Per-Olof H. Wikström Auth. Urban Crime, Criminals, and Victims The Swedish Experience in An Anglo-American Comparative Perspective

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continued on page 271

Per-Olof H. Wikstrom
Urban Crime, Criminals,

and Victims
The Swedish Experience in an Anglo-American
Comparative Perspective
With 49 Illustrations
Springer-Verlag
New York Berlin Heidelberg London
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Per-Olof H. Wikstrom
Department of Criminology
University of Stockholm
S-106 91 Stockholm
Sweden
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Wikstrom, Per-Olof H.
Urban crime, criminals, and victims: the Swedish experience in an
Anglo-American comparative perspective / by Per-Olof H. Wikstrom.
p. cm. - (Research in criminology)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN-13: 978-1-4613-9079-4 e-ISBN-13: 978-1-4613-9077-0
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I. Crime-Sweden. I. Title. II. Series.

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Acknowledgments
This book builds predominantly upon several different research projects on crime
in urban areas conducted during the 1980s and directed by the author. The vari-
ous projects have been carried out at the Department of Criminology, University
of Stockholm, and at the Research Unit of the National Crime Prevention Coun-
cil, Sweden. I wish to thank my colleagues at these two institutes for their en-
couragement, helpful comments, and assistance, and in particular my thanks
go to Professor Knut Sveri, Lars Dolmen, and Jan Ahlberg. Johan Gasste and
Kerstin Ohrnell have made a great contribution to some of the research presented
here in assisting with the coding and compilation of the data for the various parts
of what in this book is labeled the Stockholm 1982 Crime Survey (see Appendix
A).
Some of the findings presented in this book (parts of Chap. 3 and Chap. 7) are
a result of studies I have made working on Project Metropolitan, a longitudinal
study of a Stockholm cohort (see Wikstrom, 1985, pp. 117-133; 1987a, 1989a,
1989b, and Farrington & Wikstrom, 1990). Project Metropolitan is directed by
Professor Carl-Gunnar Janson, Department of Sociology, University of Stock-
holm, to whom I am grateful for valuable comments on my research. Some of
the findings, and some tables, in Chapter 3 have previously been published in
an article by the author in the Journal of Quantitative Criminology, Vol. 6. No
1, and are published in this book with the kind permission of Plenum Press.
The research reported in this book has been generously supported by grants
from many different foundations:
The Bank of Sweden Tercentenary Foundation.
The Swedish Research Council for the Humanities and the Social Sciences.
The Scandinavian Research Council for Criminology.
The National Council for Crime Prevention, Sweden.
The Swedish National Police Board.
In addition it can be mentioned that Project Metropolitan operates on grants

from the Commission for Social Research and the Swedish Council for Planning
v
vi Acknowledgments
and Coordination of Research, and was until 1985 supported by the Bank of
Sweden Tercentenary Foundation.
Dr. David P. Farrington has been my major source of inspiration in taking on
the task to complete this book. His encouragement has been invaluable to me.
This book was completed while I was a visiting fellow at the Institute of
Criminology, Cambridge University, England.
Contents
Acknowledgments............................................................... . .... v
Chapter l. Introduction ........................................................... .

Scope and Aim of Study.......................... ...... ........ ........ ..... 2
Some Brief Notes on Swedish Society and Its Crime ................. 3
Chapter 2 The Rate, Structure, and Trends in Urban Crime............... 7

The Rate of Crime ............................................................ 8
Trends in Crime ............................................................... 11
Explaining the Difference.................................................... 13
Chapter 3 The Urban Offender .................................................. 16

Offenders in Urban Crime................................................... 17
Crime and Its Development in the Urban Population................... 24
The Distribution of Crime in the Urban Population..................... 27
Specialization and Versatility in Crime.................................... 30
Age Patterns.................................................................... 36
Chapter 4 The Social Contexts of Urban Crime.............................. 49

Contextual Crime Analysis .................................................. 50
Urban Violence................................................................ 51
Urban Vandalism.. .............. ........ .... ............ .... .... ....... ....... 82
Urban Serious Theft........................................................... 88
Conclusion.......... ..... ................. .. .................. .. .. .......... .. .. 97
Chapter 5 The Urban Victim..................................................... 100

