Broken Windows Policing The author starts his article with the experimental Safe and Clean Neighborhoods Program created to enhance the quality of community life (New Jersey, mid-1970s).
foot patrol was a part of this program. From the very beginning, the local authorities and many police officers disliked foot patrol, but, since the government was paying for it, they were willing to go along. In five years the Police Foundation published a report evaluating the foot patrol project. The conclusion was that foot patrol had not reduced the crime rate, but the residents of the foot-patrolled neighborhoods seemed to feel more secure than the residents of non-patrolled areas. The policemen defined and enforced the rules aimed to eliminate everything that most often frightens people in public places and to make them feel more secure. Therefore, the project was quite successful as far as it made people feeling safer by establishing a kind of order, despite it had little to do with violent crime rate reduction.
At a community level crime and disorder are usually inextricably linked. The author illustrates this assumption by the following example: if a window in a building is broken and is left unrepaired, all the rest of the windows will soon be broken. The psychologists made several experiments confirming the righteousness of the window-broking theory. Drawing a parallel between the theory and the article, it is logical to conclude that the untended behavior can also lead to the breakdown of community controls. A stable community turns into a hostile and frightening jungle, where the fear rules. The disorderliness evokes a feeling of fear. In response to fear, people start avoiding each other, in its turn, weakening community controls.
The Essay on Broken Windows Theory
During the mid-70’s, the state of New Jersey came up with a program called “Safe and Clean neighborhood Program.” This program was designed to help better the quality of the community life in twenty-eight cities. For part of the program, the state had provided money to help some of the cities take police officers out of their patrol cars and assign them to walking beats. Many state officials were ...
Therefore, the role of police in maintaining public order is very important, and, although sometimes the police is unable to reduce the crime rate, it is able to enhance the level of community order, thus, indirectly being conductive to reinforce the informal control mechanisms of the community itself. Bibliography Wilson, J. Q. (1982).
Broken Windows. The Atlantic Monthly ..
