Broken Windows: The police and neighborhood safety (George L. Kelling and James Q.Wilson) The Atlantic, March 1982 PDF

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Summary and Notes on Broken Windows: The police and neighborhood safety (George L. Kelling and James Q.Wilson) The Atlantic, March 1982 ...

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Broken Windows: The police and neighborhood safety (George L. Kelling and James Q.Wilson) The Atlantic, March 1982 Issue        

Mid 1970s, “Safe and Clean Neighborhoods Program” announced by The State of New Jersey to improve community life Money provided to up foot police patrol Aim was to cut crime BUT police argued that it caused reduce mobility and therefore effectiveness Assigning on foot patrol was considered a punishment due to increased work, cold, rain etc Police Foundation, Washington D.C published an evaluation after 5 years finding that foot patrol had not reduced crime rates. However, residents felt more secure, believed crime had been reduced and therefroe took fewer steps to protect themselves from victimisation People in foot patrol areas had a better opinion of police “officers walking beats had higher morale, greater job satisfaction, and a more favorable attitude toward citizens in their neighborhoods than did officers assigned to patrol cars.”

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Was foot patrol just fooling people? or did people realise that the job of foot patrol was different but still making the neighbourhood safer?

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Foot patrol elevated the level of public order, people were not troubled by disorderly members of society Foot patrol officers built up a relationship with the locals and unwritten rules developed e.g “drunks and addicts could sit on the stoops, but could not lie down” Was a more informal way of keeping order as well as following the letter of the law More fear from sense of disorder than from “real” crimes When interviewed people placed high value on public order Disorder and crime are linked e.g broken window theory Zimmy did experiments on this using a car with/without broken windows Due to area of experiments (The Bronx) there was much anonymity and frequency of cars being left and therefore vandalised THEREFORE vandalism happened much more quickly here than in Palo Alto where the stakes were higher “unattended behaviour” leaks into other aspects of life e.g weeds, lacking discipline in family life, fights This leads to serious crime Many people see violent crime as on the rise in these situations In these areas people don’t see it as their home but “a place where they live” Neighbourhood then ceases to exist This makes the area more prone to crime because it becomes more likely that criminal acts will occur The elderly find it difficult to move but they are also less likely to be victims of crime Focus on poverty crimes – is it a crime to be poor? Its not individualistic, its group based Can some communities fix their windows and some can’t?- maybe it depends on how much they care/the feeling of community For some people police control gives the façade of safety but for others perhaps this is a threat – eg black communities being over policed It DOES work but its expensive and can’t be rolled out everywhere

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Perhaps a waste of police time especially with the lack of resources rn because only petty crimes are targeted Just throw people into prison instead of focussing of rehab or prevention so not actually targeting the root source of the problem Targets deviance which is subjective...