How the Other Half Lives · Theme
Crime and Moral Degradation
How How the Other Half Lives develops Crime and Moral Degradation.
Riis links the tenement environment to the rise of crime, gangs, street Arabs, and moral decay, arguing that poverty and squalor breed lawlessness and corrupt the young.
Where it surfaces
- IV: The Downtown Back-Alleys
The chapter references the Swamp Angels using sewers for escape, a murder resulting from a 'can racket' (alcohol-fueled fight), and the pervasive presence of the saloon as a refuge from despair.
- VII: A Raid on the Stale-Beer Dives
The raid itself is a police action against illegal dives, and the chapter describes the moral decay of tramps who steal, beg, and live in filth, as well as the toughs who turn to theft.
- VIII: The Cheap Lodging-Houses
The chapter details how cheap lodging-houses function as nurseries of crime, turning young men into thieves and beggars through systematic corruption.
- IX: Chinatown
Opium addiction, violent crime, and the exploitation of women are central to the depiction of Chinatown as a source of moral decay.
- XVIII: The Reign of Rum
Saloons foster crime, shield criminals, and are linked to political corruption, with dive-keepers becoming aldermen and police officials.
- XIX: The Harvest of Tares
The chapter details the violent criminal culture of New York's gangs, including murder, robbery, and the brutalization of innocents.
- XXII: The Wrecks and the Waste
The penitentiary and workhouse are depicted as holding 'toughs' from slums like Battle Row and Poverty Gap, with convicts described as thoughtless and jolly, and the institutions as failing to reform.