Introducing Social Geographies + Blood sports Some have been illegal in Britain since |835 (e.g, bear-baiting and cock- fighting), while others (eg, fox-hunting) are still legal. Within Europe laws vary widely for example, bull-fighting is legal in Spain. + Middle-class crime In most countries of the world, ‘white collar’ crimes in the workplace, such as fraud, are never punished as harshly as minor thefts by the less affluent (Langan, |996). + Violence against women This has been widely viewed as less acceptable between strangers in public space, than within the family in private space. Only after a long struggle led by feminists to change attitudes and statutes have domestic forms of violence begun to be treated by law enforcement agencies as criminal. + The redefinition of activities of those who occupy marginal or contested spaces The Criminal Justice and Public Order Bill (1994) in Britain newly defined as ‘criminal’ the activities of new age travellers, hunt saboteurs, those attending raves and mass trespasses — groups perceived as threatening the interests of the rightwing Conservative government and its traditional supporters (see Chapter 3). 11.1.2: Methods and approaches Until relatively recently, geographical research tended to focus upon quite a narrowly defined range of criminal acts. Part of the reason has been the data which are available for analysis. Official crime statistics are notoriously misleading, as only an estimated 44 per cent of all UK crimes are reported to the police, and personaliviolent crimes are particularly unlikely to be represented (Mirrlees-Black et al, 1998). Geographers’ earliest contributions to the study of crime involved the analysis of the better documented property crimes in cities, often using quantitative techniques such as computer mapping and statistics. In recent years social geographers have also examined the spatial patterns of violent crime, as previously ‘hidden’ crimes such as racial, sexual and homophobic violence have come to light. Much research on fear of crime has been criticized for using data from questionnaire surveys in which respondents are asked to choose from pre-set lists of responses to crime, without also using qualitative or subjective data to suggest what labels such as ‘fear’ actually mean (see section | |.3.|). More recently a range of alternative methods have been applied to study fear and its effects on individuals and communities, including in depth interviews, focus groups and local ethnographies. The philosophical approaches taken to the study of crime and fear of crime have also diversified, from early welfarist and positivist spatial science to recent work influenced by the humanistic tradition and more radical standpoints such as feminism (see Chapter |, section 3.1) 11.1.3 Outline of chapter Section | .2 is concerned with geographical theories about ‘crime areas’, and mainly concentrates on the environmental correlates of property crime and fear of crime. Section‘uoqequalo jenxas 0} Aidde you seop yey; Me} uoRepIUNU! S}yBs JOU Op sme) {yjeuad euULO aje4 yng 'uoNeyUaLO jenxos ‘opnjout 2m@] uonaajjo9 wep OWLS ayey UOBYOIY PUB PURE), “2010JU6 01 YNOYIP 91 PUB ‘sonUEPEIEYP oyJoods ‘@weU Jou S80p ynq 'Ies9UeB U! oWL aeY sassaippE Me] SEXO], 1DIqs97 pup ADd jUOAON :931NOS “4.46 ip, e sey sassouue) requienag ‘sai01g pou ‘saves 0} - Soysua;eTEYD Aue Uo paseg seuyo opnjouy jeUp sme] wo ajeY aney youog, ‘se}21S g}. - voyeWauO jenxes uo paseq sowiuo apnjout ou op sme] siuUD oe} soleis 1 - uove uaa lenxes uo paseg sau epnjoul sme] a9 ae}, eiquinjog, J0 OUNSG pue Sores f - MNuapL JapUEd pue UOYEWUaHO || lenxes Uo paseg saul spnjoul sme] siwu0 ale} IHW. SPH iE aanBey 233Introducing Social Geographies 111.3 introduces the spatial patterns of fear of crime, and their geographical relationship with crime. Section 11.4 deals more specifically with geographies of violent crime, their implications for the geographical experiences of individuals and social groups, and the ways in which space and place are involved in violence and resistance to violence. 11.2. ‘Crime areas’ and geographies of inequality According to official statistics, the greatest predictor of becoming a victim of crime is where you live. The distribution of crime has three basic characteristics which have remained and, some evidence shows, deepened, in recent years: * A small number of offenders commit a large number of crimes + Asmall number of victims suffer a large number of crimes + Assmall number of areas suffer @ disproportionate amount of crime (Trickett et al, 1995) ‘These three characteristics tend to coincide, as the most deprived areas of cities typically experience the highest levels of property crime. These frequently lie in or close to city centres in the USA, while patterns of public housing provision in Europe often means there are additional high crime areas on urban peripheries. These spatial patterns are not universal, but have been fairly prevalent and persistent across space and over time. Geographers and those working in related disciplines have interpreted these areal patterns in a number of ways 11.2.1 The built environment At a fine spatial scale, a large body of work has noted an association between the incidence of crime and particular built environments, and theorized a causal link between design and crime. Ths literature grew from the influential critique of post-war housing estates in the USA by Newman (1972), who identified four important housing design features which he suggested directly influenced the number of opportunities for crime + Territorial influence: ‘mechanisms for the subdivision of and articulation of areas of the residential environment intended to reinforce inhabitants in their ability to assume territorial attitudes and prerogatives’ + Surveillance opportunities: ‘mechanisms for improving the capacity of residents to casually and continually survey the non-private areas of their living environment, indoor and out! + Perception: ‘mechanisms which neutralize the symbolic stigma of the form of housing projects, reducing the image of isolation, and the apparent vulnerability of inhabitants’ + Juxtaposition: ‘the effect of location of a residential environment within a particular urban setting or adjacent to a “safe” or “unsafe” activity areal (Newman, 1972:50) 234