Tamna i svijetla strana tamne brojke kriminala: o izazovima istraživanja nepoznanica i blagoslovu neznanja

Abstract

In the paper at hand the authors critically analyse the state of the art in the research into the dark figure of crime, as well as the conceptual and methodological challenges that are inherent to this kind of research. They do so based on current international, foreign and domestic studies, with the goal of highlighting not only the commonly stressed ‘dark side’ of the dark figure of crime, but also in order to raise awareness of its almost completely disregarded ‘bright side’. In this regard the bright side of the dark figure of crime relates to the thesis of the so-called preventive effect of ignorance (germ. Präventivwirkung des Nichtwissens) and presents a phenomenon with a vastly important positive function which has thus far been completely neglected in the domestic criminological and criminal law discourse. This function basically ensures that the criminal justice response to criminal behaviour is perceived as comprehensive and effective. Without such perception the general preventive effect, as envisaged by criminal law, would be unsubstantial. By highlighting the dark figure’s bright side, the authors on the one hand aspire to make a scientific contribution to the comprehensiveness of the discourse about the dark figure of crime in Croatia, while on the other hand they illustrate the unsolvable conceptual and almost unavoidable methodological challenges which are inherent to the attempts of shedding light upon the dark figure of crime. The authors’ intention is neither to devalorize dark figure research in general, nor to bring about resignation with regard to enterprises seeking to reveal the dark figure of certain types of crime by means of victimisation or self-report studies. It is rather the intention of the authors to comprehensively and critically examine the dark figure phenomenon in all its complexity, vividness and mutual interwovenness with the criminal justice actors, and while doing so to neither underestimate the dark figure’s negative cognitive effects, nor to ignore its overly positive function in the service of norm stabilisation and sustaining the repressive system, as well as society as a whole.