From the Atlantic Magazine, March, 1982, introducing the classic article on the “broken window theory.”
By Paul Goldfinger, M.D., Editor @Blogfinger
We have received an alert from the Neighborhood Watch: Spring is upon us, and the usual petty crimes of theft and vandalism will soon be increasing. Over the last year, Blogfinger has documented the problem of crime in Ocean Grove. Usually we are troubled by “small” events such as bike thefts, stolen lawn and porch items, broken car windows, damage to empty houses, etc. But sometimes there are issues that are more ominous such as muggings in broad daylight and house invasions with the people home or not.
Although Ocean Grove’s crime rates are relatively low compared to some other communities, this hasn’t reassured a lot of our residents. This town has a certain personality: it’s a quaint and historic place where one feels a sense of neighborliness, safety, and old fashioned values. Of course, the reality is that our fantasies can be quickly smashed when bad things happen here.
Over the last year we have documented the concerns of Grovers regarding these matters. Interestingly, some individuals thought that the police and the citizens were being overzealous in their pursuit of these small time crooks, while others thought the opposite. Some readers thought that our articles about endless bike thefts, car break-ins, etc. would give the town a bad name and make people needlessly paranoid. Others felt that some of these felons were victims of the recession, so we needed to have compassion.
All of this reminds me of the “broken window theory” in the field of criminology. This is the idea that small crimes and civil disorder, if unchecked, can lead to bigger crimes and worse anti-social behavior in communities. The plan is that you fix the problems when they are small in order to prevent major crimes from happening later. It is this theory that was used in the 1990’s to help bring order in the New York Transit System by Transit Police Chief Wm. Bratton (1990) and the great work of Mayor Giuliani and his Police Chief Howard Safir (1997). It has shown promise in other, usually urban, places.
Here is a small part of the classic article on this subject by George L. Kelling and James Q. Wilson, in the Atlantic Magazine, March, 1982, entitled “Broken Windows: The police and neighborhood safety.” *
“Social psychologists and police officers tend to agree that if a window in a building is broken and is left unrepaired, all the rest of the windows will soon be broken. This is as true in nice neighborhoods as in rundown ones. Window-breaking does not necessarily occur on a large scale because some areas are inhabited by determined window-breakers whereas others are populated by window-lovers; rather, one unrepaired broken window is a signal that no one cares, and so breaking more windows costs nothing. (It has always been fun.)”
The core of this idea for us is that our community needs to put on a “game face” and make it clear that we will not tolerate litter, pan handling, public disorder, small crimes, graffiti and other antisocial behavior because we don’t want one broken window to result in all the rest being broken.
We need to continue to work with the Neptune Township Police Department to aggressively signal that we want an environment in Ocean Grove where we will not allow small issues to grow into big problems.