Helmut Hirtenlehner

Insecurities about crime in Germany, Austria and Switzerland: A review of research findings:

This paper reviews the research literature on insecurities about crime in Germany, Austria and Switzerland. Making criminological studies written in German accessible to the wider European community, we first document how insecurities about crime have been conceptualized and measured in these three countries, and second review the various theoretical positions that have been empirically assessed.We highlight commonalities and differences in the German- and English-language literatures on the topic, making the review relevant to criminologists from all European countries. Our overall goal is to help stimulate a comparative research agenda on insecurities about crime across the European continent.

The interaction between self-control and morality in crime causation among older adults

Situational Action Theory (SAT), a recently developed explanation of criminal conduct, is becoming increasingly studied. Hitherto, however, nearly all tests of the theory and its hypotheses have been based on samples of adolescents or young adults. Studies drawing on the older population have been missing so far. This work addresses the interplay of moral beliefs and the ability to exercise self-control in crime causation among respondents aged 50 years and over. In line with SAT and the results obtained previously for young people, our analyses show that self-control ability affects offending among older adults too, particularly when personal morality is weak.

Explaining the gender gap in juvenile shoplifting: A power-control theoretical analysis

Shoplifting is one of the crimes with the smallest gender gap among all offense types. Contrary to common stereotypes, males commit shoplifting more frequently than females. Apart from the insight that the share of female offenders is highest for crimes that are well compatible with the prevailing female role, the roots of the gendered distribution of shoplifting have not been extensively studied. Its focus on gender roles and gendered socialization processes makes power-control theory an obvious explanatory approach, yet it has never specifically been utilized to examine the gender gap in shoplifting. This study attempts to close this research gap. Based on a large-scale student survey from Austria, this study scrutinizes the theorys potential to account for the gender divide in juvenile shoplifting. Results provide somewhat more support for the control and risk-related parts of the theory than for its power component.

On the Conditional Relevance of Controls: An Application of Situational Action Theory to Shoplifting

ABSTRACT Classic self-control theory and the pure deterrence argument have both been recently challenged by integrative theory and appropriate empirical evidence suggesting that controls are only conditionally relevant to action. Situational Action Theory (SAT) provides a fertile framework within which to study the effectiveness of controls. Specifically, SAT’s principle of the conditional relevance of controls states that controls only influence behavior when a person is forced to deliberate over action alternatives because of conflict between his/her own moral rules and those of the setting. That the moral filter does not preclude crime from the action alternatives perceived by an individual can be due to weak personal moral norms or exposure to a crime-conducive moral context. In particular, SAT states that (1) deterrence (external control) only becomes relevant to deliberations when personal morality is weak and (2) the process of self-control (internal control) only becomes relevant to deliberations when an individual is exposed to criminogenic moral contexts. Both these hypotheses are tested with a large-scale Austrian student survey dedicated to the explanation of adolescent shoplifting. The results provide firm support for these key propositions of SAT.

Anxieties About Modernization, Concerns About Community, and Fear of Crime Testing Two Related Models

In contemporary European criminology, there is a growing understanding of the fear of crime as the consequence of, and a code for, broader social anxieties, the origins of which are usually traced to fundamental social and global transformation processes characteristic of late modernity. Within the large body of papers published on this topic, one can differentiate between two distinct perspectives: a generalized insecurity approach, according to which free-floating, amorphous anxieties about modernization are directly projected onto crime, and an expanded community concern approach, whereby abstract anxieties about social change require the prism of local conditions in order to convert into fear of crime. Here, these two perspectives are examined on the basis of survey data from Austria. The results provide support for both approaches, with slight advantages for the generalized insecurity model. We also demonstrate that large parts of the frequently reported association between concerns about incivility and fear of crime can be traced to their common roots in broader social anxieties. Questions are raised pertaining to the generalizability of the findings and a comparative research agenda is encouraged which acknowledges that pathways into fear of crime may differ from country to country, depending on the sociocultural and political–institutional makeup of a society.

Culture, Institutions, and Morally Dubious Behaviors: Testing Some Core Propositions of the Institutional-Anomie Theory

This study draws on self-report data on the prevalence of morally dubious behaviors in Europe to examine Messner and Rosenfelds institutional-anomie theory. Institutional-anomie theory tries to explain cross-national differences in crime rates through the interplay between the cultural commitments and the institutional arrangements characterizing a society. The relevant state of research is unsatisfactory and full of gaps. Deficiencies exist, especially with regard to the postulated cultural dynamics. Findings from a series of multilevel models testing the combined effects of cultural forces and social institutions on respondents’ engagements in morally dubious behaviors that are committed in pursuit of self-interest—thereby controlling for differences in sociodemographic composition—shed doubt on the theorys explanatory power. Neither the cultural imperatives of the “American Dream” nor the extent of anomic orientations are linked in the expected manner to the observed cross-national variation in rates of moral misconduct across Europe.

