Measuring the Geographical Displacement and Diffusion of Benefit Effects of Crime Prevention Activity

The displacement of crime is an important criminological phenomenon. However, while there has been theoretical discussion of this issue in the research literature, there has been little in the way of either standardized empirical work that investigates the incidence of displacement or in the development of techniques that can be used to measure it. In the current paper we discuss a new technique, the weighted displacement quotient (WDQ), that was developed to measure the geographical displacement of crime. A critical feature of the rationale is that displacement can only be attributed to crime prevention activity if crime is reduced in the target area considered. Thus, the WDQ not only measures what occurs in a buffer (displacement) zone but also relates changes in this area to those in the target area. Part of the appeal of the measure is that it can be used either with aggregate or disaggregate crime data and for any geographical boundary selected, provided the appropriate data are available. In addition to detecting displacement, when detailed data are available, the technique can also be used to identify where the effect was most prominent. The WDQ can equally be used to measure the diffusion of benefit of any crime prevention activity. A series of examples are presented for illustration purposes.     

Surveying American State Police Agencies About Lone Wolves,Far-Right Criminality,and Far-Right and Islamic Jihadist Criminal Collaboration

This study presents state police agencies’ perceptions about three significant terrorism issues on which there is little empirical research. All three issues have significant implications for understanding the role of state police agencies in responding to terrorism threats. First, the authors investigated whether the respondents believed that supporters of specified extremist movements tended to commit crimes as lone wolves, with others, or both alone and with others. Second, they were asked to provide data to gauge how often far-right extremists committed 13 crime types that varied in magnitude and motivation. Third, they were asked if they had knowledge about whether far-right extremists and Islamic jihadists had cooperated to commit crimes. These data were collected by surveying the 50 state police agencies in the United States. The results indicate that state police officials are concerned with both group and lone-wolf activities. Importantly, there was variation in the potential for lone-wolf crimes when comparing different types of extremist movements. The results indicate that far-right extremists are involved in a range of terrorist, preparatory, and routine criminal activities, but this involvement varies by region. Two state police agencies also indicated that they knew of Islamic and far-right collaboration. The study identified two other instances of direct collaboration and a number of other interesting cases through open source searches. The article concludes with a discussion of the policy implications of the findings and outlines directions for future research.     

The Effect of Political Discussion in Producing Informed Citizens: The Roles of Information,Motivation, and Elaboration

Recent studies have demonstrated a strong empirical relationship between political discussion and political knowledge. However, as of yet there has been no clear discussion or demonstration of how political discussion translates into increased political knowledge. The present study proposes three explanations--exposure (similar to the two step flow), anticipatory elaboration (linking work on uses and gratifications and news information processing), and discussion-generated elaboration (focusing on how discussion itself can influence information processing)--for this observed empirical relationship. In order to test these three explanations, data from the 2000 ANES and a local community survey during the 1996 presidential election were employed. Findings suggest that the direct relationship between discussion and knowledge may be mediated through motivations and information processing behaviors. These findings support the anticipatory elaboration and discussion-generated elaboration explanations while questioning the exposure explanation, and link well with recent findings on the cognitive mediation model.     

A neglected and intelligent alternative to arbitration is finally coming of age

Although not a substitute for arbitration, grievance mediation can be an effective, readily available and inexpensive means of resolving some disputes. Educator/arbitrator Bowers also sees it as an unjustly neglected preventive measure and seeks here to remedy that neglect by examining mediation's role in labor relations.