The Challenge of Crime: Rethinking Our Response.

• Author: Ferrall, Bard R.
• Position: Book Review

HENRY RUTH AND KEVIN R. REITZ, THE CHALLENGE OF CRIME: RETHINKING OUR RESPONSE (Cambridge, MA: Harvard Univ. Press 2003). 374 PP.

In The Challenge of Crime, the authors argue that we still have a very incomplete understanding of the effectiveness of our response to crime, which the authors label as our "criminal response complex." The authors go on to argue that more empirical study is needed, as well as a polyvalent analysis of current existing data. The most important considerations for this analysis are: actual reduction in crime and actual reduction in the fear of crime. The criminal response complex should also be evaluated for its justice and fairness and for its effect on public perception of the legitimacy of the response. The fifth, somewhat separate consideration, is whether a particular policy extends the criminal response complex beyond areas where it is needed, enforceable and effective.

The collected data for these evaluations must be communicated to policy makers. This communication is problematic both because of the mistaken belief in the adequacy of existing methods of data collections and because most of the officials have some type of partisan view. Most reliably collected data only incompletely supports or contradicts particular viewpoints. (The authors present examples where data is presented to support policies, although the validity of the data is questionable.) A more flexible response complex is needed, adapted to different types of crime and offenders and to changes in the crime rate. Policy debates are usually cast in broad, "either-or" terms.

In the late 1960s the view that crime was a response to poor social conditions, (poverty, etc.) reached its peak, and rehabilitation was the overriding concern of the criminal response. In the 1970s some analysts argued that crime was a rational choice and the preferred option of some, and thus rehabilitation is of little use. A better response is to impose such a heavy cost on the offender that crime would no longer be appealing. As a result of this theory, law enforcement became increasingly strict and expansive. The number of legislatively defined offenses grew each year, the penalties became more severe and mandatory, and arrest and prosecution were pursued in many more situations (punitive responses to "life style offenses," for example). The effects of these policies are most measurable in the growth of the prison population. The crime rate rose sharply in the 1970s...