from ex-gang members, many of these individuals remain deeply knowledgeable about the inner workings and evolving dynamics of the gang world. Their insights were both detailed and current, especially when interpreted alongside data from my key informant, who remained embedded in the gang milieu and was well-informed of developments in the underworld.

A total of 22 informants participated in the study, categorized as follows: 8 youth gang members, 10 adult members of secret societies, and 4 former law enforcement officers. Interviews were conducted between April and December 2024. Given the sensitivities of the research, ethical considerations were paramount. The process of obtaining consent was guided by the notion that ethics are embedded in “the mundane conduct of everyday life” and must be reflexively evaluated throughout the research process (Roth and Unger 2018, p. 33). To mitigate ethical and methodological challenges, only individuals above the age of 16 were included in the study, as Singaporean law designates those below this age as minors, requiring parental consent.

Even among adult participants, many were hesitant to sign formal consent forms due to concerns that such documentation could later be used against them by law enforcement. While written consent would have been ideal, the researcher employed the “single-party testimonial consent” method, in which a brief record of the participant’s consent was documented alongside an explanation of why conventional consent procedures were not feasible (Feixa et al. 2020, p. 12). This approach was particularly appropriate for working with deviant populations in Singapore, given the strict legal framework surrounding gang violence and drug-related offenses. Data collection was limited to jotted notes taken during informal or naturally occurring conversations with interlocutors. While this method precluded verbatim transcription, qualitative researchers argue that such strategies often yield “the richest, most expansive, and most authentic data of all” (Swain and King 2022, p. 2). Indeed, as Rutakumwa et al. (2020, p. 567) observed, in certain research contexts, “not recording [an interview may actually be] the best approach, not ‘second best’”. However, it must be noted that I did record these notes carefully and consistently using traditional ethnographic techniques, taking detailed notes by hand during and immediately after interviews. While this approach may not capture every word verbatim, it enabled me to document the substance and emotional tenor of the conversations with sufficient accuracy, as evidenced in the analysis presented in the study. To maintain the anonymity of participants, as well as the names of gangs, secret societies, and specific locations, rigorous confidentiality measures were observed.

The selection of interlocutors followed a theoretical sampling method—a purposive sampling technique that prioritizes conceptual and thematic depth over statistical representativeness. Participants were, thus, selected based on the relevance of their lived experiences to the study’s evolving research questions, rather than through random or probabilistic means. This methodological flexibility ensured that the study remained responsive to emerging themes and insights, ultimately contributing to a nuanced understanding of the intersection between gang violence, social structures, and racialized criminal justice outcomes. While such sampling does not allow for claims of statistical generalizability, every effort was made to ensure that the data reflected both the authenticity of lived experience and the currency of knowledge within the field of inquiry

6. Racial Minorities as “Double Failures”

In line with the literature reviewed in this study, the data indicates that while certain segments of racial minorities face marginalization due to social class, leading them to gravitate toward illegitimate sectors of society in pursuit of social mobility, status, and economic opportunities, their experiences within these spaces are further shaped by racial hierarchies. The findings reveal that even within secret societies, emblematic of “criminal subcultures” (Cloward and Ohlin 1960), through which many attain criminal social mobility and accumulate criminal social capital, racial minorities encounter systemic barriers that limit their upward mobility. This points to the existence of mechanisms of exclusion and stratification that operate in formal institutions and legitimate spaces that are reproduced within illicit economies, reinforcing existing structures of racialized inequality.

This phenomenon is particularly significant, as it aligns with broader sociological theories of differential opportunities (Cloward and Ohlin 1960), which argue that marginalized groups, when denied access to legitimate pathways for success, often seek alternative means of achieving economic security and social status. However, the data from this study challenge the assumption that such alternative pathways offer unmediated access to mobility with the secret society, despite the sworn brotherhood model upon which secret societies are based. Instead, they reveal the presence of racialized gatekeeping within the informal economy, where racial minorities, despite their membership, are relegated to subordinate roles, with their prospects for advancement curtailed by ethnically stratified power structures.

