Crack: Rock Cocaine, Street Capitalism, and the Decade of Greed

by David Farber

A shattering account of the crack cocaine years from award-winning American historian David Farber.

Crack tells the story of the young men who bet their lives on the rewards of selling 'rock' cocaine, the people who gave themselves over to the crack pipe, and the often-merciless authorities who incarcerated legions of African Americans caught in the crack cocaine underworld.

Based on interviews, archival research, judicial records, underground videos, and prison memoirs, Crack explains why the crack industry was a lucrative enterprise for the 'Horatio Alger boys' of their place and time. These young, predominately African American entrepreneurs were profit-sharing partners in a deviant, criminal form of economic globalization.

Crack takes a hard look at the dark side of late twentieth-century capitalism and discusses the racist drug policies that led to mass incarceration.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Race, American History, Politics, School, African American

222 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2019

About the author

David Farber is the Roy A. Roberts Distinguished Professor of History at the University of Kansas.

Reviews

[Meike · Rating 4 out of 5]

An excellent historical and sociological study that discusses the crack epidemic between the early 1980s and mid-1990s as a societal phenomenon relating to poverty, classism, racism, and popular culture, especially hip hop. Farber talks about the production, the destribution, and the effects of crack cocaine, about manhood in the age of greed and how it connects to crack capitalism, the politics and laws of drug enforcement, particularly under Reagan and Bush I, the ensuing pratice of (black) mass incarceration – and the ongoing initiatives to right the wrongs and to learn from the failed attempts to reign in drug epidemics.

Thus, the book manages to show how this illegal business is closely connected to American culture at large, and why crack capitalism is an offspring of legal turbo-capitalist structures that marginalize large groups of people – the author evokes the neo-liberal culture of greed by quoting, among others, a certain Donald Trump. I was particularly fascinated by the passages explaining how large hip hop businesses were build up from crack money – why have I never registered this particular association when Jay-Z, who came up as a crack dealer, even named his empire Rock-A-Fella? (Rock, get it?) And there are many others mentioned when it comes to the intersection of music, crime, and economics: Diddy, Biggie, Tupac, The Wu-Tang Clan, Snoop etc. pp. – all of them were closely connected to the crack game.

I saw that quite a few reviewers described this book as dry, and I strongly disagree: It’s just not exploitative, gossipy or emotionally manipulative. Rather, this is a scientific book depicting a phenomenon from different angles and supporting its theses with numerous sources. An impressive book, very illuminating.

[Mehrsa · Rating 4 out of 5]

The book was a bit unsatisfying even though it did what it said it was going to do, which is to focus on the economy of crack. It is more journalistic than analytical, but it is comprehensive and insightful

[R.J. Gilmour · Rating 5 out of 5]

Farber's thin book looks at the history of the crack epidemic in the 1980s and 1990s in the United States. He places what happened in a larger historical, social and political context, showing crack decimated neighbourhoods that were already suffering from inter-city poverty.

"Crack dealers, as he saw it, were just the refuse of Reagonomics. Crack distribution, he believed was a criminal industry tailor-made for poor black people by a merciless white America that left those who were locked out of its go-go post-industrial economy to fend for themselves.
In 1984 Ronald Reagan....told the American people that the United States was open for business; "It's Morning Again in America." Capital, lifeblood of the marketplace was flowing. Financial deregulation and tax cuts had turned on the money spigot. As economists would say, people with the right "animal instincts" emerged: "creative destruction" ruled the day. Moneymen were reinventing whole sectors of the economy-the airlines industry, trucking, financial services-tearing apart old sclerotic corporations to salvage profits wherever they could." 2

"For people who lived in the "other" America-the poorer, inner-city America never pictured in Reagan's pastel-coloured campaign....capital did not flow. Instead President Reagan oversaw governmental disinvestment in their corners of the nation. Jobs continued to move outward from city centres to newly capitalized suburban office parks, exurban freight depots, and anti-labor Sunbelt states. Ever more sophisticated global supply chains and international logistical networks allowed for offshore manufacturing and assembly plants. The working-class jobs that had brought poor people, especially poor African-Americans, from the south to the northeast, midwest, and California in the 1940s and 1950s dried up under the fierce rationalization that savvy capitalists brought to the transitioning economy of the 1980s." 2-3

