Dealing with fatherhood: Paternal identities among men in the illegal drug economy

Abstract

This study investigates paternal identities among men who are involved in the illegal drug economy in Norway. Using data from life-history interviews, we identified two paternal identities relating to the role fatherhood played in their lives and crimes: struggling fathers and absent fathers. Our analysis demonstrates the structural constraints of fatherhood for crime-involved men, which is rooted in their class positions and enhanced by being situated in hyper-masculine drug markets with little access to hegemonic masculinity. Our study offers a contribution to scholarship on marginalized fatherhood, and highlights the import of paternal identities for understanding the relationship between fatherhood and crime over the life course.

“I have to be a man for my son”: The narrative uses of fatherhood in prison

“…You know, I didn’t rely on the welfare system to take care of our family, my family.Here, Tyler’s reference to welfare and state support is an interesting gloss on the masculine “provider” narrative. Like the taint of being a “deadbeat dad” (Grundetjern et al., 2019), for some incarcerated fathers the prospect that their family was (or might be) on welfare represented a stigmatizing personal failure, negatively shaping their paternal identity (Cammett, 2014; Hansen et al., 2014; Miller, 2010). As Lachlan put it:I was also an institutional drug dealer.…”

“…However, the favourable cultural meanings of fatherhood provided opportunities for participants to invoke their paternal status to advance different personal goals ( Sandberg et al., 2020 ; Warr, 2020 ). These narratives often included efforts to project a particular vision of masculinity, referencing such stereotypical paternal attributes as courage, financial support, and paternalistic love ( Connell, 1995 ; Grundetjern et al., 2019 ). For our purposes, we do not treat masculinity as a distinct fatherhood narrative, but as a pervasive and almost ubiquitous aspect of prison life, inextricably linked with each of the three narratives we identify ( Bartlett and Eriksson, 2019 ; Evans and Wallace, 2008 ).…”

“…Criminologists have dedicated considerable attention to studying incarcerated parents. The scholarship on incarcerated fathers has foregrounded the social, relational, and economic challenges that incarceration poses for fathers and families (Grundetjern et al, 2019;McKay et al, 2019;Sandberg et al, 2020;Turner, 2017). However, fatherhood is not merely a set of biological, financial, or familial relationships; it is also a symbolically rich social identity, performed and made understandable through personal narratives, and deeply intertwined with masculinity (Connell, 1995).…”

“…These men consistently articulate narratives about their families, especially when discussing desistance and future plans (Bourgois, 2003;Bucerius, 2014;Contreras, 2013). For instance, Grundetjern et al (2019) studied the fatherhood narratives of marginalized drug dealers in Norway. They found that most participants describe working hard to maintain paternal relationships with their children, despite drug use, criminalization, and a widespread failure to meet socially-conditioned fatherhood expectations.…”

“…These men consistently articulate narratives about their families, especially when discussing desistance and future plans ( Bourgois, 2003 ; Bucerius, 2014 ; Contreras, 2013 ). For instance, Grundetjern et al. (2019) studied the fatherhood narratives of marginalized drug dealers in Norway.…”