The Victimological Approach............................................... 100
Chapter 6 Stockholm: Its Crime and Urban Structure....................... 111

The Research Area............................................................ III
Crime Rates and Crime Trends in the City of Stockholm.. ..... ....... 113
vii
Vlll Contents
The Basic Units of Analysis................................................. 115

The Inner- and Outer-City Areas... ......... ........ ............. ..... ..... 116
Housing in Stockholm........................................................ 120
The Factorial Social Ecology of Stockholm.............................. 121
Grouping Wards to Major Types of Urban Environments ........ ..... 127
Chapter 7 Housing, Population Composition, and Offending.............. 130

The Offender Residential Distribution..................................... 132
The Offender Rate Distributions............................................ 135
Age Structure and Offender Rates.......................................... 147
The Individual-Level Relationship Between Housing and Offending
in Childhood and youth................................................... 150
Zero-Order Correlations...................................................... 154
Population Composition and Offending ................................... 156
Familism, SES, Social Problem Households, and Offending.......... 159
Population Composition and Offending Within Different Types of
Housing ...................................................................... 171
Housing, Population Composition, and Offending: An Integrated
Model......................................................................... 173
Chapter 8 Routine Activities, Area Crime, and Victimization Patterns.. 185

The Crime Area Distribution................................................ 191
The Area Crime Rate Distributions ........................................ 200
Crime and Distance ........................................................... 213
Explaining Area Crime Distribution.......... ............ .. . .. .. .. .... 225
The Area Distribution of Victims of Personal Crime................... 232
Chapter 9 Integration and Discussion of Findings ........................... 237

Urbanization and Crime...................................................... 237
The Urban Offender.............................. .................... ......... 241
The Urban Victim ........ ........ .... ...... ............. ...................... 243
City Structure and the Rate and Structure of Crime.. . .. ... .. .. .... .... . 244
References. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 246
Appendix A The Stockholm 1982 Crime Survey ............................ 260
Appendix B Legal Definitions of Crimes Included in the Stockholm 1982

Crime Survey..................... .............. ........ ............. 264
Appendix C Definitions of Variables Used in the Factor Analysis of

Stockholm Urban Structure....................................... 268
1
Introduction
Crime is largely an urban phenomenon, but the specifically urban and area dimen-
sions of the social processes that are connected with crime have been seriously
understated in much recent criminological work ... Such a claim could not have
been made forty years ago.
(Baldwin & Bottoms, 1976, p. 1).
The above statement by Baldwin and Bottoms about the neglect in crimi-
nology of the urban dimension of crime was made in the mid-1970s.
However, in the last decade there has been a significant upswing in theory
and research on crime in the urban environment. Also, new areas oftheory
and research into urban crime have come into focus. (For overviews see
Brantingham & Brantingham, 1984; Davidson, 1981.) One very good
example of the increasing interest in urban crime is the recent volume of
Crime and Justice entitled "Communities and Crime" (Reiss & Tonry,
1986), in which Reiss makes a strong argument for the importance of the
study of crime in urban communities and for the linking of the ecological
and individual traditions in theory and research on crime.
A review of the literature on crime in urban environments shows, not
unexpectedly, that Anglo-American research heavily dominates the scene
(Wikstrom, 1982; 1987b). Hence, much of the experience we have on
urban crime is based on North American and British research and theory.
In this book, I shall try to give the Swedish experience on urban crime in an
Anglo-American comparative perspective. The Anglo-American compara-
tive perspective means, first, that much of the analysis made in this book
takes as its point of departure the theories and findings of Anglo-American
research on urban crime and, second, that when possible, the Swedish
findings are compared with those of North American and British research.
Needless to say, this is not, nor is it intended to be, a comparative study.
But hopefully the results presented in this book might contribute interest-
ing questions for genuine cross-national research on urban crime. There is
a great lack of true cross-national comparative studies in criminology
(McClintock & Wikstrom, 1987), and it is my view that to advance our
1
2 1. Introduction
understanding of crime and its causes, there is a great need for the develop-
ment of such research. Cross-national studies are important for showing
us the common and unique features of crime in different countries, for
evaluating the generalizability of existing theories or for generating new
theories (Bennet, 1980), and for giving us perspectives on criminality in
our own countries and the policies and measures we use to handle it.
Scope and Aim of Study

