British Journal of Criminology 53(5)

British Journal of Criminology, September 2013: Volume 53, Issue 5

Crime and Economic Downturn: The Complexity of Crime and Crime Politics in Greece since 2009
Sappho Xenakis and Leonidas K. Cheliotis

Description and explanation of the relationship between economic downturn and crime have to date been limited by the narrow scope of criminal activity characteristically selected as a focus by pertinent criminological scholarship. Efforts to examine the relationship have overwhelmingly approached it through the prism of common property and violent offences, or, and to a lesser degree, white-collar crime. As a consequence, appreciation has been impeded of the existence and heightened political significance of diverse and complex connections between a wider array of forms of criminality during times of economic downturn. To demonstrate the value of such connections to the study of the relationship between economic downturn and crime, we draw on the contemporary experience of crisis-hit Greece, where the political importance of associations between corruption, common property and violent offences, and illicit political violence, has made them indispensable components of any account of the linkages between economic downturn and crime in the Greek context.

The Myths and Realities of Deterrence in Workplace Safety Regulation
Steve Tombs and David Whyte

Given the proliferation of the use of deterrence in neo-liberal crime control policies, it is remarkable that this concept remains absent from the study and practice of corporate regulation. The paper explores this absence in the regulation literature, highlighting a series of widely accepted myths about deterrence in this literature, myths that have also been reproduced in British policy debates. Having discussed the enduring, if hidden, adherence to deterrence across this literature, we then go on to discuss the significant absences of deterrence and, in doing so, we focus specifically upon the dynamics of law enforcement, as it applies in the case of UK workplace health and safety law. The paper concludes that only through a careful consideration of the politics and praxis of law enforcement can we adequately grasp the context of the regulation of workplace safety—what the proper place of deterrence is and how it might be better secured.

Combating The Kidney Commerce: Civil Society against Organ Trafficking in Pakistan and Israel
Asif Efrat

Can civil society bring governments to curb transnational crime? The article answers this question by analysing a most-likely case for civil-society influence: organ trafficking. Physicians’ efforts to eliminate this practice are examined in Pakistan and Israel: two major participants in the global organ trade. In both countries, the physicians’ pressure resulted in the enactment of organ-trade prohibitions. These, however, were not fully enforced. The analysis suggests that, even under favourable conditions, civil society’s impact on transnational-crime policies is limited, yet not inconsequential: Pakistan’s involvement in organ trafficking, and even more so Israel’s, has declined. Beyond its contribution to understanding civil society’s role in the criminalization process, the article sheds light on the hitherto little-studied politics of the organ trade.

A Social Resistance Perspective For Delinquent Bahavior Among Non-Dominant Minority Groups
Roni Factor, David Mahalel, Anat Rafaeli, and David R. Williams

Non-dominant minorities, compared with majority groups, often have greater engagement in risky and delinquent behaviours. This study develops an innovative theoretical model for understanding risky/delinquent behaviour among non-dominant groups based on the social resistance framework, which suggests that power relations within society bring non-dominant minorities to actively engage in various forms of everyday resistance that can include delinquent behaviours. We tested this model on traffic violations, surveying 1,060 non-dominant and majority drivers in Israel. Structural equation models suggest that different mechanisms underlie delinquent behaviours in the two groups: social resistance plays a direct role in traffic violations among non-dominants, while, for the majority, procedural justice and non-commitment to the law have a stronger impact. Implications for understanding delinquent and risky behaviour and as an extension of the well-known procedural justice model are discussed.

Reflections on Risk, Anti-Social Behaviour and Vulnerable/Repeat Victims
Jane Donoghue

This article theorizes the adoption of risk assessment practices to inform criminal justice responses to ‘vulnerable’ and repeat victims of anti-social behaviour. Evidence suggests that some police forces have become highly risk-averse which has had consequences for the way in which minor incivilities have come to be viewed as perpetually requiring a formal police response. However, the development of victim risk assessment has also been very effective in enabling agencies to determine ‘high-risk’ victims with clarity and speed. It is argued that, rather than viewing risk in hegemonic terms, more attention ought to be given to conceptualizing risk in terms of the new opportunities it presents not simply for refining and improving the delivery of services, but also for the ways in which risk enables victims to develop new parameters of victimhood, and to subvert the traditional dominance of politics/policy in acting as primary definers on understanding(s) and accepted knowledge(s) of victimization and vulnerability.

‘Undoing’ Gender and the Production of Insecurity and Fear
Prashan Ranasinghe

While criminology has provided a wealth of knowledge about security and fear, it is hindered by a particular limitation, namely the failure to explore and explicate the manner in which space and place are crucial to their production and constitution. This paper seeks to highlight the importance of this line of inquiry for criminological analyses and does so by exploring and explicating the manner in which employees at an emergency shelter make sense of their (in)security and fear (or lack thereof) in their daily work lives. Attention is cast on the manner in which ‘(un)doing’ gender—biography being an important aspect in such thinking and acting—sheds light on the ways that the employees make sense of (in)security and fear and the ways that these feelings are informed by particular norms of security and fear that are inscribed into the space itself.

