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The crime drop and neighbourhood inequalities in the exposure to crime: A longitudinal study of violent and property crime in Glasgow and Birmingham (2001-2016)

Since the 1990s, a dramatic decline in recorded crime has been observed across many developed polities (Aebi and Linde, 2010; Tseloni et al., 2010). Set against this finding, there has been limited attention paid to the crime drop at the neighbourhood level, an exception being Bannister et al (2017) who found marked distinction in the crime drop trajectories of different neighbourhood groupings in Glasgow. Building upon this finding, this paper seeks to explore whether the crime drop has resulted in an increase in inequalities in the exposure to crime. The analysis utilises police recorded property and violent crime in Glasgow and Birmingham, enabling assessment of whether any observed shifting inequalities in the exposure to crime can be considered place specific or part of wider area trends.

The research deploys a novel ‘anchored’ kmeans clustering method (Adepeju, Langton and Bannister, in preparation) to examine the longitudinal crime trajectories of neighbourhoods. This technique offers substantive advantage over existing kmeans clustering methods (Curman et al., 2015) and group-based trajectory modelling (Weisburd et al., 2004; Wheeler et al., 2015) enabling clearer delineation of neighbourhood crime trajectories. The results indicate growing inequalities in the exposure to crime and may be applied, in an era of fiscal austerity, to help target and prioritise policing interventions.

This research is in development. If you have any questions about this work, please contact Professor Jon Bannister

 

Research Team

Dr Monsuru Adepeju
Research Associate