[ams6110]

I'm suspecting that it will eventually prove that those that don't remember history are doomed to repeat it.

NYC in the '70s and '80s was not that safe. Street crime, muggings, etc. were common. In the 1990s Giuliani stepped up patrols and sarted enforcing what most people thought were petty crimes, such as loitering, graffiti, parking violations, subway-gate-jumping, etc. with the effect that more serious crimes also decreased, and within several years NYC became one of the safest big cities.

[lkrubner]

The "broken windows" theory of police enforcement doesn't stand up when compared to other Western cities. A big part of the "broken windows" theory is that small crimes, such as graffiti, created an atmosphere that allowed worse crimes to happen. And yet, if you visit Berlin, you will see a city with a shocking amount of graffiti, but very little crime. If you visit parts of London you'll see run down industrial districts, but very little crime.

Even if you confine your analysis to the USA, the "broken windows" theory of crime does not explain the relative shift in crime towards the suburbs, nor does it explain the increasing epidemic of drugs in rural areas. There is a lot that it does not explain, so it should be treated with suspicion. A theory that only explains one data point is not a theory at all.

Most Western nations have seen decreases in crime during since the late 1980s. The USA had the most crime, and the USA has seen the biggest decrease. No one knows why. New York City has seen the biggest decrease of all the big cities, but figuring out why, given the extremely multi-variate nature of the problem, will be extremely difficult to do. Even those theories that attempt to explain the decline of crime in the USA (aging of the population, Roe vs Wade, unleaded gasoline, change in police tactics) fail to explain why New York City should see the largest decrease in crime, since one can find other cities, for any of those variables, that saw larger changes than New York City.

[jkimmel]

>The USA had the most crime, and the USA has seen the biggest decrease. No one knows why.

Some have proposed that outlawing leaded gasoline has led to less lead poisoning in children, thus less aggressive behavior in adults and subsequent decreases in crime.

NBER paper - Environmental Policy as Social Policy? The Impact of Childhood Lead Exposure on Crime

[1] - http://www.nber.org/papers/w13097.pdf

MotherJones story

[2] - http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2013/01/lead-crime-li...

Links to criticism of the story above

[3] - http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2013/01/lead-and-crime...

[saraid216]

> A bit part of the "broken windows" theory is that small crimes, such as graffiti, created an atmosphere that allowed worse crimes to happen.

I've always been confused as to why the broken windows theory presumes that the window is broken because of malicious action. It seems obvious to me that the window was broken accidentally, and as such, the correct response (in police action and otherwise) is to repair the window. Full stop.

[jerf]

The idea of the broken window theory isn't that the window was broken was any particular way. The idea is that the visual image of a broken window serves as a signal that the degree of social concern/cohesion/enforcement in the area is low, and will thus encourage further behaviors. Also, breaking the second window is psychologically easier than the first.

I say this without endorsement, just explanation. (I'm ready to believe the evidence suggests it doesn't actually work and that the real drop in crime was another cause, but, on the other hand, academics can sometimes just be contrarians too, it's not just an online thing, and I still give some credence to successful engineering efforts such that one ought to at least consider the original theory.)

[geoelectric]

You're taking it a little too literally. The theory is that once a situation seems less maintained, people will normalize that state and allow it to decline further.

It's essentially a slippery slope argument, though I do think there's a little bit of psychological truth to the argument. But I also think there's a really high cost for trying to keep things perfect.

[JoeAltmaier]

The cost is in cultural adaptation, not police work. Singapore has a high standard of public appearance and behavior. It comes at a cost. But they did succeed in creating the social norm. Without that the police effort is endless.

[geoelectric]

That's what I meant, though maybe with a different spin. The cultural adaptation to a grossly over-aggressive police force is the major cost: fear, oppression, distrust, etc.

As far as Singapore goes, I don't have a ton of experience there to comment. If their standards end up leading the police to proactively treat people like criminals, then I suppose I wouldn't like that very much.

Worth noting that Asian culture in general seems to have much more of a "compromise the individual for the good of the whole" component, though. Nothing wrong with that, but it's a poor fit with our cultural expectations.

[sparky_z]

> I've always been confused as to why the broken windows theory presumes that the window is broken because of malicious action.

It doesn't.

> It seems obvious to me that the window was broken accidentally

Are you suggesting that no young vandal has ever broken a window on purpose? I assure you, it happens.

> and as such, the correct response (in police action and otherwise) is to repair the window. Full stop.