In their study of “triadization” in the Singapore context, a concept denoting a process where youth gang members were socialized into secret society norms, values and ideologies (Lo 2012), Ganapathy and Lim (2024) revealed the crucial but latent role that race dan play in terms of criminal mobility and opportunity within a secret society. Although aspiring youth gang members of various ethnoracial groups tend to experience the triadization stages of initiation, liminality, and integration in similar ways, the progression of racial minorities conspicuously differed from that of their Chinese “brethren”. This divergence stems from the existence of a “glass ceiling” within the racialized hierarchies of secret societies, which curtails their advancement and often assigns them peripheral and frontline roles. The leadership and decision-making power remain concentrated in the hands of the dominant racial group.

As a member of Indian ethnicity reflected:

I am from the ___area. The Chinese are a majority in the gang because it is a Chinese group! (laughs) We get together very well but there’s always an invisible division … there’s a colour bar … the Chinese is more in charge of business while the Indian and Malays on the other side…there is a difference between the Malays and Indians too… Basically, we do small stuff but most of the time Indians spend our time together… There is no progress for most of us … we just accept it because it is Chinese society to begin with, but what we have is identity and sense of belonging to the group, we can actually ‘open their number’ (slang for identifying oneself with the secret society) … this unexplained feeling that I’m somebody … most of us take this thing very seriously. It is important to us. But there are people like ___who had gone up the ranks to earn very well but they must be very good and enterprising like the Chinese and the Chinese higher-ups must like and respect them, otherwise no way Indians or Malays can go up. The Chinese control the society and we play second fiddle … This is the reality.

Another remarked:

… Malays and Indians in Chinese secret societies are really like step-children. One family but different too.

Racial minorities’ restriction to lower-echelon roles in Chinese secret societies is not merely a contemporary issue but dates back to the early 19th century, when these societies first emerged in British Malaya as key players in colonial capitalism (Trocki 1990). Initially functioning as mutual aid networks akin to clan associations or voluntary organizations (Kongsi/huiguan), they provided vital social support for immigrants lacking traditional kinship ties (Comber 1956; Lim 1999; Freedman 1960). Over time, secret societies became inseparable from the Kongsi, controlling employment opportunities in the colonies. With limited cultural and linguistic competence, the British had little choice but to rely on these societies as instruments of governance (Freedman 1960).

During the latter half of the century, as Wynne (1941) notes, “in order for the Chinese secret societies to safeguard their imperium in imperio within the context of multi-ethnic, migrant community, it was crucial for Chinese secret societies to ideologically de-emphasise ethnic allegiance”, an adaptive strategy that resonated well with the post-independent Singapore government’s political ideology of multiracialism. Ganapathy (2016) argues that it is this ceremonial emphasis on “brotherhood” over ethnic loyalties that has contributed to the resilience of secret societies:

“Notwithstanding the provision of socio-cultural and structural mechanisms by which younger Chinese—by virtue of their ethnicity—could gain access to the illegitimate opportunity and learning structures should conventional means fail, [Chinese secret societies] in Singapore had to historically adopt an ideology of ‘brotherhood’ and ‘blood-oath of loyalty’ where ethnic allegiance among members had to be downplayed”.

In actuality, social mobility within these societies is limited and contingent on “race”, with the Chinese members forming the core and racial minorities consigned to the lower echelons of the society, a reality that was consistent with the observations of Wynne in 1941 where he reported the following:

[T]he Malays were always a tool in the hands of the Presidents and Vice-Presidents of the Chinese secret societies, engaged to do the dirty work that the Chinese did not want associated to their own Chinese secret societies. The differentiated status between Chinese and Malay members of Chinese secret societies was marked by a difference in the entrance fee of Chinese members which was three dollars and sixty cents to the one-dollar and sixty cents paid by lesser members of Chinese secret societies, namely Malays.

7. Hybridized Racialized Masculinity

Archer’s (2001) concept of “racialized masculinity”, which highlights the contextual and relational link between gender and racialized identities, and Messerschmidt’s (1986) observation that marginalized men, despite material deprivation, remain a formidable force in terms of gender, are crucial for understanding the relationship between violence, masculinity, and marginality. In Singapore’s racially plural and economically competitive society, violence plays a significant role in how marginalized men navigate and attain status.