"Crack cocaine was a business tailor-made for ambitious young people willing to operate outside the law in return for a high rate of return on a limited investment. Crack was nothing more than cocaine mixed with baking powder then cooked down to a hard pellet-a "rock"-that could be sold for as little as $ 2.50. As a commodity, crack was the perfect drug for people who lived dollar to dollar but were desperate to escape, as often as possible, from the drudgery, pain, boredom, or sadness of their lives." 3-4

"But crack's core customers were disproportionally low-income African-Americans who were already disconnected from the labor market.
A potentially explosive demand existed, and serving this need became a major market opportunity for young black men in inner-city neighborhoods." 4

"To an extent, Crack is a history of what some social scientists and journalists at the time called the "underclass," inner-city residents who did not and could not escape the ravages of racism that structured their lives and who did not have the means to-or chose not to-adapt to a mainstream world in which their skills, their codes of conduct, and their ambitions were either unrewarded or disdained." 5

"Uneducated men of color in particular, Bourgois argues, struggled to adapt to the service-driven, social and cultural capital intensive demands of the "new" economy that was producing so many of the jobs in financial and legal services, healthcare, and sales in the 1980s and 1990s. Left out of, or refusing to abide by, the codes of middle-class demeanour and civility these sorts of jobs demanded, they chose instead to embrace the rough life of the streets." 6

"The crack crisis is the dark side of the Reagan-Bush-Clinton years. An accounting of it necessarily foregrounds the lives of desperate people...But the story of crack is also a history of neo-liberalism and its cousin, economic globalization, from the ground up. In a de-industrializing America in which market forces ruled, service industries abounded, and entrepeneurial risk-taking was celebrated, the crack industry was a lucrative enterprise for the self-made men-the "Horatio Alger boys" of their place and time-who were willing to do whatever it took to improve their lot in life." 6-7

"In the 1950s, heroin use had exploded. Suburban housewives abused "downer." Middle-class whites and a racially mixed assortment of bohemians too "speed." Millions of Americans indulged daily in a drink or two. Cocaine users, between the end of World War II and the advent of the 1960s, were a fairly small niche market." 29

"Some 1960s veterans mourned this changing drug culture. Music producer David Rothschild believed that cocaine, unlike marijuana and acid, drove people apart." 32

"In 1973, the rules of the cocaine industry changed. General Auguste Pinochet led a coup that overthrew the democratically elected, if not always effective, government of Chile. As part of his brutal law-and-order campaign, he smashed Chile's relatively small cocaine industry...The Colombian entrepreneurs' timing could not have been better. The market, most especially in the United States, was taking off." 34

"LA had a big cocaine trade by the late 1970s, but it became America's cocaine capital in the mid 1980s because of an external disruption in US supply networks. In the early 1980s, federal authorities targeted the Colombian cartels' supply routes and distribution networks in South Florida." 76

"More obviously, the Reagan administration decimated America's public-housing programs, cutting their budget by some 76 percent between 1980 and 1988." 87

"As the socially conscious rapper Nas declared in "Represent," a track form the illustrious Illmatic (1994), the work and the hustle of rap and crack were born of the same streets." 119

"In 1980, only 4,749 people were in federals prisons for drug offences...By 1990, 30,470 out of 56,989 people sentences to serve time in a federal prison were there on drug offences." 151

"These tools of the cartel state, Van Cleve argues, produce "a culture of racism." 172

[Sierra Bartlett · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5

I needed data for a report that specifically looked at how Chicago experienced the crack cocaine surge and this book had it. Chicago was relatively late to the surge because of how insular gangs were here and the market control they had. Pulled lots of good quotes.

[Michaela Kollin · Rating 5 out of 5]

It’s been a long time since I’ve read an academic text aimed at a social science/humanities audience, so at first the specific academic jargon and topic-based chapter organization was a bit distracting. However, once I got into the groove of this book, it was really pretty fantastic.

