NCJ Number
184268
Date Published
1997
Length
26 pages
Annotation
The author examines whether, in attempts to develop practices to displace law and order as the basis of political and public discourse, crime prevention advocates can demonstrate similar resolve in South Australia.
Abstract
The author indicates that, in the case of South Australia, difficulties in crime prevention appear to be political and administrative in nature and to be associated with conflicts over crime control philosophies and priorities. Government officials in South Australia made crime prevention a major theme in 1989 when a study was conducted to review crime prevention in other countries. Crime prevention initiatives in France, Great Britain, the Netherlands, and the United States were considered, and the study determined that there was more to crime prevention than identifying success stories and transferring them to the Australian case. In the early 1990's, South Australia's crime prevention strategy incorporated a Statewide Coalition Against Crime with five working groups and the reallocation of local resources to build local crime prevention constituencies. In discussing the crime prevention efforts of South Australia, the author notes difficulties associated with incompatibility between politicians who announce new programs and administrators charged with implementing those programs and with viewing crime prevention strictly as a social control mechanism. He concludes that crime control policies should be informed by sound criminological theory and research. 83 references