I don't understand what you're disagreeing with. Has anybody ever seriously argued that the police should punish accidental window breaking? Conversely, if a police officer witnesses somebody throw a rock through a window without cause, should he not stop them?

[saraid216]

> It doesn't.

If it doesn't, then why does the theory call for small crimes to be punished?

[potatolicious]

jerf explains it well above - the theory is that the appearance of disorder begets more disorder. Whether that disorder is deliberately caused by bad actors is significant at the micro scale but somewhat moot at the macro scale.

i.e., a window broken by malicious act is a bad thing, but ultimately an accidentally broken window will also contribute to crime. The notion is that the appearance of disorder signals that such laws are poorly enforced, as well as decreases the level of responsibility and ownership people feel towards the place ("this place sucks already, what's one more...")

Note that I don't endorse this particular view ;)

[saraid216]

But punishing small crimes doesn't fix broken windows, so it doesn't actually contribute to the presumed consequence of decreasing disorder.

I mean, let's say that a vandal deliberately broke a window, and this act is witnessed by a police officer. Arresting the vandal doesn't fix the window, so why does the theory call for such an arrest?

[krschultz]

The truth of the matter is that we don't know why crime dropped over the last 30ish years. There are lots of theories, broken windows policing is just one of them.

https://www.themarshallproject.org/2014/11/24/10-not-entirel...

[cynicalkane]

The idea of tough, aggressive policing in New York has a lot of cultural momentum that will be hard to reverse. Despite the impression that Internet media subcultures try to create, New York is not united against police harassment. This is why de Blasio & co are being extremely careful to not politicize that incident where two policemen were randomly executed; and why the police union is doing its best to do the opposite. They are fighting for the "support the police" crowd.

The reason for this cultural momentum is because it wasn't too long ago that Manhattan was overrun with open drug use, open solicitation of prostitution, three-card-monte scammers, squeegee men, and so on. Central Park was dangerous after dark (and somewhat so even during the day). This is a particular sort of crime that we can imagine is solved by tough policing--and in the judgment of many people, this is exactly what happened.

[Ryel]

I can't tell if you're disassociating yourself from the "many people" you mentioned or not, so I'm not sure how to word this, but... Just out of curiosity (because you seem like you have first-hand experience of the old NYC) What do you believe has had the most impact on decreasing crime in NYC? And what do you believe is the best solution going forward?

[pcthrowaway]

Here in Vancouver, police appear to be fairly hands-off (of course this is coming from a white male perspective, and I don't know enough black people here to have an idea of how different their experience is).

And while we have a lot of drug activity, homelessness, streetwalking, etc. I believe there is a lower rate of violent/organized crime than NYC.

Of course, Canadians have a much different attitude towards gun ownership than Americans...

[kailuowang]

Manhattan is pretty safe. People walk in the central park pretty late in the night (9-11pm) because there are (were) police patrol in it.

[Xylakant]

Police patrol != enforcement. Having relaxed police in the vicinity makes me feel safer, having police nearby that is just looking for minor infractions makes me feel less secure - and I'm privileged white.

[koenigdavidmj]

> Of course, Canadians have a much different attitude towards gun ownership than Americans...

That must be why Surrey had more homicides than Seattle in 2013, despite being a couple hundred thousand people smaller, and shall-issue CCW in Seattle.

Maybe, just maybe, something else is involved.

[pcthrowaway]

Great, but you've just picked one of Canada's most violent cities and compared it to an arbitrary American city, which is also relatively safe.

By the way, the Canadian city with the highest murder rate (Red Deer, with a murder rate of 6.4 http://www.macleans.ca/worst-cities/) has a lower murder rate than nearly every city on this list of American cities by crime statistics (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_cities_by...)

[potatolicious]

I think the point is that guns laws and attitudes don't paint the whole picture.

You have a city in an extremely gun-tolerant state (Washington) that has lower violent crime than a city in an extremely anti-gun area (Surrey).

This suggests at least that low crime with liberal gun ownership laws is possible, and also suggests that gun ownership is not a primary factor in determining the level of violent crime.

[pcthrowaway]

Those are just two cities. Saying an incredibly safe city in a 'gun-tolerant' state (though I'm pretty sure it's not particularly gun-tolerant in attitude compared to the southern U.S.) is safer than one of the more dangerous cities of a gun-intolerant countries doesn't prove anything. Those are just two data points in a much more complicated graph. Overall Canada is much safer than the U.S. That doesn't mean every city in Canada is safer than every city in the U.S. However, guns are much harder to get in Canada, and that is believed by many to be a main contributing factor to it's lower rates of gun crime

[merrua]

Link to proof for Surrey crime stats/Seattle crime stats?

