Community-Based Crime Prevention: Tackling Hypersegregation and Poverty

Abstract

There are several options that are effective in crime prevention. However, very few crime prevention programs have been scientifically evaluated and have successfully replicated results. Sherman et al. (1997) report of 500 prevention programs found that there was not enough adequate evidence to conclude what crime prevention programs work and which do not. Sherman et al. (1997) placed seven programs into different institutional settings in which these programs were affective such as programs that were in communities, programs in families, in schools, in labor markets, in businesses and hotels and other common locations, programs by police, and programs out in place by criminal justice agencies after arrest or detention. I am most interested in programs that assist before the police and the criminal justice system gets involved, such as programs that focus on the community, families, schools, and the labor market. One domain that is the most interesting is the community domain in which Serman et al. (1997) states that the profound nature of the problems affecting our community and in turn affecting our crime rate is due to the central nature of communities in which they set the stage for all other institutions success or failures based on the community context in which they operate.  "Our nation's ability to prevent serious violent crime may depend heavily on our ability to help reshape community life, at least in our most troubled communities (Sherman et al. 1997)." Various community programs have failed to tackle inner-city violence commonly seen in hypersegregated communities where roughly half of all murders are committed. Hyerpsegregation due to government interference and policies  such as "restrictive covenants, redlining by banks and insurance companies, zoning, panic peddling by real estate agents, and the creation of massive public housing projects in low-income areas Serman et al. (1997) ." While there...