Abstract
The notion of a "criminal career," though generally used in reference to individuals, can be applied also to residential communities. The key to understanding community criminal careers in Britain lies within the operation of the housing market. The urban geography of most large British cities has resulted from historical developments unique to housing tenure in Britain. The tenure picture is unlike that portrayed in the Chicago model of concentric ring development, and the distribution of British offender rates therefore does not correspond to expectations of the Chicago model. Bureaucratic mechanisms for allocating housing in the public rental sector have profound direct and indirect effects on offender distributions and community crime careers. These mechanisms may help to maintain the stability of offender rates in particular communities, exacerbate the rate, or reduce the rate by changing practices in a given public authority housing area. Private rental, although severely diminished in importance during the twentieth century, offers an alternative form of tenure to the more common owner occupation and public housing. Its location in decaying areas around city centers and its attraction to a transient clientele often result in high offender rates. Changes in the social composition of the area that were initiated by government changes in housing policy have made some areas into more desirable residential districts without causing dramatic declines in offender rates. The future of the main tenure forms-owner occupation and public housing-remains uncertain and complicated, so it is difficult to predict how offender rates will change. The decline of private rental areas will undoubtedly continue. Changes in the criminal career of one area will probably affect careers in other areas.
Published Version
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