Ibadan Journal of the Social Sciences
Volume 22, No. 1, 2024
DOI: 10.36108/ijss/4202.22.0180
Methodological Issues in Organized Crime Studies: A Research on Illegal Local Oil Refineries in Warri, Nigeria
Austin Ayodele
Fellow, University of Pretoria, South Africa
Abstract
The alarming spate of organized crime in contemporary Nigerian society calls to question the conditions for which crime strives even in the face of security measures by the Government to decimate criminality. This has attracted academic discourse on criminality and the actors influencing the economy of illegal refineries in the country. The study on networks of actors involved in Illegal Local Refineries (ILRs), the persistent venture in oil-rich communities within the Niger Delta states of Nigeria, hinges on the contextual application of methodology. This choice significantly influences the data quality and eventual research outcomes. Thus, this paper situates the methodology that elicits rich information with less limitations in-spite of the burden of securing access to actors of illegal local refineries in the Delta region of Nigeria, the terrain where more researches miss out on attaining optimal research outcome while adhering to ethical standards. This paper shows the importance of a methodological approach that accommodates the flexibility of ethics in the data-collection phase of studies on organized crime. The study established that qualitative method; face-to-face interviews, pictorial evidence and non-participant observation enhanced the collection of robust data on the activity of actors of ILRs. While the nature of criminality and terrain of the networks of actors involved in illegal local refineries influenced data collection processes; hub entry, oath taking and initiation of researcher as well as imbibing the rules and regulation formalising the ties of actors of illegal oil refining industry affected study’s adherence to related ethical standards in research.
Keywords: Hub entry, initiation, illegal local oil refineries, qualitative method and Warri