Jon Bannister

Afraid or Angry? Recalibrating the ‘fear’ of Crime

Studying the fear of crime is a research field that has grown enormously in the past two decades. Yet our empirical knowledge has grown at the expense of conceptual development. It is beginning to be suspected that ‘fear’ is a term encompassing a confusing variety of feelings, perspectives, risk-estimations, and which thus means different things to different people. It is additionally suggested that what we know empirically may well be largely an artefact of the fact that the questions that are put repeatedly to respondents seldom vary, and the ways that those questions are put, and the settings in which they are put seldom change. The research project which is in part reported here initially used one set of respondents to develop new questions relating to their general and specific feelings about criminal victimisation, before testing them on another, much larger sample. This latter exercise confirmed that being ‘angry’ about the threat of criminal victimisation is more frequently reported than being ‘afraid’ of it. Little is known of the meaning or range of meanings that respondents infer with the term ‘anger’, but further research — which is needed — might well show that anger about crime is as complicated a concept as fear of crime has transpired to be. In any event, research into anger should benefit from the lessons learnt from three decades of research into fear.

Respectable or Respectful? (In)civility and the City

Do we stand before a rising tide of incivility, of disrespect? Or, is this the latest moral panic? Examining (the UK) New Labours approach to incivility in the city, as manifest in the respect and urban renaissance agendas, this paper argues that the current zero-tolerance approach to incivility is based upon a confused understanding of anti-social behaviour and contradictory evidence of its occurrence and impact. Ultimately, it is proposed that a version of urbanity that endeavours to enforce respect and create the respectable city will prove counter-productive. Rather, respect and the respectful city require tolerance of, and engagement with, incivility.

In)civility and the City

Urban Studies Publication details, including instructions for authors and subscription information: http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/title~content=t713449163 (In)civility and the city Nicholas Fyfe a; Jon Bannister b; Ade Kearns b a Department of Geography, University of Dundee. Perth Road, Dundee, DD1 4HN. UK b Department of Urban Studies, University of Glasgow. 25 Bute Gardens, Glasgow, G12 8RS. UK

Invisible Walls and Visible Youth Territoriality among Young People in British Cities

This paper explores how young people experience territoriality in six British cities. It challenges the prevailing view within existing literature that young people derive important benefits from their ability to shape their identities by occupying public spaces. The paper is based on an exploratory study using semi-structured interviews, focus groups and cognitive mapping with young people. The origins, motivations and impacts of territoriality among groups and ‘gangs’ are examined, especially among those groups who possess an acute sense of place attachment and rivalry with groups from other neighbourhoods. It finds that territoriality is a form of cultural capital passed from one generation to the next, often with rich, heavily mythologised histories. Territoriality comes from the close affinity between young people and place and is often expressed through periodic violent confrontations. The paper illustrates how territoriality limits mobility and subsequently imposes sanctions on access to leisure, education, employment and social opportunities.

The function and foundations of urban tolerance: encountering and engaging with difference in the city

The key contribution of this article is its articulation of a conceptual framework for understanding the function and foundations of urban tolerance. The function of tolerance is defined as the capacity of the citizenry to negotiate harmonious encounters with difference and to engage with difference to secure improvements to social well-being. Yet the populations of cities are increasingly disconnected, spatially and socially. Has the citizenry lost its capacity, or indeed its willingness, to encounter and engage with difference? Strategies that endeavour to impose a mode of social interaction, which treat difference as illegitimate and understand tolerance as static, run the risk of perpetuating a cycle of intolerance. In contrast, the existence of a shared language of social interaction and the recognition of the legitimacy of difference are defined as the interrelated foundations of tolerance. Strategies to accommodate difference that appreciate the dynamism of tolerance, can unlock the potential of the citizenry to encounter and engage with difference.

Knowledge mobilisation and the social sciences: dancing with new partners in an age of austerity

The social sciences hold the potential to help interpret and address the complex challenges confronting society. The impact agenda actively encourages the social sciences to make and demonstrate a difference; to justify and protect social science funding. Knowledge mobilisation (KM) can be thought of systematically as a process, encompassing the co-production and channelling of knowledge that can enable the social sciences to gain purchase and voice in the policy-making and delivery process, and supports the endeavour to make a difference. This article serves as an editorial introduction to a special issue in two parts: ‘KM: Research Impact’ and ‘KM: Engagement’. It sets out to outline the forces leading to the rise of the impact agenda and the questions it poses for the social sciences. Particular attention is given to the changing policy context that has reshaped the academy. The article then progresses to outline debates on research and impacts and the forms of engagement that are needed to demonstrate and deliver impact beyond the academy. The article examines the ways in which impact is defined, measured and ‘delivered’ within the social sciences. This is followed by a section on the ways in which social science knowledge is mobilised. The penultimate section addresses the co-production of social scientific knowledge and this is followed by a brief conclusion.