Farber traces the history of the international drug trade in the United States, focusing primarily on the rise and fall of crack cocaine, highlighting the parallels between the ruthlessness and conspicuous consumption of crack dealers and the “greed is good” cutthroat world of Reagan-era corporate America. Farber illustrates why some young Black men in impoverished communities who had few opportunities to build wealth legally would be drawn to the fleeting money and power they could experience as drug dealers, especially in an era when American culture celebrated ruthless business savvy and financial success.

At the same time, even as Farber illustrates the allure that drug dealing held for young men with few other options, even has he acknowledges the racism and excessively punitive focus of the War on Drugs, he never ignores or excuses the very real and devastating impact that crack had on Black communities. He rightfully paints incarceration-based policies as reactionary while also showing how these policies were enacted in reaction to a legitimately destructive wave of addiction and crime. A lot of other contemporary histories of the War on Drugs solely focus on how damaging anti-drug laws were while ignoring how damaging crack addiction was, so it was refreshing to see a more nuanced take.

I liked this book so much that I read all of the acknowledgements and endnotes just to see how Farber collected all of his sources, so I’d definitely recommend this to anyone who wants to learn more about the history of crack in the United States.

[Toby · Rating 4 out of 5]

Our drug laws are a mess; the "war on drugs" unwinnable and wrong-headed. This is a superb, excoriating account of American - and global - cultural mores of the last century or so, specifically in relation to how people like to get high.

[Elaine Moore · Rating 5 out of 5]

In his new book, David Farber explains the reasons the crack epidemic became so successful. With economic changes that started with President Reagan, the poor grew poorer and what jobs were available were outsourced. To support their families, the underprivileged found producing and selling crack to be an answer to their prayers.
Farber describes the role public housing played in facilitating these clandestine enterprises in primarily poor black neighborhoods in large cities all over the country. And unlike the victimization attributed to opioid addicts, harsh penalties and long jail sentences became the fate of those involved with crack, both sellers and users.
A historian, Farber knows well how greed has shaped the United States in the last few decades and affects the consequences for those who exploit the poor. Crack is an important book for those interested in history and sociology and for anyone who cares about the factors that contribute to life in the United States.
I received this book from Cambridge University Press and feel fortunate to have been given the opportunity to read this excellent book.

[Diane Hernandez · Rating 4 out of 5]

It was the eighties and everything was about making money. Reaganomics gave the promise that everyone could be rich with some smarts and initiative. So what were poor African-Americans using as their method to achieve this American Dream? Crack.

With a 40% unemployment rate for African-American teenagers in 1984, there weren’t any other ways to get rich quick in the poor neighborhoods where most lived. There was definitely no shortage of buyers. However, once the gangs moved in and took over crack sales, the homicide rate of those same teenage boys skyrocketed. The only way to expand their market was by taking over some other gang’s territory—usually involving extensive bloodshed on both gangs’ part.

Interesting and important information about both the Crack epidemic and the cocaine one that preceded it. However, it is very “academically” presented. While that makes sense considering the publisher, just be aware that this is an incredibly well-research study and not a pop-culture type book. 3.5 stars rounded up to 4 stars!

Thanks to Cambridge University Press and NetGalley for a copy in exchange for my honest review.

[Brian · Rating 5 out of 5]

Crack by David Farber is an academic look at the crack cocaine epidemic of the 1980’s from an economic and social point of view. Although academic it is well written and moves along quickly providing a high level summary. From the hip hop culture that emerged out of crack to the responses of the government this book touches on all he key areas and in a very balanced and thoughtful way assess the issues of each. The ways in which black communities were left out of the economic upturn in the 1980’s contributed to crack as the way to make money which then turned black neighborhoods into war zones. The issue then bleeds into tough sentencing laws on a conversion ratio that did not make sense allowing powder cocaine dealers to have lesser sentences then low-level offenders carrying crack. This led to a generation of black men serving time in prison with felony convictions that kept them out of the employment market. Finally we see the abatement of crack because of the revulsion of the neighborhoods that were affected and seeing what “crackheads” looked like causing people to turn away. Very well written and quick look at the Crack issue in America.