This book is a study of urban crime in post-Second-Worid-War Sweden.
Although urban crime from the 1950s and onward will be studied, the focus
will be on urban crime in contemporary Sweden, because most research
in Sweden relevant to this topic was carried out in the late 1970s and in the
1980s. The major empirical studies presented in this book concern Stock-
holm, Sweden's biggest city; therefore, there will be a special focus on
crime in Stockholm.
The focus of this study is primarily on what have been labeled traditional
crimes (i.e., violence, vandalism, and theft) as opposed to modern crimes
(i.e., traffic crimes, computer crimes, tax fraud etc.)-(Sveri, 1974). Most
traditional crimes are direct-contact predatory crimes (Cohen & Felson,
1979, p. 589), that is, crimes directed toward another person or another
person's property that imply a direct contact between the offender and his
or her target.
The overall aims of this book are to present the findings from different
studies on urban crime, to give the Swedish experience on urban crime,
and to relate the Swedish experience of urban crime to the experiences
from Anglo-American research. A more specific aim is to try to link major
approaches to the study of crime in exploring urban crime in Sweden.
In discussing different traditions of research in criminology (ie., the indi-
vidual and ecological approaches), Reiss (1986) concludes, "More is to be
gained by linking those traditions than by their continued separate de-
velopment and testing" (p. 29). In this book, four different approaches to
the study of crime will be taken up, and some tentative efforts to link them
will be made. These four approaches are the following:
The offender and criminal career approach (see Chap. 3).
The contextual analysis of crime approach (see Chap. 4).
The victimological approach (see Chap. 5, parts of Chap. 8).
The ecologicaVenvironmental approach (see Chaps. 6,7,8).
Before turning specifically to these four approaches in the study of urban
crime, I shall give an introduction to urban crime in Sweden in Chapter 2,
which will include the rate, structure, and trends of Swedish urban crimi-
nality. Chapter 3 is devoted to the offender and criminal career approach.
Both cross-sectional and longitudinal data will be used in Chapter 3 to
Some Brief Notes on Swedish Society and Its Crime 3
describe and analyze the offender characteristics and their patterns of crim-
inality. In Chapter 4 the focus is on the circumstances of crime, involving
victim and offender characteristics as an important part of these circum-
stances. Chapter 5 includes a special discussion of the urban victim and
some more analyses of the victim-offender relationship. Because this is a
book devoted to urban crime, a large section of it (Chapters 6, 7, and 8) will
deal with city crime patterns; among the issues taken up are the relation-
ships among housing, population composition, and offending, and the rela-
tionships among routine activities, area crime, and victimization patterns.
In Chapter 9, the conclusion, I shall summarize and try to link together the
findings from the previous chapters to give a tentative integrated picture of
urban crime, criminals, and victims.
Some Brief Notes on Swedish Society and Its Crime

For those readers unfamiliar with Swedish society, I shall in this section
give some brief notes of introduction. Sweden is located in northern
Europe and is one of the Scandinavian countries. It is a rather small coun-
try in terms of population; Sweden has about 8 million inhabitants. How-
ever, in terms of land area, Sweden is quite big (about twice as big as
Great Britain). The government of Sweden is a liberal democracy. The
Social Democratic party has ruled in all but 8 years during the post war
period.
The general standard of living in Sweden is high. The country is de-
veloped, industrialized, and affluent. Around 60% of the working popula-
tion is employed in the service sector, followed by about 25% in the manu-
facturing industry. Sweden is traditionally regarded as one of the welfare
countries and has a well-developed social welfare policy. The unemploy-
ment rate is low, and has traditionally been so (Table 1.1). The age struc-
ture of the Swedish population is shown in Table 1.2.
Of the Swedish population, 55% lives in localities with 10,000 or more
inhabitants (see Table 1.3). Sweden has three big cities: Stockholm
(650,000), Goteborg (420,000), and Malmo (230,000). The populations of
the conurbations are much larger than those of the cities. For instance, the
conurbation of Stockholm has about 1,400,000 inhabitants (see Chapter 2).
A fairly high proportion of the population rents its housing. The public
(nonprofit) sector of the rented housing is important. The Swedish housing
conditions are generally very good (see Chapter 6).
In 1980, the average household size was 2.32. The married proportion of
the adult population is 41 %. However, cohabitation under marriage-like
forms is likely to be rather common in Sweden. In 1983, 6% of the adult
population was divorced.
The population of Sweden has increased over the past 10 years. Sweden
has long been a country open to immigration. There are now around
4 1. Introduction
TABLE 1.1. Unemployment rates in Sweden,