[koenigdavidmj]

Seattle: http://www.seattle.gov/police/crime/13_Stats/2013_Major_Crim...

Surrey's was obtained from this article: http://www.vancouversun.com/news/Surrey+murders+four+days+ho...

[craigwblake]

Of course, Canadians have a much different attitude towards gun ownership than Americans...

I doubt our attitudes differ much with respect to violent criminals using guns (or knives or fists) to hurt people, as we are talking about here.

Attitudes on gun ownership by peaceable citizens may be another story.

[lotsofmangos]

Violent crime fell across Europe and America during that period.

http://www.economist.com/news/briefing/21582041-rich-world-s...

Estonia even decreased their prison population during that period and their crime still fell massively. Whatever is going on, it didn't just happen in New York, so it is not to do with the policies of Giuliani.

edit - Guiliani was a thug who commented about the NYPD's "degree of restraint which is virtually unmatched in the country.", during a Civil Rights Commission hearing about a suspect being sodomised with a broomstick.

[milesskorpen]

... and a lot of this change can be attributed to changes in demographics, wealth, improved car alarms, the decline of cash, and dozens of other variables. Policing has, I'm sure, some impact, but no research I've seen suggests it is the primary (or even a significant) driving force in the declining crime-rate.

[pcurve]

I don't know why people down voted this to death. Whether true or not (no one knows for sure), it's a view held by many.

If the enforcement is down 90%, there will always be some consequences / impacts down the road. It will not be immediate because it takes some time for criminals to test the new boundaries of what they can get away with.

And for those who think this will hurt the police budget, ticket revenue only accounts for 10% of NYPD budget. It will not lead to layoff.

[mhurron]

> It will not lead to layoff.

It will if they think they can blame it on the Mayor. NYPD appears to be throwing a temper-tantrum, I wouldn't exactly expect nothing but rational actions from them.

[wnevets]

but crime also decreased in other big cities where Giuliani style tactics were not used.

[niravshah]

There are a number of reasons for the decrease in crime in the 1990s, including a decrease in the use of crack cocaine and, famously, lead removal (http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2013/01/lead-crime-li...). Causation/correlation, etc.

[a8da6b0c91d]

Crime went down because many criminals couldn't afford rent anymore and left. This is by far the number one reason. Crime in counties in northern pensylvania and parts of NJ went up. The criminals just moved.

The same thing is happening in many "gentrifying" cities. Crime goes down in DC as the rates in neighboring counties in Maryland increase.

You get a fantastic correlation between section 8 housing and crime. Eliminating a ton of crime is not very complicated and doesn't require much police work. You just deport all the poor people. That's effectively what happened under Giuliani.

[StefanKarpinski]

This is just not plausible. New York is not the same city today as it was then. I grew up in the East Village in the 70s and 80s and live in same place now. Having witnessed the entire process up close and personal, I'm deeply skeptical that Giuliani's policies [1] were responsible for more than a minuscule drop in crime here – it was almost entirely due economic and demographic changes. The new "relaxed" police enforcement is how enforcement morally and practically ought to be. I would be thrilled if they continue this indefinitely. Maybe the cops could feel like they actually exist to help the people who live here instead of harassing them.

[1] The culmination of those policies led to a cop trying to ticket my mother for jay walking. I say "try" because what happened instead is that she lectured him for a good 20 minutes and in the end he apologized and tore up the ticket.

[snowwrestler]

This theory of crime actually says that police presence can be safely reduced now, because all those petty crimes are no longer common.

What you're talking about is a theory of how to boot-strap a reduction in crime: start small. But it also implies that once crime is reduced, the reduction will be self-persisting (for the same reason crime was self-persisting--because of the environment). It does not imply that heavy police presence needs to be permanent.

Anyway, it's never been proved in any real way, it's just an idea that got popular. And a whole lot of cities that Giuliani did not lead also saw significant reductions in serious crime over that same period of time.

[kailuowang]

That's the broken window theory that every programmer should be familiar with.

[buerkle]

Crime has been going down for decades across the United States including other major cities that did not have the same policies as Giuliani.

[JulianMorrison]

NYC in the 70s was poor. Both the city, and the people in it.