Chris Blattman

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Confessions of a hustler

When Sudhir Venkatesh titled his new book Gang Leader for a Day, I expected a self-aggrandizing tale, one that simplified and sensationalized urban street gangs and black American youth.

I was wrong.

What I got was one of the most riveting and thoughtful accounts of field work I have yet encountered. I got a nuanced view of lives far outside my own, one that does not shy away from the author’s own naivete. I also got a revelation about field research in general, including my own.

After several years of hanging out in the projects, Sudhir realizes that he will have to surrender his notes to the law if subpoenaed. He decides to confess this risk to his subjects, including the powerful and streetwise leader of the building’s tenants association, Ms. Bailey. She is not surprised:

“Sudhir, let me explain something to you. You think we were born yesterday around here. Haven’t we had this conversation a hundred times? You think we don’t know what you do? You think we don’t know you keep all your notebooks in Ms. Mae’s apartment?”

I shuddered. Ms. Mae had made me feel so comfortable in her apartment that I’d never entertained the possibility that someone like Ms. Bailey would think about — and perhaps even page through — my notebooks.

“So why let me hang out?” I asked.

“Why do you want to hang out?”

“I suppose I’m learning. That’s what I do, study the poor.”

“Ms. Bailey said, laughing “Of course you’re learning! But you are also hustling. And we’re all hustlers. So when we see another one of us, we gravitate toward them. Because we need other hustlers to survive.”

“You mean people think I can do something for them if they talk to me?”

“They know you can do something for them!” she yelped, leaning across the table and practically spitting out her words. “And they know you will, because you need to get your information. You’re a hustler, I can see it. You’ll do anything to get what you want. Just don’t be ashamed of it.”

I spent months and months for my own dissertation research tracking down and talking to the perpetrators and victims of rebel violence in Uganda. I wanted to understand why a guerrilla group would mass abduct tens of thousands of teenagers, and so I sat down with the returned lieutenants and captains of raiding parties. I wanted to understand what lasting effects war violence had upon the young, and so I sat down with dozens upon dozens upon dozens of youth who had witnessed massacres and battles and other atrocities unspeakable.

Like many a researcher I felt the extractiveness of these interviews — acutely. You tell yourself that the study is for the greater good — that it will change policies and perceptions for the benefit of all. And indeed I think it has, at least more than I imagined.

Even so, I see now that these interviews were also a hustle. Me, scouring displacement camps for rebel leaders and victims, hungrily asking questions. Them, answering questions in the hopes that I could give them something, would give them something, in return for information. And if nothing else, I was simply a way to relieve the boredom of life in a displacement camp.

There is something very morally challenging in field work among the very poor. You fear that you exploit them. With your cleverness, wealth and influence, you think you must also protect them. But Sudhir realizes that he has overestimated his cleverness and underestimated theirs. He is using them for a selfish as well as a greater good, and they him.

In my case I think the power is less evenly distributed. However much I am hustled back, I have much more to give and gain than they do.

As I head to a new field site tomorrow — Liberia — I bring some insights and questions from the Chicago projects and a social scientist every field researcher should read.

4 Responses

  1. I read this book last year. It was in fact so riveting that I didn’t put it down until it was finished. Then I passed it on to some young kid. Maybe he’ll pass it along to someone else.

    web hustler: Dig the office. I have one like it, too. Some real hustlin’ goes on. ;)

  2. As part of the 16 Days of activism, we aim to conduct a youth focused programm in which we will visit 6 school within the NY and Philly townships. We will present a youth friendly yet factual and informative 1.5 hour presentation.

  3. Hi Chris,

    A very grave situation is unfolding in Ghana – Liberian refugees are being arrested and detained, faced with forced repatriation.

    Mass arrests by heavily armed Ghanaian police…. 600 women and children detained since monday…. I don’t know who to turn to to bring immediate attention to this terrible crisis:
    http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/LiberianRefugees/index.html

    i’m heartbroken, as my friends and co-workers are in hiding, fearing for themselves and their families…. if you have any suggestions, please help.

  4. I have forwarded the link for the Survey for War Affected Children to my African friends in Uganda and Sudan that are grassroots leaders.

    Thank you for your work regarding these important African issues.

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