1950-1984.
Year %
1950 1.3
1955 1.5
1960 1.4
1965 l.2
1970 1.5
1975 1.6
1980 2.0
1981 2.5
1982 3.1
1983 3.5
1984 3.1
Source: Yearbook of Labour Statistics, 1976 (SCB)
and Statistical Abstract of Sweden, 1985.
Note. There have been some changes in the defini-
tion of unemployment over the period shown.
TABLE 1.2. Age structure in Sweden in 1981.

Age %
19 and under 26
20-29 14
30-39 16
40-49 11
50-59 11
60 and over 22
Source: Statistical abstract of Sweden, 1985.
TABLE 1.3. Population in Swedish localities with 500 or more inhabitants.

Population size of locality % of Population No. of localities
50,000 and above 33 18

10,000-49,999 22 - __ 92
500-9,999 25 1018
Total 80 1128
Source: Swedish official statistics for 1980.

Some Brief Notes on Swedish Society and Its Crime 5
TABLE 1.4. Traditional crimes recorded by the police in Sweden in 1988.

Class of crimes No. of crimes Per 10,000 Inhabitants Percent
Crimes of violence 46,975 55.5 6.0

Homicide 146 0.2 0.0
Assaultb 41,320 48.8 5.3
Robbery 4,177 4.9 0.5
Rape 1,332 1.6 0.2
Crimes of theft 641,430 758.3 82.9
Burglaries l30,923 154.8 16.9
Theft of and from cars 209,609 247.8 27.1
Other thefts 300,898 355.7 38.9
Vandalism 85.731 101.3 11.1
Total 774,l36 915.2 100.0
aComplet~d homicides and assaults causing death.

bAttempted homicides, serious and petty assaults, and violence toward a public official.
Note. Legal definitions of crime categories are given in Appendix B.
TABLE 1.5. Traditional crimes recorded by the police in Sweden in 1950, 1960,
1970, 1980, and 1988 (per 10,000 inhabitants).
% increase
Crime 1950 1960 1970 1980 1988 1950 to 1988
Crimes of violenCe" 12 13 26 35 52 333%

Homicideb 0.09 0.10 0.12 0.16 0.17 89%
Assaultc 11 12 23 30 45 309%
Violence towards a
public officiald N.A. N.A. 2 3 4
Robbery" 0.27 0.62 1.87 4.12 4.94 1730%
Rape 0.50 0.68 0.86 1.06 1.57 214%
Crimes of theft 168 272 552 739 758 351%
Burglaries 29 75 l33 167 155 434%
Theft of cars 11 24 40 41 71 545%
Theft from cars N.A. N.A. 69 121 176
Other thefts 127 172 310 409 356 180%
Vandalism 7 18 42 71 101 1343%
aFor reason of comparability between years, violence toward a public official are not included
in the figures.
bCompleted homicides and assaults causing death; figures given with two decimal points.
c Attempted homicides, serious and petty assault.
dViolence toward a public official appeared first in 1965 as a separate category in the crime
statistics. The only important difference between the legal definitions of assaults and violence
to a public official is that the latter is restricted to assaults on public officials, which, according
to the law, should be regarded as a more serious crime than assaults on civilians.
eFigures given with two decimal points.
N.A. = Not available as separate category for this year.
6 1. Introduction
TABLE 1.6. Percentage of selected categories of crimes reported to the police in

