Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
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The 'local social-control' hypothesis suggests that neighbourhoods
with a strong sense of place and high social interaction are less
vulnerable.
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The 'area-variability' hypothesis suggests that mixed residential
areas with high levels of transience are vulnerable.
These are hypotheses for which some evidence is available but
this is rarely conclusive. The local social-interaction hypothesis
is closely aligned to the policy of 'neighbourhood watch' where
residents, in collaboration with crime prevention offi cers, look out
for each other's property in the fi ght against crime.
Along with crime itself, there is strong evidence of the importance
of fear of crime. Vulnerable people, such as the elderly and women
with young children, are often reluctant to move around certain
parts of the cities and areas such as open spaces after dark are
avoided. Research has moved on to examine the roles of the police
in shaping the geographies of crime. A well-known study of vice
areas in San Francisco showed that the spatial shifts in these over
time were products of the police and the criminal justice system in
changing the rules of behaviour rather than the 'offenders'
per se
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The police carry mental maps of the cities in which they work and
these can affect the forms of policing and the responses to crime.
Problem estates are the products of both those who live there and
of the gatekeepers and agencies that allocate the housing, set the
standards, and apply the rules.
Such geographies of crime lend themselves to interpretation
by the different approaches in geography. A spatial analysis
approach, for example, would map and correlate; a Marxist would
be more interested in the ways in which the unequal distribution
of wealth and opportunities creates crime in the fi rst place; a
behavioural geographer might study the decision-making process
a burglar follows or the mental maps he or she holds of the target
city. A postmodern approach would question the discourse of a