Experience or deterrence? Revisiting an old but neglected issue:

Deterrence theory states that fear of sanctions secures compliance with the law. Empirical research on the deterrent effect of legal sanctions has remained inconclusive though. This applies especially to perceptual deterrence studies. Most of them are cross-sectional in nature and rely on measures of self-reported previous offending, which implies that they actually explain past criminal behaviour from current perceptions of risk. However, such a temporal ordering of the concepts is more congruent with experiential effects according to which previous criminal involvement lowers subsequent risk perceptions rather than depicting deterrent relationships. The few longitudinal studies that have attempted to disentangle experiential and deterrent effects are based on samples from North America. Their common finding is that experiential effects exist and that they are substantially larger than the deterrent effect. Most of them reject the notion of deterrence. This work contributes to the discussion by for the first time addressing the experience–deterrence issue with panel data collected in the UK. Results show that associations between current risk estimates and prior offending found in cross-sectional studies reflect chiefly experiential effects. Evidence in support of deterrence remains very limited.

Politische und soziale Folgen von Bildungsarmut

Dieser Beitrag geht der Frage nach, welche politischen und sozialen Folgen Bildungsarmut hervorbringt und welche Konsequenzen diese Folgen fur die wirtschaftliche Entwicklung eines Landes haben. Zur Beantwortung der Fragestellungen wird auf der Grundlage der Sozialkapitalforschung ein Pfadmodell spezifiziert, das eine Wirkung von Bildungsarmut sowohl als Individual- als auch als Kontextmerkmal annimmt. Die Ergebnisse zeigen, dass sich Bildungsarmut auf der Betroffenenebene negativ auf die politische und soziale Teilhabe auswirkt. Auf der Makroebene reduziert eine hohe Pravalenz von Bildung ausgeschlossener Personen das Wirtschaftswachstum. Eine durchgehende vertrauensmindernde Wirkung indivi dueller Bildungsarmut ist derzeit nicht beobachtbar, aber theoretisch nicht auszuschliesen, da Bildungsarmut das Wirtschaftswachstum abschwacht und damit auch das BIP pro Kopf reduziert, dem seinerseits ein starker Effekt auf das Vertrauen zukommt. Fur die mittels PISA erfasste kollektive Bildungsarmut konnte ein negativer Effekt auf das institutionelle und soziale Vertrauen ermittelt werden.

Testing situational action theory : a narrative review of studies published between 2006 and 2015

This work provides an overview of the current state of research on Situational Action Theory (SAT). Studies that have examined core propositions of SAT within the period 2006 to 2015 are reviewed. The principal aim of this narrative review is to answer the following four questions: (1) Which hypotheses of SAT have been put to the test in empirical enquiries? (2) What does the empirical evidence say about these propositions? (3) Which statements of the theory have received little attention? (4) What are the consequences of the results for future enquiries? An overall finding of this review is that numerous studies have tested selected propositions of the theory using different methods, data and statistical procedures. A majority of these studies found some support for the hypotheses tested, but there are also a few studies that did not back key assumptions of the theory. The reasons for the divergent results are discussed.

Strategien der Bearbeitung sozialer Marginalität.

In recent literature state action strategies and collective sensibilities condense to complex regimes of dealing with deviance and marginality. Thereby, national practices of handling social difference combine with public sentiments and mentalities to form coherent cultures of social control. In this article we investigate whether homogeneous cultures of control can be observed in a sample of European countries. Cluster analysis identifies three distinct regimes of governing social marginality: (1) an inclusive regime wherein generous welfare provision and little incarceration merge with low levels of fear of crime and public punitiveness, against the backdrop of considerable trust in public institutions; (2) an exclusionary regime of modest welfare benefits and high imprisonment rates, wherein fear of crime, punitive attitudes and low confidence in governmental institutions are widespread; and (3) a hybrid regime in which inclusive and exclusionary elements form a fragile alliance. The inclusive regime can be found mainly in Scandinavia, the exclusionary regime is implemented particularly in Eastern Europe.