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Slaughtering the Bison, Controlling Native Americans: A State Crime and Green Criminology Synthesis

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Abstract

We demonstrate the usefulness and importance of achieving descriptive and explanatory synthesis between the fields of state crime and green criminology when analyzing events that embody both state and “green” crime elements. Utilizing the case of the nineteenth century North American bison slaughter (1865–1890), we present an analysis that attends to the state and green crime elements present in this singular event and show that the bison slaughter exemplifies the type of case that benefits from a synthesis of the state and green criminology perspectives. That is, we can best understand the bison slaughter and other similar events when drawing jointly upon the resources offered by the state and green criminology fields. We conclude this paper with an explanation of the bison slaughter that utilizes a political–economic framework and the complementary concepts of structural contradictions and hegemony, showing, among other things, that political economy is one vital approach that meets the explanatory goals of both state crime and green criminology, aiding our understanding of cases like the bison slaughter. As the world moves forward into a future defined by various ecological, political and economic insecurities, scholars from both disciplines will increasingly encounter events that are impossible to fully understand without engaging with each other. This paper is thus an attempt to motivate the sowing of cross-disciplinary seeds of heightened collaboration between state crime scholars and green criminologists.

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Notes

  1. Congressional Globe, 42nd Congress, 1st Session, Pt. 1, at 80 (1871)

    Congressional Globe, 42nd Congress, 2nd Session, Pt. 2, at 1063 (1872)

    2 Congressional Record, 43rd Congress, 1st Session, Pt. 1, at 371 (1874)

    2 Congressional Record, 43rd Congress, 1st Session, Pt. 2, at 1123 (1874)

    4 Congressional Record, 44th Congress, 1st Session, Pt. 1, at 773 (1876)

    4 Congressional Record, 44th Congress, 1st Session, Pt. 2, at 1813 (1876).

  2. We wish to thank one of the anonymous reviewers at Critical Criminology for encouraging us to reference the early contributions that Marx and Sutherland made to this now popular critique.

  3. We wish to thank one of the anonymous reviewers at Critical Criminology for urging us to expand upon this point.

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Acknowledgments

The authors wish to thank the anonymous reviewers at Critical Criminology, Prof. N. Prabha Unnithan from Colorado State University and Britney M. Tibbits for their insightful comments and suggestions on earlier drafts.

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  1. Department of Sociology, Center for the Study of Crime and Justice, Colorado State University, Fort Collins, CO, 80523, USA

    Christopher J. Moloney

  2. Department of Sociology, George Washington University, Washington, DC, 20052, USA

    William J. Chambliss

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Moloney, C.J., Chambliss, W.J. Slaughtering the Bison, Controlling Native Americans: A State Crime and Green Criminology Synthesis. Crit Crim 22, 319–338 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10612-013-9220-5

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