A Macro-Micro Integrated Theoretical Model of Mass Participation in Genocide
Olaoluwa Olusanya

Can general criminological theories of crime explain mass participation in genocide? Can seemingly conflicting theories be reconciled? And, if so, how? Only a small number of studies have attempted to explore the application of general criminological theories to international crimes. Also, there have been few attempts to integrate micro-level theories with macro-level theories. In this paper, I propose a macro–micro integrated theoretical model of mass participation in genocide. The proposed framework combines micro (e.g. social control theories) and macrolevel theories (e.g. strain theories), thereby recognizing that no single factor can explain people’s involvement in genocidal violence perpetration. Finally, the central element of my conceptual framework is the notion of cognitive dissonance (CD). I contend that CD can act as a structuring concept which allows for the development of a comprehensive criminological explanation for mass participation in genocide.

A Framework to Assess the Harms of Crimes
Victoria A. Greenfield and Letizia Paoli

Despite the centrality of harm to crime and criminalization and increasing interest in harm as a basis for crime-control policy, the criminological community has yet done little to systematically reflect on criminal harms or their identification, evaluation and comparison. This paper presents a newly developed framework with which to systematize the empirical assessment of such harms and address at least some of the attendant conceptual and technical challenges. It also suggests several roles for the framework in policy making. Our conclusions are twofold: it is possible to reliably evaluate the harms of criminal activities, as our examples suggest, but it is not possible—for both conceptual and technical reasons—to develop an encompassing estimate of the total harms of these activities.

Seeking ‘Civilianness’: Police Complaints and the Civilian Control Model of Oversight
Stephen P. Savage

The ‘civilian control’ model of police complaints systems is premised on a clear separation between ‘civilian-led’ and ‘police-led’ investigative processes. This paper examines the nature of ‘civilianness’ in civilian control-based oversight agencies by examining the cultural profiles and internal dynamics of three police oversight bodies within the British and Irish islands. Based on over 100 interviews, it presents findings relating to the motivations behind oversight work and the dynamics associated with the joint workings of investigators with both non-police and police backgrounds. It concludes that civilian control may be seen as a differentiated space with varying degrees of civilianness, including remnants from and continuities with police culture.

Social Disorganization and Crime in Rural Communities: The First Direct Test of the Systemic Model
Maria T. Kaylen and William Alex Pridemore

While there is considerable empirical evidence that social disorganization is positively associated with crime rates in urban areas, the empirical literature on rural social disorganization and crime faces three crucial limitations: inconsistent results, reliance on official crime statistics and the failure to test the full model. We overcome the two latter limitations via the British Crime Survey. Using data from respondents living in rural areas of 318 postcode sectors, we employed weighted least squares regression to estimate the effects of (1) the exogenous sources of social disorganization on our intervening measures of community organization and (2) all variables on victimization rates. This represents the first test of the full social disorganization model in the literature on rural crime and we find very little support for it. Our results suggest a reassessment of the conclusions drawn about how social disorganization and crime are related in rural communities.

Unintended Consequences of Neighbourhood Restructuring: Uncertainty, Disrupted Social Networks and Increased Fear of Violent Victimization Among Young Adults
Sara K. Thompson, Sandra M. Bucerius, and Mark Luguya

Concerns about high concentrations of poverty, social isolation and neighbourhood safety have made social housing developments the target of various interventions in recent decades. A current housing policy trend in many Western nations aims to de-concentrate poverty and other forms of disadvantage by engineering more socio-economically mixed residential environments. Based on 40 in-depth interviews, this paper examines the impact of neighbourhood ‘revitalization’ on young adult residents of Regent Park, Canada’s largest and oldest social housing project. We find that the large-scale displacement that attends this process has destabilizing effects on the neighbourhood, both in terms of social networks and supports, but also with respect to young people’s perceptions of their risk of violent victimization.

Social Disorganization, Social Capital, Collective Efficacy and the Spatial Distribution of Crime and Offenders: An Empirical Test of Six Neighbourhood Models for a Dutch City
Gerben J. N. Bruinsma, Lieven J. R. Pauwels, Frank M. Weerman, and Wim Bernasco

Six different social disorganization models of neighbourhood crime and offender rates were tested using data from multiple sources in the city of The Hague, in the Netherlands. The sources included a community survey among 3,575 residents in 86 neighbourhoods measuring the central concepts of the six models. The data were aggregated to ecologically reliable neighbourhood measures and combined with census data. Crime rates and offender rates were calculated on geo-coded police-recorded data on crimes and apprehended suspects. Spatial regression models were applied to test social disorganization theories in a Western-European city. The findings reveal that social disorganization models do not fit the data well, and indicate that crime rates and offender rates may be caused by distinct urban processes.