Why Crime Rates Fell

by Conklin, John E.

• ISBN13: 9780205381579
• ISBN10: 020538157X
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2002-11-25
• Publisher: Prentice Hall

Summary

riminal Justice Plummeting crime rates were front-page headlines throughout the 1990s, but criminologists have yet to provide a satisfactory explanation for this historically unprecedented decline. This new book fills that gap by using published research and available data to assess the various explanations offered by law-enforcement officials, political leaders, and criminologists in the New York Times during the 1990s.Why Crime Rates Fell also assesses the validity of the explanations offered in the newspaper for the decline in crime rates. Hypotheses put forth by political leaders, law-enforcement officials, and criminologists are assessed using published research and available data. The author's goal is to provide understanding of why crime rates fell in order to point the way to measures that can save more lives and property. This new book will teach the reader what criminologists have discovered about the causes of crime and show them how research can be used to understand a social phenomenon that has received extensive media coverage in recent years. Criminologists, sociologists and anyone interested in criminal justice.

Table of Contents

Each chapter ends with “Conclusion.”

1. Introduction.

2. The Decline in Crime Rates in the 1990s.
Measuring Crime.
Crime Indicators.
Relative and Absolute Change in Crime Rates.
Crime Trends 1960-1999.
New York City's Contribution to the Decline in National Crime Rates.
The Failure to Report and Record Crime.
Crime Cycles.

3. The Politics of Falling Crime Rates in New York City.
The Dinkins-Brown/Kelly Administration.
The Giulani-Bratton Administration.
The Giuliani-Safir Administration.

4. Did the Police Reduce Crime?
Crime and the Number of Police Officers.
Crime and What the Police Do.

5. Did Increased Incarceration Reduce Crime?
Crime and Incarceration in the New York Times.
Research on the Crime-Incarceration Relationship.

6. Drugs and Falling Crime Rates.
Drugs, Crime, and the Criminal Justice System.
Drug Use and Crime rates in the New York Times.
Drugs and Crime in the 1990s.

7. Firearms and Changing Crime Rates.
Firearms and Crime in the New York Times.
The Firearms-Crime Relationship.
Firearms and Crime in the 1990s.

8. Age and Crime.
Age and Crime in the New York Times.
Have Changes in the Age Structure Affected Crime Rates?

9. Changing Institutions and Falling Crime Rates.
Lafree's Theory of Institutional Legitimacy.
Crime and the Family.
Crime and the Economic System.
Crime and the Political System.
Crime and Religion.
Crime and Community.

10. Why Did Crime Rates Fall in the 1990s?
The Police.
The Prisons.
Drugs.
Firearms.
Age Structure.
Institutions and Community.
Understanding the Causes of the Decline in Crime.

Appendix.

Bibliography.