Community Crime Prevention: Theories, Models, and Challenges

Introduction

Community crime prevention is a goal of many communities and law enforcement agencies around the world today. The idea is based on sociological, psychological, and criminal justice principles and theories about the way people interact in society, how trust is developed, what conditions tend to lead to crime, and how culture plays a part in preventing crime. This paper discusses the etiological theories supporting community crime prevention, as well as its essential components. It identifies and describes different models for community crime prevention, community crime prevention organizations, and the obstacles and challenges facing community crime prevention efforts.

Community as a Central Institution in Crime Prevention

Community is a central institution in crime prevention because it is the life of society — the place where individuals interact, get to know one another, develop social bonds, grow organizations, and establish roots. Without community life, the environment is prone to deterioration: there is no sense of accountability, no sense of responsibility, no initiative to improve surroundings, and no connectivity among stakeholders. Crime tends to proliferate in areas where there are opportunities for it to take hold. This is the basis of various etiological theories, such as broken windows theory, social control theory, and social disorganization theory.

By establishing a culture of accountability within a community, the necessary social structure for encouraging responsible lifestyles can develop properly. The main challenge of crime prevention is to identify the underlying issues that lead to crime. By focusing on community life, the goal is to develop an infrastructure that facilitates a positive environment in which crime is discouraged through informal social controls, activism, community service, and community surveillance.

Etiological Theories Supporting Community Crime Prevention

Gibbs (1987) points out that "each theory should be limited to one type of crime if only because it is unlikely that any etiological or reactive variable is relevant for all crimes" (p. 830). However, Listwan (2013) states that "the cause of crime can be found in the environmental conditions within impoverished areas."

Social disorganization theory and social control theory help to explain why some types of crime may emerge. Broken windows theory offers another perspective that focuses more on the physicality of the community, arguing that unkempt communities demonstrate a lack of care and open the door to criminal enterprises. In any case, community is a focal point for both the causes and facilitators of crime and, thus, a primary arena for crime prevention. Social control theory holds that opportunities for control attract criminals who seek to profit from unethical decision-making (Takagi et al., 2016). Social disorganization theory holds that the more disorganized a community is, the easier it is for criminal elements to take root and exploit its weaknesses. Essentially, from the standpoint of these theories, crime results from the breakdown of the social community and the deterioration of the socio-economic and physical community. As informal social control breaks down — due to physical neglect of properties, a lack of community organization, or exploitable weaknesses in formal systems of control — the community degenerates. Social disorganization has therefore been found to lead to crime and disorder by way of the degeneration of community culture (Sutherland et al., 1992).

Zones of transition further exacerbate the issue because they are areas characterized by high and often rapid population turnover. Residents in these zones do not lay down roots, so families do not feel connected to or responsible for the community or its maintenance. They live there essentially as transients, and this is where delinquency is often highest (Felson, 2018). Without effective socialization and control, there is no way out of this pathology. Solutions that have been implemented focus mainly on community development, such as those seen in the Urban Village Model, the Chicago Area Project, and the Mesa, Arizona, Mesa Gang Intervention Program (MGIP). MGIP was implemented by the Mesa Police Department in conjunction with community leaders and organizations in order to reduce delinquency-related gang problems and crime (Spergel et al., 2005). MGIP was a five-year program utilizing a case-management approach, involving a team of gang police, probation officers, case managers, and outreach youth workers. The key elements of its success were the coordination among community leaders, organizations, and law enforcement agencies. Their combined and committed effort reduced crime by giving youths alternatives to crime through community organization and informal control.

Essential Components of Community Crime Prevention

Community crime prevention is community-based, meaning that the community is the focal point of effective crime prevention. Private citizens are expected to play a major role in maintaining order within their community. The success of community crime prevention depends upon their motivation to exert that maintenance, and thus from a crime prevention standpoint it is imperative that they be encouraged to assume responsibility for community safety. As was demonstrated in MGIP in Mesa, crime prevention efforts must bring together individuals and groups who represent the community, including civic leaders, professionals, coaches, educators, business owners, parents, social workers, and law enforcement officers. Partnerships and coordination between neighborhood residents, community groups, and police are essential. The community must be seen as a major crime prevention institution, alongside the family, schools, labor markets, and other social institutions.

