Wilson and Kelling (Topic 5 crime prevention (social) Flashcards
what did they produce?
A situational explanation of crime called ‘the broken windows theory’.
The broken windows theory
The idea that disorderly neighbourhoods lead to serious crimes.
When one window is smashed and left unrepaired, psychologists and police expect rest of windows soon be broken, suggests no one cares about property, effects attitudes of residents, triggers fear, become isolated from neighbours and less concerned with or involved in what happens in their community.
Authors suggest disorderliness in community leads to increased fear of crime, isolation from others and lack of faith in police to act in the interest of community.
2 types of disorder
physical
social
physical disorder
such as graffiti, vandalism, littering
social disorder
such as gangs of teenagers, drugs, prostitution, public drinking
Consequences of disorder
triggers fear in residents, indication that serious crime is on increase=fear of crime increases.
Validity of this connection between disorder and crime is supported well by wilson and kelling.
Consequences of fear of crime
People spend less time in the community and avoid contact with others.
Citizens are therefore not around to challenge disorder leading to break down in community.
developing strength in the community
cities where communities walk around and have a presence they act as ‘guardians’ and help develop strength.
If high mutual surveillance then more disorderly behaviour is challenged, support from police is enforced-acts as deterrent for crime.
if disorderly behaviour escalates
drives people to stay in their homes out of fear of their community, scene is set for more crimes to take place openly on streets, can turn more serious crimes like street muggings.
Wilson and Kelling’s work concluded
The police and ONLY the police can effectively maintain public order.
They suggested by dealing with minor examples of disorder, foot patrol officers could play vital role in preventing serious crime.
In this way their theory offers suggestion for crime prevention.
Research was well received by police departments
(unlike most research)
Did not criticise the police and it gave them something positive to implement.
Zero tolerance policing
New York police commissioner William Bratton 1990 was the pioneer of ZTP; A strategy involving relentless order maintenance and aggressive law enforcement against even the minor crimes and incivilities.
Based on ‘broken windows theory’.
ZTP demands even minor misdemeanours must be pursued with the same vigour as serious crime because it is easier to prevent neighbourhood’s slide into crime than rescue it.
What Bratton did between 1990-94
Chief of NYC transit police, Bratton assigned 7000 extra officers who were put to work in addressing minor crimes.
In 1992 serious crimes reduced by 25% thanks to ZTP.
This strategy was quickly adopted by police depts across country.
Negative to ZTP
Hard to establish cause and effect between ZTP and reduced crime rates, important to note police resources also increased (more officers on streets) this with increased effort could have played large role in decrease in crime.
Dennis and Mallon 1997
Directed ZTP in Hartlepool UK, aimed to restore communities faith in police force and make low level offenders well known to police so they could keep eye on and ensure earlier intervention to prevent progression into serious crimes.
Proved successful, reduced crime rate by 27%, also 56% drop in car thefts.
Franklin 2010
Put forward research suggesting ZTP can have negative effects, has been criticised for causing tension and threatening police community relations.
As part of order maintenance policing the use of stop and search means anyone can be stopped and searched.
Overuse of ZTP lead to citizens resenting police, found them intrusive.
AIM
Review article on a series of findings that aimed to challenge existing beliefs about fear of crime and role of police.
Authors explored links between disorder and anti-social behaviour to occurrences of serious crime in communities.
Article consisted of 3 sections:
1-safe neighbourhoods
2-changing role of police
3-maintaining order
Method
This article is a discussion piece proposing theory of neighbourhood safety and crime so does not use particular sample.
Authors made reference to one case in detail- Newark Foot Patrol experiment.
Newark foot patrol experiment
Newark=city in New Jersey
-state-wide initiative started in mid 70s
-called ‘safe and clean neighbourhood’s programme’
-programme designed to improve quality of community life by putting more officers on foot patrol on street.
-Popular with politicians, unpopular with police chiefs who saw foot patrols as reducing police mobility
-disliked by police officers- saw as hard work and punishment, outside in all weather
Researchers also conducted naturalistic participants observation
Observed police officers, Kelling accompanied different officers on foot patrol over many hours observing interactions with members of community through Newark.
RESULTS
After 5 years review of programme found NO decrease in crime rates.
