A Micro Theory of Crime Opportunities

Symbolic interaction among motivated offenders, suitable targets, and capable guardians

Origin

Problem: Major macro-level theories have unarticulated or incomplete micro-level mechanisms, e.g.:

  • Collective efficacy
  • Broken windows

Goal 1: Specify social mechanisms compatible with core claims and empirical evidence

  • Perception, motivation, meaning
  • Strategic action and selection
  • Inter-level causal mechanisms

Goal 2: Establish identifying assumptions for macro-analyses

Macro-Structural Theories

Collective Efficacy

G a Collective Efficacy b Disorder a->b c Crime Rate a->c

A recursive macro model

Rooted in social capital and collective action

Collective Efficacy

G a Collective Efficacy b Perceived Solidarity a->b d Crime & Disorder a->d c Intervention b->c c->d e Interactions e->a

Mechanisms typically implied: norms, perceptions, deterrence

Collective efficacy is an emergent social structure

Broken Windows

G a Social Control b Disorder a->b c Crime Rate a->c b->a b->c c->a

Same elements as collective efficacy but non-recursive

Equilibriating and cascade effects

Broken Windows

G a Disorder b Perceived Social Control a->b d Reduced Social Control a->d c Withdrawal b->c c->d e Reduced Individual Risk c->e f Social Control f->a

Explicit mechanisms: Deterrence, perceptions

Recursive with micro-model

Selection as an externality problem

Community Theories

  • Collective efficacy and broken windows have incompletely articulated models of situations and individuals

    • Opportunity absent in particular

  • Rely heavily on perceptions as mediating mechanisms

    • e.g. disorder, solidarity, support, risk

  • Social effects and structures: Emergence, norms, cascades

Language of routine activity theory useful for connecting these theories and introducing opportunity

Routine Activity

G a Routine Activities b Offender Target No Guardian a->b d Crime Rate a->d c Crime b->c c->d
  • Emphasizes objective opportunities and selection
  • Routine activity’s micro-theory is a non-falsifiable postulate
  • Abstract crime-relevant roles

Routine activity theory provides a simple, unifying language

  • Collective efficacy increases real and perceived guardians
  • Disorder increases and signals absence of guardians

Communities can also control crime by:

  • Hardening targets (e.g., environmental interventions)
  • Excluding offenders (e.g., enforcing boundaries)
  • Invoking guardians (e.g., police, place managers)

Problems:

  • No micro-theory of crime-relevant roles
  • Objective and subjective opportunity may diverge

A Micro-Theory of Opportunity

We propose a situational micro-theory of roles, perception, and motivation based on criminological theory1 and pragmatist thought.2

  • Link social structure and physical environment to distribution of crime-relevant roles in space and time
  • Consider strategic actions to alter distributions
  • Specify how situational outcomes change social structures
  • Highlight challenges for empirical macro-analyses

Routine Activity Role-Identities

Analytical categories of motivated offender, suitable target, and capable guardian correspond to social roles

  • Encompass meanings attributed to self, others, and objects
    • e.g., perceiving others as motivated offenders
  • Vary in salience and commitment
    • e.g., influencing deterrence susceptibility
  • Shape habitual and deliberate behavior
    • e.g., governing crime-relevant selection
  • Change as actors redefine situations

Role-Identities

For a law-abiding person with little criminal motivation, an unguarded open cash register would mean that someone should alert a sales clerk of a potential problem; for a motivated offender, it would mean that they could steal money with impunity. In other words, what is important is not just the objective opportunity, but rather the opportunity as perceived by the individual, which is based on a priori meanings actors bring into the situation, which are then shaped by the ongoing social process.

Symbolic Interaction

G sc1 Social Context si Situation sc1->si sa Social Action sc1->sa sc2 New Context sc1->sc2 si->sa sa->sc2 i2 New Identity sa->i2 i1 Identity i1->si

Symbolic interaction elaborates processes of learning, selection into situations, social action, emergence of shared meanings

We use this framework to clarify assumptions for identification and when micro-processes bias macro-analyses, e.g.:

  • If subjective opportunities ≠ objective opportunities

    • Estimated opportunity effects are attenuated
    • Association declines with novelty / heterogeneity
    • Adjustment using perception antecedents

  • If and where emergence occurs

    • Widespread bias unless orthogonal to covariates
      • Bias Low: Institutionalized settings / homogeneous actors
      • Bias High: Novel situations / heterogeneous actors
    • Form determines appropriate design

Implications for Theory

Connects core community theories to broad literature, e.g.:

  • Cultural theories1

  • Situated transactions2

  • Signal crimes3

  • Life-course4

  • Environmental criminology5

  • Collective action6

Questions

Thank you!