A Letter from Australia: Doing Crime Prevention Research: A Personal Reflection

Abstract

It is important for the criminologist to be conscious of the challenges policy makers and practitioners face in translating official policy statements and theories of crime prevention into working practices, and to empathise with the crisis they face. Doing so does not diminish one's objectivity, but can actually enhance comprehension of the contingent nuances of crime prevention policy and practice. The work of C. Wright Mills provides a framework for attaining such insights. In a similar vein the ‘what works’ paradigm needs to pay far greater attention to the inherently contingent nature of crime prevention, with the delivery of programmes and strategies being far harder than assumed. The weakness of the position is that it ignores the ‘enabling conditions’ which need to exist to ensure ‘best practice’ is followed in practice. The examination of these issues is grounded in the author's own experience and observations of conducting research on crime prevention in the Australian state of Victoria from the late 1990s to early 2000.