[Randal White · Rating 3 out of 5]

A interesting, yet somewhat uninspiring, book on the phenomenon of crack cocaine. Lays out the history of crack in America. Describes how crack decimated the inner-cities, and destroyed the family structures of people living there.
Where I did feel the book got interesting was in the descriptions of distribution of crack by different gangs. All the pertinent gangs are covered. The Gangster Disciples, Black P-Stone Nation/El Rukns, the Latin Kings, Bloods and Crips. Their leaders, Jeff Fort, Rick Ross, Rayful Edwards.
Having served for over 20 years as a Federal Bureau of Prisons employee, it was like a trip down memory lane for me. I witnessed the incarceration of so many young black men, sentenced to horrific terms for dealing only tiny amounts of crack. I thought then, and still do, that the mandatory sentences were a real tragedy.
The book would probably serve well as a guidebook to beginning correctional officers, law students, and college-age political science majors.

[Cary · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness by Michelle Alexander, and now I'm reading Crack: Rock Cocaine, Street Capitalism, and the Decade of Greed
by David Farber. The book by David Farber covers much of the same material (plus a lot more), but it's way better. The New Jim Crow is a very forced, heavily worked take on racism. Crack: Rock Cocaine is much more unbiased and facts are presented in a way that the reader can take the information and form many of his/her own conclusions without the heavy handed bias of Alexander's The New Jim Crow. Alexander expends a lot of effort trying to make the issue a race issue, but in my opinion, the effort works against the argument. It feels forced and relies on the author's attempts at convincing the reader, rather than letting the facts speak for themselves. In Farber's Crack, the author is very well researched and informed, and speaks with knowledgeable authority. Also, the reader is really great at voicing the different characters in the book.

[Liam · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Fetal death rates among black women went up 25 percent during the peak of the crack years -- no similar increase occurred among white women. The number of low birth-weight babies born to poor black women also spiked dramatically during those years (and declined markedly in the late 1990s), putting those babies at risk for a variety of bad health outcomes." (96)

"A large majority of states -- thirty-six in total -- did not differentiate between powder cocaine and crack cocaine when it came to sentencing. Not only did they not encode the federal government's 100:1 ratio into their laws, they did not distinguish, in terms of weight, between the two forms of cocaine at all." (153)

[William Milks · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent journalism. Farber makes the connections - engagingly- between the rise of crack and the mass incarceration-of-men-for-profit in the U.S.’s war on drugs.

Great history, politics, and cultural commentary.

I particularly liked the author’s backgrounding of the hip hop/rap connection to the crack dealing gangs of LA, Chicago, and New York. He even provides a “crack playlist.” It’s dope.

[Tralala Tralala · Rating 5 out of 5]

Interesting read, felt politically neutral, like a good exposé. Neither long nor short. Sheds a useful light on the history of cocaine, on how different groups, over time, chose different poisons, some legal, some illegal, some tolerated, some heavily prosecuted, on the era, and how consequences are still felt today. I would like to read a book on the prison complex and how it benefits from locking up people.

[Erin 😎 · Rating 5 out of 5]

“The point about social bandits is that they are peasant outlaws whom the lord and state regard as criminals, but remain within peasant society, and are considered by their people as heroes, as champions, avengers, fighters for justice, perhaps even leaders of liberation, and in any case as men to be admired, helped and supported.” Eric Hobsbawm

[J-kwon Stanley · Rating 4 out of 5]

Im writing this review a bit late, but I really appreciated how much was written about Chicago in this book. This was the first time I heard about the Black P Stones becoming El Rukn and their dealings with Ghadaffi.

Crazy that the war on drugs is still raging and we’re still perpetuating the same ineffective tactics to stop it.

[Christopher Febles · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting. Unsettling, and really a sociology report.

[Grace Keith · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this book for class and I loved it! It's extremely informational and teaches you a lot about a side of the 1980s that isn't always discussed. Also, I really like the way Farber writes.

[Maurice Fitzgerald · Rating 4 out of 5]

Of course the real evil people were the democrats, and the republican but the democrats should be ashamed

[Jonas Stephan Johnson · Rating 5 out of 5]

God so good Corking