Local residents must act collectively and in a public-minded manner. Individualistic attempts at community reform fail to involve all aspects and members of the community. To turn a community around requires collective action, with everyone participating at different levels. The more people involved, the more likely the movement is to succeed, as there is strength in numbers. This is especially true in shared public spaces — such as parks, basketball courts, street corners, and swimming pools — where crime and disorder can flourish if community members are unwilling to get engaged and show ownership of these spaces. Cleaning and maintaining these areas requires a community effort grounded in social interaction, social cohesion, and informal social control.

By modifying the behavior of potential victims within a community, crime can be prevented. To this end, the "implant" or "transplant" hypothesis can be applied, although it can be difficult to mobilize communities in crime-ridden areas (Schneider, 2020). To support this encouragement, some stability is needed — or some investment that can either produce or strengthen the social environment so as to provide for informal regulation. Clubs, organizations, and extracurricular activities such as sports for youths can facilitate this process: by giving vulnerable subpopulations an alternative to crime, disorderly behavior can be reduced. Through implanting social cohesion, informal social control can grow where it did not previously exist.

Informal social control represents social norms in which customs and common agreement have been established. It is difficult to accomplish informal social control in communities with high turnover because there is no way to establish continuity or consistency without local organizations or leaders who establish roots. To enforce local rules or to encourage appropriate public behavior, a grass-roots environment must persist; if it is established, it can promote norms and standards of conduct that deter crime and disorder. Informal social control is therefore seen as a prerequisite for territoriality, vigilance, surveillance, and activism on the part of residents.

Developing informal social control can proceed organically or artificially. Organic development requires minimal population movement so that patterns of association can be well established to facilitate social cohesion. Artificial development can proceed through transplant in areas where transience is high and where communities are disorganized (Schneider, 2020).

Situational crime prevention depends upon social interaction, social cohesion, and informal social control. Neighborhood residents can be mobilized to participate in crime prevention through collective action. Their collective involvement should foster a stronger sense of community, whereby individuals assume a greater responsibility for the maintenance of their community and for the protection of property and the lives of others. The more socially interactive and cohesive the community becomes, the more it leads to informal social control, which in turn reinforces crime prevention. The essence of situational crime prevention is to focus on the environment, build bridges between community members, promote points of contact and inter-communication, and enhance community spirit through positive interaction and networking.

Crime pattern theory and routine activities theory are among the theoretical processes underlying community crime prevention. As Bruce and Santos (2011) explain, a crime series is "a group of similar crimes thought to be committed by the same individual or group of individuals acting in concert" (p. 3). Other theories are equally helpful, such as social bond theory and life course theory. Social bond theory posits that unless individuals cultivate necessary social bonding with others in the community, they do not feel they owe anything to that community and do not feel they need to abide by its laws or rules. They feel outside the normal social fabric and thus engage in self-interested activities — including criminal activities — with disregard for how these affect others or the community as a whole. To resist this kind of isolation, community outreach programs and social work can be advantageous, especially at the grass-roots level, where churches and civic leaders can engage with community members on a person-to-person basis. Leadership is required to bring people into a normal social bonding experience.

Life course theory posits that life events can derail a person from becoming a law-abiding citizen. These may be traumatic experiences that set a person on the wrong track, or an accumulation of small experiences that gradually push one toward criminality. A proper life course development toward law and order must be supported by peers, groups, and media; it is the accumulation of these three influential factors that can help keep individuals on a constructive path.

Conclusion

Community crime prevention is not an easy process, but it is one rooted in sound etiological theories of crime, sociology, psychology, culture, and policing. Communities have to be supported by informal social controls, wherein members of society know and understand what is acceptable behavior and what is not. This type of informal social control depends upon the establishment of a community culture that is social, principled, and consistent; otherwise, it can only be enforced through the formal means of policing. Policing can be an object of controversy, especially in communities that are most in need of crime prevention, as law enforcement relations with communities across the world are at significantly serious lows. Through community organization and the application of community crime prevention models, some headway may be made, but at root it is the culture of the community and the leadership of individuals that makes the decisive difference.

References

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