Kazan phenomenon

Common card · No. 476434

The Kazan phenomenon (Russian: Казанский феномен, Kazanskiy fenomen) was a term used by journalists to describe the rise in juvenile street-gang activity in the city of Kazan in the RSFSR and later, the Russian Federation. From the early 1970s, Kazan had a particularly bad reputation for juvenile delinquency, and a substantial portion of young males in the area of both Russian and Tatar background joined youth gangs, which fought amongst each other for territory, principally using improvised or melee weapons (at the time firearms were not widespread in Russia and were hard to come by). Between 1985 and 1999 the rate of crimes committed by sixteen- to twenty-nine-year-olds in Tatarstan (until 1992 the Tatar ASSR) increased 1.7 times. Struggles for domination of public space, where success in the appropriation of resources was often predicated on one's aptitude and skills in violence, forced many young men unaffiliated with gangs to reconsider their options in the face of increasing insecurity...

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