Maras as Producers of Translocal Spaces of Violence: Translocal Spaces of Violence: Theoretical Model and Structure of Argument
Bibliographic record
Abstract
This working paper presents the basic concept of a research project that is part of theCollaborative Research Center (SFB) 1199. Section and that focuses on the spatial format produced by Maras. Maras are a form of particularly violent youth gangs, primarily associated with El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala as well as the United States. While Maras do not encompass drug cartels, in the form of petty drug business (narcomenudeo) they do cooperate with cartels and mafias. They maintain a subordinated role in this cooperation and generally play a minor role in the drug business (see Wolf 2011: 68; Ward 2013: 170). What we investigate is the question if areas of expansion beyond the established areas of Maras can be detected in the Americas (Canada, Mexico, Chile, Peru, Argentina) and in Europe (Spain, Italy, the United Kingdom). It will further focus on finding out if, and (if so) why, the respective adjacent states (Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Belize, Panama, Colombia, and Peru as well as Portugal, France, and Germany respectively) appear to be unaffected by Mara presence. The project examines how, due to which interests, in which external and internal dimensions, and within which boundaries and borders actors of criminal violence—in this case Maras—produce space. The project hypothesizes that the Mara spaces are a form of translocal spaces of violence—a spatial format that requires further specification. Due to the limited literature on the spatial localization of Maras, this project cannot utilize existing theory- based literature. For this reason, the research has to depend on general models of spatial philosophy and sociology to develop a spatial conceptualization of the Maras. On the one hand, this research undertaking wants to comprehend the process of creating spaces, that is to say the space production by the Maras. Just as social agency does in general, so does the agency of Maras in particular entail a dimension of spatialization. On the other hand, this investigation of the Maras’ spatialization agency aims at identifying their privileged spatial format. To this end, several perspectives on spatiality and spaces will be applied and the resulting different—internal and external—spatial dimensions will be placed into a relational matrix. The theoretical contributions of this research are, first, the application of the process tracing method in order to close an existing gap in the literature between space-producing agency and space produced as a result of this process. Second, it shall compare the collected empirical evidence on space production by Maras with the theoretical literature on spaces of violence. By connecting both the processes of de- and reterritorialization as well as flow and space, the project will advance these theoretical contributions. It will further deviate from a certain literature on spaces of violence and on globalization which focuses primarily on deterritorialization and dissolution of borders in general and of violent spaces in certain situations in particular. The project assumes that by migrating between different locations the members of the Maras, the Mareros, create a space that stretches transnationally. The ensuing Mara space is at the same time translocal in nature. As a diaspora community, the Maras move with this space as well as within this space. This diaspora community promises Maras shelter as well as a home and a sense of belonging. It is this migration and diaspora that eventually “marks” the borders of the Mara space of violence. The principal investigator and author of this working paper is a political scientist specialized in International Relations (IR). In this working paper, the author seeks to combine the insights of her own discipline with those from philosophy, sociology, political economy, cultural studies, and geography in order to locate the topic within the framework of the area studies.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.005 | 0.006 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.005 | 0.003 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.008 | 0.048 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.015 | 0.023 |
| Open science | 0.003 | 0.010 |
| Research integrity | 0.007 | 0.004 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.012 | 0.001 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".