1. LO: To understand how environmental factors influence crime
Locality and Crime
LO: To understand how environmental factors influence crime
Sociologists have explored the links between where people live, work and have their leisure and crime patterns. What can these tell us?

2. Explaining offenders The pattern: Shaw & McKay (1931)
Chicago sociology
The pattern: Shaw & McKay (1931)
Plotted the location of the addresses of those who committed crimes in the city. They found that if they divided the city into concentric zones, each had different levels of offenders. The popluations were changing rapidly, suggesting it was the zones not the inhabitants that encouraged crime
Explanation: - social disorganization & cultural transmission.
Activity:
Briefly summarise Shaw & McKay’s (1931) explanation for ‘the pattern

3. Differential association
A criticism of the Shawn & McKay was that their theories were too vague and difficult to prove
Sutherland & Cressey (1966) put forward their concept of differential association
This states that if people interact with others who support lawbreaking, they are likely to support it themselves (‘favourable definitions’)
In order to further clarify they suggests four types of definition:  frequency, duration, priority & intensity

4. Differential association
frequency, duration, priority & intensity
How often, for how long, how early in life, and from whom an individual is exposed to criminal associations will affect the relative impact on an individual’s behaviour.
For example, a young child who is raised by a drug-addicted parent will be exposed to stronger definitions of deviant behaviour than a teenager who witnesses a cousin snorting cocaine at a party.
In this case, the child would be frequently exposed (frequency) for many years (duration) in early life (priority) to pro-criminal definitions.

5. Housing policies
Most British research failed to replicate the Chicago School findings
The crime rates varies by area, but in more complex patterns
Morris (1957) found no evidence to suggest that people from high crime areas had an obviously different set of values to those in mainstream society
Suggested a more important factor was local councils’ housing policies.

6. Activity: Explain how the actions of local housing authorities could lead to high levels of delinquency in certain areas
Baldwin & Bottoms (1976) – ‘Stonewall’ and ‘Gardenia’, the concept of “Tipping”

7. ‘Stonewall’ / ‘Gardenia’ and “Tipping”
Research in Sheffield also failed to reflect American findings. A study by Bottoms, Mawby and Xanthos (1989) looked at two council estates - Stonewall and Gardenia - separated by a main road. Recorded offender rates for Gardenia were 300% higher than those for Stonewall. Both estates were built in the 1920s. Each had a stable population of 2500 to 3000, with 60% of adults in both areas having lived in the same residence for 10 years or more. And there was little or no difference between the estates in terms of social factors such as class, ethnicity, age, gender, income and employment levels.
The researchers offered the following explanation for the differences in offender rates between Stonewall and Gardenia. Sometime in the 1940s, Gardenia 'tipped'-started a downward spiral towards a high crime area. This appears to have influenced the council's housing policy. Those with severe housing needs and various other social problems were allocated to Gardenia - the very people most at risk of crime. Gardenia developed a negative reputation which resulted in some residents leaving and others refusing to move on to the estate.

8. Disorder Skogan (1990) Expanded the idea of tipping
Social control breaks down when there is a combination of physical deterioration in local buildings and parks, and an increase in social disorder
This leads to a situation of disorder, which has 3 consequences:
Undermines the mechanisms of informal social control
Generates worries about neighbourhood safety – people avoid going out at night
Those who can afford to move out of the area

10. Activity: Create a table outlining newspapers’ and sociologists’ different approaches to ethical issues
Newspapers
Sociologists

11. Social capital
There has been a recent shift back to understanding the role of values in crime
Putnam – social capital
There has been a decline in the extent to which people are linked into family and friendship networks
Feel more alone and less confident about engaging in community activity
Weak community is unable to impose social control on those who engage in offending
Which perspective would hold that a decline in family and community networks leads to delinquency?

12. William Julius Wilson (1996)
Adapted a version of Putnam’s approach to explain the high levels of crime in deprived neighbourhoods
Argued:
There is a high level of social interaction, people are not isolated
There are, however, low levels of social control
Stems from a sense of powerlessness and a lack of integration into the wider society
Sampson et al. (1997) – inner-city Chicago: considerable social interaction between people, little community organisation (‘collective efficacy’)
Areas with high levels of collective efficacy = low crime, regardless of levels of social interaction

13. Explaining offences
We have look at the effect of where offenders live, but it is important to consider where the offences take place too
Wilkstrom (1991)- Stockholm
Types and extent of offences vary across neighbourhoods
City centres, poorer districts & affluent areas adjacent to poorer districts have higher rates of crime
Poorer districts = more violent crime
More affluent districts = more burglary
Activity:
Explain why there is a difference in the type of crime, depending on the area. Think about the different factors leading to crime that you have already learnt about

14. Explaining offences Cognitive maps Brantingham (1991)
- We all hold cognitive maps of the place in which we live.
- Some parts are more familiar than others.
Offenders more likely to commit offences where opportunities link with ‘cognitively known areas’

15. Opportunity theory Clarke (1995) Opportunity made up of two elements:
How attractive the target it (how much can be gained)
How accessible the target is (how easy it is to commit the crime)

16. Routine activities: Cohen & Felson (1979)
Crimes more likely to occur where day-to-day activities of victims and offenders are likely to coincide and where there is little formal of informal social control
Activity:
They introduced two knew issues into the discussion about explaining offences. Summarise their definitions.

17. These ideas have lead to the suggestion of ‘situational crime prevention’
Clarke (opportunity theory)
Cohen & Felson (routine activities)
Agree that crime occurs when the offender think that the advantages of carrying out the crime outweigh the disadvantages of being caught
More effective way of reducing crime is to make the ‘costs’ of committing crime higher
Activity:
Outline the suggested ‘situational crime prevention’ methods on p. 269 and suggest one of your own for theft and violence

18. Bernasco & Nieuwbeerta (2005)
Activity: p. 369 Focus on research box – create a table and fill in the boxes, thinking of your own conclusions and criticisms too
Aims
Procedure
Findings
What conclusions could you draw?
Criticisms/evaluation?

19. The privatisation of public space
Distinction between public space and private space is important for levels and types of offending
Stinchcombe (1963)
‘the institution of privacy’ – policing tended to be against deviant activities carried out in public, less so with violence and abuse in the home
This study was carried out in 1963 – has this changed?

20. The issue of private and public space has re-emerged recently
Shearing & Stenning (1983)
There has been a growth of shopping centres and leisure complexes
These places are both public and private as most people are welcomed but the owners have the power to exclude people
This is also true in housing, with gated communities
S&S argue that owners have taken reponsibility for ‘policing’ these areas using CCTV & security guards  privatisation of public space
Exclusion of undesirable groups has displaced crime to the less affluent publica areas

21. Time
Cohen & Felson (routine activities) – time is an important and often neglected factor in crime
Areas change depending on the time of day
Hobbs et al. (2000) – ‘night-time economy’
In last 15 years – more pubs and clubs
This leads to people going out and drinking (and possibly taking drugs)
As a result a huge number of young people come together in a small time-band in a relatively restricted area
¾ of all violent incidents in urban areas occur at the weekend between 9pm and 3am, usually between groups of young men
Activity: Outline Hobbs’ (2003) findings to support this.

22. The night-time economy and the global economy
Taylor (1999)
Nocturnal economy and crime
The impact of the global economy in Britain has been a huge decrease in manufacturing leading to loss of tradional working-class employment
Tradtionally industrial towns have seen a decline in their economy
Leisure industry takes over derelict factories etc. for clubs and bars, with limited jobs
Taylor suggests there is likely to be more crime in areas with high unemployment but many clubs and bars