The Solution: Zero Tolerance

WHAT IS ZERO TOLERANCE?:

• First introduced in NY in 1994 and was widely applauded for reducing crime.

• However, Jock Young argues that its ‘success’ was a myth peddled b y politicians and police keen to take the credit for falling crime.

EFFECTIVE POLICY OR URBAN MYTH?:

• The crime rates in NY had already been falling since 1985 – nine years before zero tolerance – and was also falling in other US (and foreign cities) that didn’t have zero tolerance policies.

• Police need arrests to justify their existence, and NY’s shortage of serious crime led police there to ‘define deviance up’. That is, they took to arresting people for minor acts that had previously fallen out of their ‘net’.

• This concludes that zero tolerance was an urban myth.

OTHER CRITICISMS OF ZERO TOLERANCE:

• Preoccupied with petty street crime and ignores corporate crime, which is more costly and harmful.

• Gives the police free reign to discriminate against minorities, youth, the homeless, etc.

• Over-emphasises control of disorder, rather than tackling the causes of neighbourhood decline such as lack of investment.

• Zero tolerance and target hardening just lead to displacement of crime to other areas.