1987 that were cleared as no crime or crime not proven (cleared through decisions
recorded on crime report forms).
Crime not proven No crime
Crime Number of reported crimes ('Yo) ('Yo)
Assault (serious and petty) 34,757 9.4 2.1

Rape 1,114 5.2 3.6
Robbery 3,939 1.5 1.2
Burglary 142,331 0.3 0.2
Car thefts 58,489 0.3 1.3
Vandalism 82,221 1.5 1.1
30,000 immigrants to Sweden each year. However, the peak in immigra-

tion to Sweden was in the early 1970s.
In 1980, of the Swedish population, 8% were born in a foreign country.
Of the foreign-born population, more than one half (55%) are from one of
the other Nordic countries, notably Finland (40%), 30% are from a non-
Nordic European country, 2% are from North America, and 13% are from
Asia, South America, or Africa.
The rate of current police-recorded traditional crimes (i.e., violence,
vandalism, and theft) is shown in Table 1.4. As in North America and
Britain (see Brantingham & Brantingham, 1984), the police-recorded
crimes in Sweden have increased significantly in the postwar period. In
1950, there were 161,778 crimes reported to the police, whereas in 1988,
1,086,211 crimes were reported to the police, 6.7 times the number in 1950.
The rates for selected years and types of traditional crimes, and the percen-
tage of increase from 1950 to 1988, are shown in Table 1.5. Although all
types of crimes have increased over the studied period, the pattern of de-
velopment shows some differences among the major types of crimes, of
which perhaps the most significant difference concerns crimes of violence,
which had a fairly even level until the mid-1960s, when a significant in-
crease took place; thereafter, the rate of violent crime has been con-
tinuously increasing.
When comparing the rate of crimes reported to the police in Sweden
with the rates of crimes reported to police in other countries, it should be
noted that all crimes reported to the police-regardless of whether after
investigation they turn out to be crimes or not-are included in the crime
statistics. Moreover, petty crimes are also included in the figures pre-
sented. Table 1.6 shows how many of the reported crimes were cleared as
"no crime" or "crime not proven."
2
The Rate, Structure, and
Trends in Urban Crime
If one wants to reduce crime, one should, all other things equal, avoid to concen-
trate people in highly urbanized areas.
(Christie, 1975, p. 91, my translation)
The purpose of this chapter is to introduce the study of urban crime in
Sweden by considering its rate, structure, and trends.
The aggregate crime rate in any area or population may be viewed as a
result of the participation and frequency in crime, where participation is
defined as the percentage of individuals in the area or population ever
having committed a crime during the studied period, and frequency is the
average number of crimes per offender during that same period (see Blum-
stein, Cohen, Roth, & Visher, 1986, p. 20). The question about the parti-
cipation and frequency of crime in the urban population will be taken up in
Chapter 3.
When considering crime in an area, a further important divison may also
be made between crimes committed by residents of the area and crimes
committed by visitors to the area (see Table 2.1). In Chapter 7, it will be
shown that quite a big proportion of the crimes in the city of Stockholm-
more so for some than for other types of crime-were committed by
nonresidents. 1 Unfortunately, very little is known about how much of the
variation among different types of areas by degree of urbanization is due to
differences in crimes committed by residents and those committed by visi-
tors. A reasonable hypothesis, however, seems to be that the larger the
urban area, the more of its crime is committed by visitors. All in all, differ-
ences in crime rates between urban and other areas, between larger and
smaller urban areas, and so on, can be viewed as a result of differences in
participation in and/or frequency of crime by residents and visitors, and
changes in urban crime rates can be viewed as resulting from changes in the
participation in and/or frequency of crime by residents and visitors.
1. However, most of the nonresident offenders (71 %) were residents in the more
distant suburbs of the Greater Stockholm.
7
8 2. The Rate, Structure, and Trends in Urban Crime
TABLE 2.1. The area aggregate crime rate decomposed into its main components.
Residents Visitors
committing crimes committing crimes Total
Participation Pr P, PlOt
(% committing crime)
Frequency Fr F, F tot
(crimes per offender)
Crime rate CR r CRy CRtot
In this chapter, differences in the aggregate crime rate will be studied. It

