Abstract
In the United States, violence is related to the construction of the American nation and its culture. However, the violence was a tool in the past and, apart from perhaps for the racial riots, many measures have been frequently adopted to end it. Today, urban violence, constantly increasing, expresses despair, alienation and takes the final form of self destruction that seems to defy any possibility of control. The drug traffic, free movement of weapons is increasing in the territories actually abandoned by the US and the rest of the society. Many people live in these enclaves, marked and characterized by the existence within the population of a strong sense of community, and where urban democracy is in free fall. The violence is the last mode of expression. With the processes that led to riots in Europe, is the current socio-economic context of the European countries quite different?
