Environmental Criminology Notes

A branch of criminology that deals with why crime occurs when and where it does.
A family of theories sharing an interest in:
- Crime events
- The role of the immediate environment in crime causation
- Key approaches:
  - Routine Activities Approach
  - Crime Pattern Theory
  - Rational Choice Perspective

Environmental criminology is less concerned with the attributes or motivations of offenders.
It is interested in patterns of crime events rather than patterns of criminality.
Focuses on the causal role of opportunity.
Concentrates on proximate rather than distal causes.
Examines how the immediate environment creates patterns of crime events by bringing together offenders and targets in settings where offenses can take place.
Applied to manipulating the environment to reduce crime opportunities, rather than focusing on changing offenders' dispositions.
Appealing to those tasked with preventing crime (e.g., the police).
Shifting thinking from criminals to crime.

Criminal behavior is not confined to a minority of “different” people.
Our behavior (including criminal behavior) is highly responsive to situational forces.
Crime patterns can be understood in terms of the situations giving rise to criminal acts.
Situations can be changed deliberately to give rise to fewer crimes.

The tendency to overemphasize internal characteristics (character or intention) rather than external factors when explaining another person’s behavior in a given situation.
Contrasts with interpreting one's own behavior, where situational factors are more easily recognized and taken into account. Ross, L. and R.E. Nisbett (1991) The Person and the Situation McGraw-Hill

Early to mid 1800s: Adolphe Quetelet and André-Michel Guerry, French statisticians.
Their explanations focused mostly on offending and factors relating to propensity, rather than victims and vulnerability.
However, there are mentions of opportunity, and maps were produced akin to those still used.

Chicago School (e.g., Burgess) and concentric zones (1926).
Jane Jacobs (1961) – The Death and Life of Great American Cities.
C Ray Jeffery (1971) – Crime Prevention through Environmental Design.
Oscar Newman (1972) - Defensible Space: Crime Prevention Through Urban Design.

Cities grow radially to form concentric zones, each with distinctive uses and characteristics.
Competition between zones.
Crime is highest closest to the city center where there is greatest economic pressure and weak ties.
The nature of the neighborhood, not just the people in the neighborhood, dictated crime rates.

Jane Jacobs
- Journalist, commentator (not a criminologist).
- The Death and Life of Great American Cities.
- Cities should be designed to maximize “eyes on the street.”
- This serves to reduce opportunities for crime.
C R Jeffery
- Critic of rehabilitation as a crime prevention method.
- Called for a shift in focus from dispositions to the immediate environment.
- ‘there are no criminals, only environmental circumstances that result in criminal behaviour. Given the proper environmental structure, anyone will be a criminal or a non- criminal’ (Jeffery, 1971, p. 177).
Oscar Newman
- Narrower in focus and more practical than Jeffery.
- Focused on urban design.
- Crime is a product of anonymity.
- Urban design should promote territoriality through the use of real and symbolic barriers.
- Gives rise to defensible space.

Sidebottom, A., & Bowers, K. (2010). Bag theft in bars: An analysis of relative risk, perceived risk and modus operandi. Security Journal, 23(3), 206-224.
Bar T accounts for 22% of all bag thefts.
The top five bars account for 59% of all bag thefts.
Comparison of high-rate and low-rate facilities is often insightful and can inform prevention.

According to IACA:
- A profession and process in which a set of quantitative and qualitative techniques are used to analyze data valuable to police agencies and their communities.
- Includes the analysis of crime and criminals, crime victims, disorder, quality of life issues, traffic issues, and internal police operations.
- Supports criminal investigation and prosecution, patrol activities, crime prevention and reduction strategies, problem-solving, and the evaluation of police efforts.

Many different types: strategic, tactical, performance, intelligence, partnership, etc.
Generally can be thought of as working to slightly different aims and/or different data – although lots of overlap

Criminology tends to focus on criminal behavior and the distal causes of crime.
Environmental criminology focuses on crime events and the immediate causes of crime.
Overarching framework of theories which share an interest in crime events, their patterns, and the causal role of opportunity.
Crime is patterned—where crime is abundant, it exhibits concentrations.
These patterns matter because they allow for predictions which allow for prevention.
Crucially, a focus on opportunities and crime events highlights that offenses can be prevented without focusing on offenders. This is not traditional crime prevention policy.