was not possible, within the scope of this study, to separate the aggregate
crime rate into its two main components. Hence, there will be no oppor-
tunity to answer such questions as whether or not differences noted in the
aggregate crime rate are due to the fact that more people are participating
in criminal activities in some areas than in others and/or the fact that
people engaging in crime are more active in some areas than in others. The
ability to answer such questions may be highly theoretically relevant when
trying to explain area differences and area changes over time in the crime
rate.
The Rate of Crime

Although there are some significant deviations from the general pattern,2
previous research reveals that traditional criminality has the following
characteristics:
It is more widespread in urban than in rural areas (Christie, Andenaes, &
Skirbeckk, 1965).
It tends to increase with the size of the urban community (van Dijk &
Vivanen, 1978).
In the case of certain types of crime (e.g., robbery and residential bur-
glary), it is heavily concentrated in big cities (Skogan 1978).
There is a clear, although not dramatic, association (r = .48) at the regional
level in Sweden between a region's degree of urbanization and its rate of
crime (Figure 2.1). Urbanization is measured as the percentage of the
population living in localities, where a locality is defined as a continuously
built-up area with a population of at least 200, and without gaps of more
than 500 meters. Moreover, it can be mentioned that the regional rela-
tionship in Sweden between the total rate of crimes (dominated by crimes
of theft) and violent crimes is rather strong (r = .70).
2. For some examples of deviations, see Clinard (1978) or Shelley (1980).

The Rate of Crime 9
Crimes per
100.000
residents.
16000

14000

12000

..............
.,. ..

. ...... . .
10000

8000

6000
4000~~~~'-~~~~~-r-r-r-r~~~--~~~

50 75 100
Per cent living in urban area (locality)
FIGURE 2.1. Scattergram of the relationship between degree of urbanization and

total rate of crime in Sweden divided into 70 regions (1978).
TABLE 2.2. The rates per 10,000 inhabitants of police-reported traditional crimes in
the three big cities and in the rest of Sweden in 1988.
Greater Greater Greater Other
Crime Stockholm Gottborg Malmo Sweden
Assault" 67 53 61 41
Assault against female
by acquaintance 18 13 16 11
Assault against male
by a stranger 29 22 24 14
Completed homicides and
assaults causing deathb 0.24 0.22 0.26 0.14
Robbery 12 9 8 2
Rape" 2.3 2.1 1.9 1.3
Vandalism 129 108 123 92
Crimes of theft 1,205 958 1,117 591

Residential burglaries 42 48 41 15
Thefts of cars 155 124 69 44
Thefts from cars 348 275 296 114
Source: Statistiska meddelanden R 12 SM 8901 and population statistics.

aSerious and petty assault including homicides.
bShown with two decimal points.
cShown with one decimal point.
Note. The population of the conurbations in 1988 were: Greater Stockholm (1.47 million),
Greater Goteborg (720,000), anQ Greater Malmo (466,000).
TABLE 2.3. The percentage of selected traditional crimes occurring in big-city areas
and in the rest of Sweden, and the percentage of population in the big cities and the
rest of the country in 1988.
Crime (Population) Big-city areas ('Yo) Rest of Sweden ('Yo)
Robberies 66.7 33.3

Residential burglaries 57.2 42.8
Thefts of and from cars 57.9 42.0
Populations 31.4 68.6
A comparison of the rates of police-reported traditional crimes in 1988 in