Data from the study suggest that racial minority gang members face double jeopardy, being denied access to both legitimate resources and what Halpern (2005) terms “criminal social capital”. This exclusion fosters an environment of “heightened public and private forms of aggressive masculinity” (Joe and Chesney-Lind 1995). The demonstration of physical prowess is not merely an expression of the competitive struggle in the streets, but a means of self-validation and for establishing status. While sociological discussions have argued that “‘hegemonic masculinity’ in the gang world develops within an excessively aggressive context that reinforces an authoritative, controlling, heterosexual, independent and violent masculinity” (Ricciardelli et al. 2015), it cannot be reduced to a single normative form, for masculinities appear in complex ways contingent upon the respective social milieus. Connell and Messerschmidt (2005) highlight the existence of a “geography of masculinities”, wherein intersecting structures of class, race, and sexuality shape hierarchies of dominance and subordination among men. Baird (2021) argues that transnationality plays an equally critical role in structuring experiences of inclusion and exclusion in a globalized world. These intersecting dimensions not only determine which forms of masculinity are privileged or marginalized across different contexts but also reinforce the power dynamics that sustain hegemonic masculinity. Within this framework, Baird (2021) introduces the notion of “gang transnationalism” which can be understood as a form of “transnational masculinity”—one that forges cultural linkages between disparate localities marked by urban exclusion. He argues that in places, such as Belize City, this manifests in two paradoxical ways. On the one hand, it exposes “masculine vulnerabilities” by offering the foreign gang as an identity package capable of reconfiguring local forms of subordination; on the other, it consolidates male gang practices with a distinct hegemonic character that galvanizes violence and entrenches a street-level patriarchy within already marginalized communities.

Building on these previous works and based on the data that has emerged from the study, there seems to be a “hybridised racialised masculinity” (Ganapathy 2024) at play, where racial minority members were found to demonstrate a blended masculinity comprising “Malay-ness/Indian-ness” on one hand and “Chinese-ness” on the other as they navigate the racialized hierarchies in gangs and as means for compensating their marginal status. Despite their structural relegation, racial minority members in Chinese secret societies pursue Chinese-ness as an assimilation strategy to negotiate their social membership, identity, mobility and status in these criminal fraternities. This strategy has proved to be both empowering and enfranchising, as racial minorities have sought to emulate Chinese-ness not merely through the appropriation of Chinese cultural symbols—such as using Chinese-inspired motifs in tattoos or speaking Chinese dialects—but more significantly by internalizing the hegemonic ideals associated with Chinese identity, particularly the emphasis on financial success and competitiveness. Though assimilation afforded racial minority members significant social, symbolic, ostentatious, and cultural capital, both in relative and absolute terms, and only a select few ascended to the core of the hierarchy dominated by the Chinese. Most, as the data revealed, were compelled to essentialize their Indian-ness or Malay-ness by crafting a fearsome and fearless persona as a means of negotiating a more privileged status within the Chinese-dominated gang. This involved the display of “unbridled masculinity” (Ganapathy and Lim 2024) that often led to excesses of violence, both reviled and revered in the gang world, making racial minorities a much sought-after resource in gang membership (Ganapathy and Balachandran 2019). This is illustrated in the following quote:

What we Indians have is our strength and courage to take on people … We never fear even in the face of death. So you see, Chinese never come to the front, always working behind the scenes … even when they fight, they fight in groups but still not very involved. They don’t need to because they let their money do the job! (laughs). It will be the Indians and Malays who go for the kill…because they never say fear … never say die. A little mad too.

Racial minorities’ strategic self-presentation of fearlessness, designed to elicit respect, converged with the ways Chinese leaders subordinated and essentialized Indian-ness/ Malay-ness. As this Chinese senior member of a secret society shared:

What can I say … I give what they want. They want money, power, and feel good feeling … they want to be in the SS (secret society) and feel very proud. I use them. It is business for me. Malays are mad, they just do what I tell them. They are strong and never think. Indians are daring too but they think a bit, so must deal with them quite differently … but in the end, they are the same. They can act like Chinese but they can never become Chinese. SS is in our blood.