Neighbourhood Structures and Crime: The Influence of Tenure Mix and Other Structural Factors upon Local Crime Rates

Public policy in the UK has used housing tenure diversification to achieve social mix in deprived areas. Such ‘mixed communities’ are thought to be more cohesive and sustainable, with reduced crime and antisocial behaviour. However, the articulation of the link between tenure mix and crime is weak and the evidence unclear. Using geocoded crime data for Glasgow for 2001 and 2008 alongside neighbourhood structural data, including tenure mix, this paper examines the influence of neighbourhood structural factors upon annual crime rates as well as upon changing crime rates. Although crime rates are patterned by local tenure structures, the direct effects are not large. The strongest associations with local crime rates are for income deprivation levels and the number of alcohol outlets in an area. Although housing tenure structures play a part in influencing local crime rates, it may be more a result of sorting effects than neighbourhood effects.

Young people and violent territorial conflict: exclusion, culture and the search for identity

This paper strives to explain the enactment and persistence of violent territorial conflict between groups of young people (predominantly young men) from neighbourhoods of multiple disadvantage. Young people clearly recognise that participating in violent territorial conflict risks severe injury, restricted mobility and criminalisation. So what are these young people fighting for? Drawing on the findings of an empirical study of young people and territoriality in six locations across Britain, this paper explores the risks and rewards that young people attach to violent territorial conflict. It finds that the rewards of such behaviour are articulated by young people in terms of respect, protection and excitement. However, these accounts should not be accepted at face value. The enactment of violent territorial practices requires to be interpreted as being framed by the structural exclusions manifest, and the cultural responses embedded, in these neighbourhoods. Moreover, violent territorial conflict requires to be understood as a socio-spatial practice that serves to secure and fuse important aspects of individual, social and place-based identities.

Criminal neighbourhoods: does the density of prior offenders in an area encourage others to commit crime?

Using crime data over a period of a decade for Glasgow, this paper explores whether the density of prior offenders in a neighbourhoods has an influence on the propensity of others to (re)commence offending. The study shows that the number of ‘newly active’ offenders in a neighbourhood in the current quarter is positively associated with the density of prior offenders for both violent and property crime from the previous two years. In the case of newly active property offenders, the relationship with active prior offenders is apparent only when prior offender counts exceed the median. The paper postulates that intraneighbourhood social mechanisms may be at work to create these effects. The results suggest that policies which concentrate offenders in particular neighbourhoods may increase the number of newly active offenders, and point to evidence of a threshold at which these effects take place.

Civility, Community Cohesion and Antisocial Behaviour: Policy and Social Harmony

Intergroup conflict, whether manifest as the absence of community cohesion or as the presence of antisocial behaviour, is an issue of international concern. In the UK, confronting the reality or perceived threat of intergroup conflict is a core feature of community cohesion and antisocial behaviour policies. To varying degrees, the frameworks underpinning these policies see the absence or breakdown of community relations as a cause of social disharmony. A key challenge for policy is therefore improvement of the quality of community relations. In this paper, we consider how government has approached this challenge. We filter our analysis through the lens of civility, which proposes that the peaceful coexistence of diverse social groups rests on the existence and maintenance of intergroup empathy and mutual respect. This proposal is supported by international research evidence on the outcomes of meaningful interactions, where these are predicated on equal group status, leading to changes in group and intergroup perceptions and behaviours (the contact hypothesis). We consider the extent to which community cohesion and anti-social behaviour policies in the UK demonstrate a coherent conception of the problem of community relations, the quality of community relations to which these policies aspire and whether the strategies deployed to address community relations seek to support civility through meaningful interaction. We find that the policy debates start from different presumptions concerning the roots of social disharmony, and this is reflected in the nature of the interventions which the community cohesion and antisocial behaviour policy frameworks support. In particular, we find that the social interaction promoted through policies in the UK is not necessarily aimed at achieving social harmony through meaningful interaction based on recognition of equal group status. We also show that these policies are based on little in the way of evidence and prior knowledge.