However evaluation found residents reported feeling crime reduced, took fewer behavioural precautions like not staying at home behind closed doors, felt more secure.
Authors suggested rather than catching serious criminals officers were preventing crime through maintaining public order.
Officers saw it as their job to keep eye on strangers while members of community felt relieved and reassured.
Residents felt more confident to report disorder, felt something would be done about it.
Wilson and Kelling suggested use of police vehicles was physical and mental barrier to their engagement with members of community and to having their presence felt.
Effect of broken windows theory on elderly
Very negative effect, they are most vulnerable and least likely to be able to move out of neighbourhood that has fallen into decay, chose to stay home from fear, minimise risk of becoming victim.
Theory was supported by Zimbardo 1969
Arranged for car without license plates to be parked with bonnet up in street in the Bronx NYC (high crime) and also in Palo Alto California (low crime).
In Bronx car was vandalised quickly followed by random destructive acts; parts torn off and upholstery ripped.
In Palo Alto car was left untouched for over a week, Zimbardo intervened and smashed it with sledgehammer, in few hours car was vandalised.
He concluded all areas are vulnerable to criminal invasion where there is a breakdown of community controls.
Wilson and Kelling point to a pattern of policing that has lead to urban decay
Police are now becoming crime fighters, making more arrests, solving more crimes and gathering evidence.
Authors suggest this changed focus of police work away from community relations.
Applying broken windows theory and tackling low-level anti-social behaviours such as drunk and disorderliness is not priority for officers.
Authors suggest foot patrol officers have key role in building community relations and collaborating with residents to prevent crime in ways that are difficult to do from inside police car. Police must keep order as well as fight crime.
Strategies for preventing crime
-Tenant organisations can hire off-duty police officers for patrol work in their buildings- more successful than hiring private security guards
-Police officers should be encouraged to go to work on public transport where they can enforce rules about smoking, drinking and disorderly conduct- those not following rules can be ejected.
-Police should protect communities as well as individuals and recognise importance of maintaining intact communities without broken windows.
Conclusion
In this article authors conclude the relationship between low-level and serious crime can be understood using ‘broken windows theory’ and that public order should be created and maintained by police and community collaboratively.
Usefulness
Research is useful.
Working with police officers and communities studying influence of crime on neighbourhoods is good alternative to working with offenders.
Situational crime prevention considers risk factors involved in communities such as type of neighbourhood, type of policing, type of residents and aims to develop initiatives to improve crime conditions in society.
Reductionist
Broken windows theory situational explanation of crime, disorder=serious crimes and disorder and crime are linked, if order maintained and minor crimes also identified crime is reduced.
Reductionist because other extraneous variables occurring in communities besides maintaining order could account for criminal activity.
More holistic approach should be considered.
Free will vs determinism
Deterministic as they suggest even single instances of anti-social behaviour can result in more serious problems for communities.
Psych as a science
Supports psych not as a science.
Article published online largely based on anecdotal evidence, some personal experiences and an evaluation of the project.
Lacks many features of science; lack of control of extraneous variables, objectivity, replicability and standardisation.
Validity of any conclusions should be approached with caution.
Sampling bias
Study was based on safe and clean neighbourhoods programme New Jersey in 70s.
Whether such a programme would have same results in other communities and other countries is questionable.
Zimbardo suggests broken windows theory is generalisable to different areas but research outside of USA would be useful.
Ethnocentrism
Not ethnocentric to select sample from one particular culture, would be ethnocentric to make assumption findings from one cultural group might easily be applied to another.
Much psychological research into features of neighbourhoods and ZTP has been conducted in UK or USA.
Think about how people in different countries and cultures live their lives and types of crimes committed.
Article based, proposes theory rather than piece of research.
Problems and things to remember:
More common evaluative issues used usually don’t apply to Wilson and Kelling’s research.
Issues such as psych as a science and sampling may be relevant.
Difficult to evaluate as many methodological issues and debates surround concepts of usefulness, free will vs determinism, reductionism and individual vs situational explanations of crime.
‘Issues’ questions relate to whole topic area rather just the key research, being familiar with methodological issues of Zimbardo’s study into broken windows is important.