Chinese hegemonic masculinity, within the gang landscape, is characterized by competitive success, money-making, and an organized approach to criminality. In contrast, racial minority gang members embodied what Connell (1995) terms “protest masculinity”—a form of gendered expression marked by chaos, destructiveness, and alienation, rooted in deep-seated feelings of powerlessness and insecurity (Walker 2006). Given their historically subordinate position as racial minorities and as working-class men, they have mobilized this form of masculinity as a means of asserting power in the absence of cultural and social capital. Thus, masculinity is as much a “ritualized dramatic enactment” as it is an instrument of racialized power (Jewkes 2005), articulating a persona of “fearlessness and fearsomeness” to compensate for the systemic disrespect, stigmatization, and marginalization experienced by them in both the legitimate and criminal society (Irwin and Umemoto 2012). Similarly, as Baird (2021), in his study of young gang members in Belize City experiencing “vulnerable masculinities”, notes, “The gang persona becomes a vessel that vulnerable young men fill with their gendered ambitions and fantasies of manhood built around their ‘soldier heroes’”.

The study also reveals a bifurcated organizational structure within secret societies, wherein criminal- and conflict-oriented subcultures coexisted, largely stratified along ethnic lines. The Chinese were largely responsible for running it as a criminal enterprise enabled through a symbiosis with conventional society, while racial minorities were predominantly deployed for inherently risk-oriented activities, like extortion, gang fights, and drug dealing, with many succumbing to drug addiction themselves and being trapped in the revolving cycle of crime, drugs, incarceration and reincarceration (Lian and Ganapathy 2016). Racial minorities who are “trapped” in the liminal stage of triadization, often exhibited compensatory behaviors, such as hyper-masculinized expressions of violence and risk-taking, contrasting sharply with the more circumspect and strategic approaches observed among their Chinese counterparts.

Among the three forms of violence outlined by Kramer (2000)—predatory economic crimes, drug industry crimes, and social relationship violence—the latter best captures the experiences of racial minorities observed in this study. This form of violence often emerges within volatile and precarious social relationships. Individuals who feel powerless, angry, frustrated, and alienated frequently exhibit violent tendencies (Yablonsky 1962; Decker and Van Winkle 1996; Irwin and Umemoto 2012). For those marginalized by social and economic structures, violence takes on a performative function, serving as a means to reassert power and control in relationships perceived as imbalanced or unequal (Pfohl 1994; Messerschmidt 1993). Harding (2020), in his study of knife carriers in London, found that carrying knifes in public provides young men not only with a sense of authenticity where stabbing permits a release, both from the pressure associated with the potential for revenge or retaliation on the street, but also allows them to accumulate “street capital” to help perform before their peers (Densley et al. 2020). As Katz (1988) notes, individuals with low self-esteem who perceive disrespect from others may resort to what he terms “righteous violence” to resolve humiliation “through the overwhelming sensuality [of] rage”. This study’s findings further support this perspective, indicating that minority gang members are deeply socialized into a subculture of violence, where violent behavior is both modelled and reinforced as a means of conformity. Membership, especially in a conflict-oriented subculture, heightens sensitivity to perceived slights, which are interpreted as “derogations of the self” that must be met with physical violence (Baron and Hartnagel 1998; Luckenbill and Doyle 1989). As a result, individuals within these subcultures are more inclined to seek retributive justice by forcing opponents to submit or capitulate.

The murder case in 2023 (Alkhatib 2025b) that drew much attention in Singapore because of its gang character, which reached trial at the time of this writing, exemplifies offenders’ attempts to pursue “justice, gain compliance, get revenge, express a grievance, and defend or assert social identities” (Baron et al. 2001). It also reflects broader patterns of social interactions between disputants, structured around “naming, claiming, and aggression” (Baron et al. 2001). As Baron et al. (2001) explain, “Naming requires the perception or recognition of harm from another’s behaviour … and this may be an injury, a norm violation, or some form of injustice… Claiming transforms the perceived injurious experience into a dispute … activates a justice motive and requires that the individual express a demand for reparation … [leading to] aggression … which is defined as the willingness of the individual to persevere and [use] force to settle the dispute.”

