Organizational Obstacles to Participation in Community Crime Prevention Programs

Abstract

The term "organizational obstacles" refers to impediments to participation in community crime prevention groups and activities that stem from program implementation weaknesses. Given the importance that community-based organizations (CBOs) play in mobilizing neighborhoods, these weaknesses can be fatal to collective crime prevention efforts. Based upon research in a poor, high-crime neighborhood in Vancouver, Canada, this article identifies and examines how CBOs may actually inhibit participation in collective crime prevention groups and activities. Program implementation deficiencies that contributed to low participation rates in this neighborhood include weak and ineffectual community outreach and communication, a lack of strong leadership, inadequate resources, a technical and instrumental approach to crime prevention, and the nurturing of a narrow sociodemographic identity of crime prevention program participants that may be exclusionary. The inadequacies of the dominant crime prevention theories and the failure of applied models in promoting a broad-based mobilization of disadvantaged neighborhoods expose the need to develop and apply alternative theories to these unique environments. These alternative theories must pay greater attention to essential collective action processes underlying community crime prevention, emphasizing emotionally based organizing approaches (such as political advocacy, social development, and community development), which may appeal more to the poor and other marginalized groups.