The Ongoing Controversy over Shared Responsibility

Shared Responsibility

  • Shared responsibility asserts that both victims and criminals may have done something wrong, prompting victimologists to study their initiatives, responses, actions, reactions, motives, and intentions.
  • This perspective suggests victims may not have taken all possible steps to limit their exposure to threats.

Repeat and Chronic Victims

  • Past injury is a strong predictor of future harm.
  • Revictimization tends to occur rapidly in hot spots and hot dots.
  • Victimologists interview victims to understand victim careers and reduce future harm.
  • Two explanations for repeat victimization:
    • Boost explanation: Repeat victimizations occur because offenders gain knowledge about the target during the initial crime.
    • Flag explanation: Repeat victimizations occur because a target has permanent characteristics that attract criminals (e.g., vulnerable location).

Spectrum of Possibilities: Typologies of Shared Responsibility

  • Typologies illustrate the degree of shared responsibility, encompassing:
    • Complete innocence
    • Ideal behavior
    • Culturally legitimate and appropriate actions
    • Deserving status
    • Consenting involvement
    • Recidivist tendencies
    • Full responsibility

Victim Blaming

  • Victim blaming involves a three-stage thought process:
    • Assuming something is wrong with the victims.
    • Presuming differences are the source of their plight.
    • Warning victims to change their actions and thought processes.
  • Victim blaming is prevalent because it:
    • Addresses the question of “Why him and not me?”
    • Comforts those with a just-world outlook.
    • Reflects society holding victims personally accountable.
    • Serves as justification for crimes by offenders.

Victim Defending

  • Victim defenders criticize victim blamers for:
    • Overstating victim’s responsibility.
    • Overestimating blameworthy actions.
    • Implying that caution and vigilance are always adequate solutions.
  • Victim defending focuses on:
    • Offender blaming: Holding the wrongdoer solely responsible.
    • System blaming: Placing some responsibility on society’s institutions and arrangements.

System Blaming

  • System blaming is linked with victim defending.
  • It posits that lawbreakers and victims are products of their environment.
  • Actions are influenced by socialization agents, including parental input, peer pressure, subcultural prescriptions, school experiences, media images, and religion.

Victim Facilitation

  • Victim facilitation, precipitation, and provocation involve shared, undesirable actions by individuals before victimization.
  • Provocation is the most serious charge, while facilitation is the least.
  • Facilitation involves careless or inadvertent actions by the victim.
Identity Theft
  • Identity theft begins with illegally appropriating personal information and extends to stealing from existing financial accounts.
  • Identity Theft and Assumption Deterrence Act made ID theft a federal crime.
  • Identity theft is often unreported and not counted in the Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR).
  • The FTC's Consumer Sentinel Network and insurance company surveys show rising rates of ID theft.
  • In 2016, individuals spent 1616 billion repairing creditworthiness.
  • Factors affecting risk:
    • Internet usage
    • Demographics (women, ages 25−6525-65, biracial, high-income level)
    • Geographic location (e.g., Michigan and Florida).
  • Thieves use methods like stealing wallets, laptops, mail, shoulder surfing, phishing, skimming, and caller ID phone spoofing.
  • Victim blamers point to
    • Carelessness.
    • Failure to follow preventative measures.
  • Victim defenders argue
    • Prevention measures are impractical or unreasonable.
    • Even cybersmart people are victimized.
  • System blamers cite
    • Huge data breaches affecting the majority of the public.
Burglaries
  • Residential burglaries are facilitated by open windows and unlocked doors.
  • Those most likely to be burglarized include younger people, larger households, racial minorities, and lower-income households.
  • Victim defenders argue that most burglaries are forcible entries.
  • System defenders argue that the black market for stolen goods provides money-making opportunities.
Vehicle Thefts
  • Victim blamers point to negligence and crimes of opportunity, such as unlocked cars (2020%) and running cars (3333%).
  • Victim defenders argue that professional thieves are a bigger problem than joyriders, with only 1 out of 8 cars being key-facilitated.
  • System defenders argue that secondary markets make thefts appealing.

Victim Precipitation and Provocation

  • Provocation is a stronger condemnation than precipitation.
  • Most victim-precipitated murders involve male victims and alcohol.
  • Charges of sub-intentional death are often leveled at repeat victims.
  • Some victims die due to street culture norms.
  • Justifiable homicides involve dead offenders, not provocative victims.
Violent Crimes
  • National Commission on the Causes and Prevention of Violence examined the role of alcohol consumption via the selective-disinhibition and outlet-attractor perspectives.
  • Robberies proceed through five stages: planning, establishing co-presence, developing co-orientation, transferring valuables, and exiting.

System Defending

Homicide
  • Media glorification of violence.
  • Historical use as a means of conflict resolution.
Robbery
  • Gulf between the well-off and the poor.
  • Consumer-oriented society.
Burglary
  • Fencing incentivizes thievery.
Identity Theft
  • Numerous data breaches expose personal data.
  • Much personal information is readily available on the Internet.
  • Current laws are inadequate.
  • Companies are not held accountable for breaches or their impact.

Theorizing about Risk Factors

  • Theoretical explanations start as hypotheses answering “Why…?” questions, make empirical generalizations, and ask “What accounts for this?”
Deterrence Theory
  • Classical school of thought centers on free will or rational choice.
  • Deterrence theory notes that offenders may not learn intended lessons in jail, and suffering may not deter the general public.
Routine Activities Theory
  • Attractiveness
  • Situational factors
  • Proximity
  • Vulnerability
  • Routine activities theory emphasizes the existence of motivated criminals, availability of suitable targets, and presence/absence of capable guardians.
Lifestyle Theory
  • Daily activities govern the social ecology of victimization.
  • Lifestyle accounts for differences in susceptibility to violence and theft and stresses exposure to high-risk persons, locations, and time periods.
  • Deviant lifestyles greatly heighten risks.
Equivalent Group Explanation
  • Offenders choose victims from their own circles.
  • Subculture of violence theory suggests fighting as a first resort.
  • Blame-the-victim bias implies some victims' suffering is less deserving of compassion, support, and respectful treatment.

Crime Prevention vs. Victimization Prevention

  • Crime prevention relies on proactive strategies, while crime control relies on reactive measures.
  • Victimization prevention involves tips, warnings, advice, risk-reduction activities, avoidance strategies, risk-management tactics, situational crime prevention, crime prevention through environmental design, and crime resistance.

Reducing Risks

  • Generally, it is safer to stay home, travel in pairs, avoid public places and strangers, and keep one’s guard up.
  • A cost-benefit analysis determines when the odds pose an acceptable risk.
  • Victimologists must study prevention tips to determine their effectiveness.

Ambivalence and Risk Taking

  • American culture both embraces and abhors risk taking, mirroring contradictory responses to victimization.