The facts of the case are as follows:

In the early hours of 20 August 2023, six men of a secret society, all of Indian ethnicity, arrived at a club. Around the same time, the deceased and his accomplice, both of Malay ethnicity and members of a rival secret society, also arrived to meet former colleagues, having previously worked as bouncers at the club.

Upon noticing the group, the deceased and his accomplice armed themselves with knives and began hurling vulgarities at their rivals. The rioting group confronted them, leading to a scuffle. During the fight, the deceased was pushed, causing his knife to fall to the ground. One of the rioting group members seized the knife and fatally stabbed him multiple times while others continued raining blows on the deceased.

The pattern that appeared in this murder case was also seen in the analysis of other rioting cases that had been reported in the national newspapers (Alkhatib 2025a) and in those observed in the narratives of the interlocutors who participated in this study. The data critically revealed that violence—described by Weenink (2014) as “frenzied attacks”—was primarily driven by intense feelings of group membership and collective excitement. These outbursts of violence were not necessarily rooted in business disputes but rather stemmed from ego-driven clashes, identity struggles, and territorial rivalries. Such manifestations align with what Vigil (2002) characterized as locura. From this perspective, their gang involvement was more of an existential struggle for identity and recognition in a world that systematically denied them both than being strategically orchestrated for economic gain, as much of the Western literature had suggested.

8. Implications for the Prevention of Gang Violence

Addressing the issue of gang violence in multi-ethnic societies, like Singapore, necessitates an understanding of both historical trajectories and contemporary realities. Secret societies, particularly those dominated by the Chinese, have maintained a pervasive and resilient presence in Singapore despite the state’s stringent law enforcement and zero-tolerance stance on organized crime. Their deep institutionalization within society has rendered them not only commonplace but also functional in meeting certain socioeconomic needs of “the underclass in contemporary Singapore” (Nasir 2014). Nasir (2014) also points out the irony behind the expression “secret societies” on the basis that these organizations have been playing a pivotal role in Singapore’s nation-building for decades, “carrying out their dealings in the public sphere, with unofficial sanctions by the state”. Given their historical entrenchment—spanning nearly three centuries—Chinese secret societies have established themselves as key players within both illicit economies and broader social networks (Nasir 2014). Their capacity to regulate violence internally has ensured their longevity, as drawing undue attention through overt violence would only jeopardize their operations (Chin 2003; Varese 2010).

The extensive body of literature on gangs and prevention efforts underscores the structural determinants that propel marginalized individuals—particularly youths—into gang membership. The convergence of socioeconomic deprivation, weak familial support structures, labor market discrimination, inadequate housing, substandard schooling, and limited opportunities fosters conditions where gangs become alternative mechanisms for navigating structural barriers (Hagedorn 2008; Vigil 1988). Conventional gang prevention frameworks are normatively driven, advocating for interventions that address these root causes. The implicit assumption is that tackling socioeconomic exclusion through policies that promote integration, education, and employment opportunities will mitigate gang proliferation and violence (Klein and Maxson 2006; Decker and Pyrooz 2014; please also see successful gang prevention programs as discussed in Higginson et al. (2015) and Spergel et al. (2006).

However, my contention is that while gang membership may be an inevitable outcome of prevailing “anomic” conditions (Kramer 2000), the primary concern is really about the type of violence perpetrated by specific groups. Specifically, the form of violence exhibited by racial minorities within the gang landscape in Singapore is often highly expressive, explosive, and “frenzied”—the kind of violence (locura type) that most concerns the ordinary public and public order officials. This pattern of violence serves as a performative response to social marginalization and status frustration, as the data indicate (Messerschmidt 1993; Anderson 1999; Katz 1988). This dynamic parallels findings in other contexts where marginalized groups use violence as a means of asserting agency in the face of structural exclusion (Bourgois 1995; Garot 2010; Venkatesh 2000). As Chin notes in the following quote:

The members have stable criminal careers and participate in violence as well. Although there is a parallel existence of both ‘criminal’ and ‘conflict’ features, the fact that the Society is more interested in material gains makes it less comparable to ‘conflict gangs’. It is also less comparable to Yablonsky’s sociopathic [sic] youth to whom violence is basically a ‘vehicle’ to attain status, secure prestige and maintain one’s reputation of prowess.

