Perceptions, Norms, and Social Integration: Dynamics of Community Safety

Photo Credit: Gazette.net

While working at my last organization, I was tasked with identifying programs that had demonstrated effectiveness in curbing violence. The marquee program selected was an effort by the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society called the Philadelphia LandCare Program, which greens and maintains vacant lots in an effort to encourage neighborhood development and stimulate a healthier and safer community. The theoretical backing of this type of initiative links directly to the propositions put forth by Kelling and Wilson in their 1982 article Broken Windows: The police and neighborhood safety; with the program description stating “Blighted lots detract from the look and feel of neighborhoods and attract criminal activity...”  The program put into practice the idea that order maintenance, through such activities as greening disarrayed lots, can impact the well-being of the community, with program evaluation results indicating a decrease in gun violence as well as improvements in health indicators among residents (e.g., descreased stress, increased exercise). 

While the above example demonstrates the aspect of Broken Windows that most people focus on, Kelling and Wilson’s analysis went much further in exploring the topic of safety in communities.  In the article, the authors examine the role of police, and how a change in their role (“from order-maintenance to law enforcement”) has negatively influenced the ability to uphold safety in neighborhoods.  In considering Kelling and Wilson’s ideas around tending to order as a means of thwarting the proliferation of more serious crime I believe the authors open the door to deeper discussion in three areas: the influence of perception, the development and regulation of norms, and the facets of social integration.

Photo Credit: occupydenver.org

Perception has an important and influential role in community identity.  The public perception of an area can be the driving force of how that area is understood, even if the perception is “untrue.”  Kelling and Wilson acknowledge the power of perception early in their article by giving credence to the fact that while using foot-patrols in Newark, NJ did not decrease real crime, it did make residents feel safer.  As such, what people believe about a community dictates the character of that community.  What is also important about perception is that is can be built on exceptions, rather than norms.  David Kennedy, Director of the Center for Crime Prevention and Control at John Jay College Of Criminal Justice, noted in a practice brief that even in areas characterized by violence and crime, such actions are not as rampant as believed, citing numbers for Los Angeles indicating that 141 gang homicides means there are 64,859 gang members “not killing anybody.”  Similarly, as Kelling and Wilson explain, an area can be perceived as unsafe based on markers that are not criminal acts in and of themselves; e.g., panhandlers and vacant lots. This all shows that perception is a multifaceted factor which has influence over the understanding of an area and what changes are needed.

Norms are another important component of community safety, and a component Killing and Wilson considered when they asked: “Should police activity on the street be shaped, in important ways, by the standards of the neighborhood rather than by the rules of the state?”  While the authors are seeking to consider who should dictate what constitutes order in a community, the community itself or a larger regulatory body, I think a relevant discussion exists at the level of community control.  Assuming the community is able to determine what will and will not be tolerated, the formation and acceptance of these norms is an important aspect of community cohesion.  The community is delineating the boundaries of acceptable behavior, and determining what constitutes safety.  As such, there must exist a social contract between community members, recognizing the agreed upon limits, which community members choose to follow or not. 

The recognition of the influence of both perception and norms leads to a discussion of social integration and stigmatization within communities.  How people feel about a community dictates their characterization of that community, even when perceptions are based on indirect beliefs.  This may mean that community members, or even strangers, become ostracized because of the perceptions they are connected to.  Furthermore, social integration and stigmatization are effected by and affect the creation and maintenance of norms.  Sociologist and Political Scientists, including Robert Putnam, often consider social norms a form of social capital, enabling those who control or fall within the norms to build on their connections and collaborative abilities and direct what constitutes appropriate and meaningful interaction.  As such, residents who are more integrated into the social fabric of the community are positioned to set the norms of the community, and therefore create a system of order that supports themselves and their actions while potentially ostracizing and disengaging others. 

By further considering perception, norms, and social integration, we can see that Kelling and Wilson's ideas went far beyond the upkeep of windows.  The areas they explore in Broken Windows provide a perspective for understanding some of the dynamics of a community that influence safety and well-being, and implore us to think critically about the interplay of these factors when approaching responses to community issues.  

In addition to the resources included within the post, readers who enjoyed this discussion may be interested in the following:

• A difference-in-differences analysis of health, safety, and greening vacant urban space.  This 2011 piece, from the American Journal of Epidemiology, provides the results from a decade-long analysis of the impact of greening vacant lots in Philadelphia. 
• Norms as Social Capital.  In this chapter, from the 1987 book “Economic imperialism: The economic approach applied outside the field of economics”, sociologist James S. Coleman describes what social norms are, their role in social control, why they are internalized, and how they relate to social capital. 
• Principals of Good Policing.  This 2003 report from the U.S. Department of Justice provides a more recent perspective on policing.  Building on Kelling and Wilson’s ideas about the role of police, readers may enjoy reviewing the section on Police-Community Partnership—for example, beginning on page 42, the report provides strengths and outcomes of good police and community relations, discussing the impacts of effective collaboration between the two in reducing crime and the fear of crime.