Racial minorities in Singapore are particularly scrutinized in relation to gang violence due to a confluence of socioeconomic and organizational factors. Unlike their Chinese counterparts, who often exert control over organized crime networks, racial minority gang members experience a form of “ossification” within the triadization process leading to their peripheral positioning within both the licit and illicit spheres. The experience of “double-failure” manifests in hyper-masculinized expressions of violence and risk-taking, contrasting sharply with the more circumspect and strategic approaches observed among their Chinese counterparts. As Nguyen and Bouchard (2013) observed, when marginalized individuals lack access to cohesive and integrated networks, they are more likely to be involved in overt violence rather than profit-generating activities. This could explain why racial minorities have been conspicuously linked to high-profile violent incidents in recent years (Alkhatib 2024; Chua 2024; John 2007). Historical evidence, as well as findings from this study, suggest that when marginalized groups establish their own organized crime networks or gain full membership in criminal subcultures, they often transition from indiscriminate violence to more structured and regulated forms of criminal enterprise. This shift demands that members exercise greater rationality, restraint, and discipline compared to their counterparts in conflict-oriented subcultures.

From a policy perspective, effective violence reduction strategies must extend beyond conventional preventive measures. While addressing socioeconomic disparities remains critical, there is also a need to reconfigure power dynamics within the illicit economy itself. The redistribution of criminal social capital—allowing racial minority gang members greater access to structured pathways within organized crime—may paradoxically contribute to the stabilization of gang-related violence. Historical evidence as well as data from this study suggest that when marginalized groups establish their own organized crime networks or achieve full membership status in criminal subcultures, they often shift from indiscriminate violence to more regulated forms of criminal enterprise require members to exercise greater rationality, restraint and discipline relative to their counterparts in conflict-oriented subcultures.

Furthermore, the integration of criminal and conventional values within organized criminal subcultures not only facilitates the minimization of violence but also reinforces the stability and longevity of such groups. Secret societies and organized criminal networks are unlikely to sustain themselves unless they establish bridging social ties with the broader legitimate society. Kleemans and Van de Bunt (1999), for example, highlight how social connections and the transfer of knowledge and contacts generate a “social snowball effect”, blurring the boundaries between criminality and conventionality. Through this process of integration and straddling between illicit and legitimate spheres, violence is likely to be curtailed, as the social and economic stakes associated with maintaining these connections create disincentives for overtly violent behavior. The evolution of Omega, an exclusively Malay prison gang in Singapore that transitioned into a transnational criminal syndicate, serves as a compelling case study. As the group institutionalized its operations and secured its position within the underworld economy, incidents of unrestrained violence diminished, reinforcing the notion that integration—whether within legitimate or illegitimate economies—mitigates the need for expressive violence (Skaperdas 2001; Gambetta 1993).

9. Conclusions

The study underscores the need for a more nuanced understanding of how race and class intersect to shape pathways into and within criminal gangs. While economic marginalization may drive certain segments of racial minorities toward illicit economies, their experiences within these spaces reveal that illegality does not operate as a great equalizer. Instead, criminal enterprises function as microcosms of broader social inequalities, where racialized power relations continue to dictate access to economic and social capital. These findings reinforce the broader argument that racial minorities are not only structurally excluded from legitimate economic opportunities but also systematically constrained within alternative economies, perpetuating cycles of disadvantage that transcend both legal and illegal domains.

It is the contention of this study that while traditional gang prevention strategies advocate for structural reforms in education, employment, and social services, a nuanced approach that considers the organization of the illicit economy is also equally necessary. Recognizing that expressive, compensatory violence is often a symptom of exclusion rather than an inherent characteristic of gang affiliation, interventions must address both legitimate and illegitimate forms of social mobility or the lack thereof.