the three biggest conurbations in Sweden-Greater Stockholm, Greater
Goteborg and Greater Malmo-with the rate for the rest of the country
(see Table 2.2) confirms the regularities previously noted in studies from
many different countries:
The rate of crime is significantly higher in the big cities than in the rest of
the country.
The differences in the rates of crimes are bigger for theft than for vandal-
ism and crimes of violence.
For certain types of crimes the differences in the rates of crimes are espe-
cially great (i.e., robberies, residential burglaries, and thefts of and from
cars); the proportion of these crimes committed in the three big cities is
so great that it may be possible to speak about these crimes as "typical
big-city crimes" (see Table 2.3),
The difference in the rates of crimes between the big cities and the rest of
the country is greater for assaults against males by strangers (a subcateg-
ory pre-dominantly consisting of so-called, street violence) than for
assaults against females by acquaintances (a subcategory mainly consis-
ting of violence in private).
The last point is further illustrated in Table 2.4, which presents results from
a study comparing the social contexts of assaultive crimes in different areas
by size of locality. The principles behind the divison of the assaultive
crimes into different social contexts is presented in Chapter 4, together
with the detailed analysis of the contents of the contexts for Stockholm in
1982.
It has long been well-known that there is a dark figure when using crimes
reported to the police. The dark figure is generally higher for violent
crimes than for property crimes and may be expected to be rather low for
serious property crimes, at least in countries with a high insurance cover-
age (Hood & Sparks, 1970; Persson, 1980). The fact that there is a dark
figure is no problem in itself when comparing rates of crime among areas,
the only assumption necessary to make is that there are no significant dif-
ferences in the dark figures among the areas compared. The fact that the
Trends in Crime 11
TABLE 2.4. The rate per 10,000 inhabitants of police-reported assaultive crimes
(serious and petty assault, including homicides) by social context of crime in locali-
ties of different sizes.
City of Medium-sized Small places and

Stockholm cities Small cities rural areas
Social context (1982) (1978)a (1978)b (1978)c
Within the family 13 7 6 2

Acquaintances (non- 9 7 5 2
family in residences
In places of public en- 11 8 8 2

tertainment (incl.
their entrances)
In public places 21 11 9 2
Other circumstances 8 6 5 2
Total 63 39 33 10
aFifteen cities with a population between 50,000 and 105,000.

bSix cities with a population between 30,000 and 43,000.
cThe areas of the 56 studied municipalities (excluding Stockholm) that were not within the
city boundaries (for more details see Wikstrom, 1985, pp. 20-21).
two major victim surveys carried out in Sweden showed the same pattern
of difference between big-city areas and the rest of the country as that
shown by the police-reported crimes puts further confidence in the assump-
tion that there really are significant differences in the rate of crime related
to degree of urbanization (see Table 2.5). Each of the two victim surveys
included about 10,000 respondents. It should be noted that the victim sur-
veys only cover victimization of private persons victimizations and do not
include victimizations of public entities (e.g., companies). Moreover, it is
likely, as regards the violent crimes. that victim surveys and police re-
corded violence may capture different aspects of violence differently well;
it is likely that the police-recorded violence is a better representation of the
more serious violence that to a rather high degree involves abusers of alco-
hol and drugs and persistent criminals (see Chap. 3), whereas the victim
surveys are likely to best describe the violence the "ordinary" cittzen is
subjected to (for a discussion of this, see Wikstrom, 1985 pp. 36-55).
Trends in Crime
Comparing trends in crime by urbanization provides some evidence that
the general increase that seems to have taken place in most Western coun-
tries in the post war period has generally been much faster in urban as
compared to rural areas and biggest in very large conurbations (McClin-
TABLE 2.5. Percentage of victims (aged 16-74) of traditional crimes in the big cities
and in other Sweden by size of muncipality.a
Violence Vandalism Theft
1978 1984185 1978 1984185 1978 1984185
Big cities (conubnations)

Greater Stockholm 3.1 2.6 6.2 7.2 25.6 27.2
Greater Goteborg 3.5 1.6 3.9 5.2 18.9 20.5
Greater Malmo 1.4 1.5 5.1 5.4 25.4 21.3
Other Areas in Sweden
Municipalities with
at least 75.000 inhabitants 1.4 1.6 5.0 4.0 18.8 20.2
50.000-74.999 inhabitants 1.1 1.7 5.5 4.0 17.3 16.4
30.000-49.999 inhabitants 1.5 1.5 4.5 3.6 12.5 12.3
20.000-29.999 inhabitants 1.5 1.6 2.5 2.7 12.8 10.7
10.000-19.999 inhabitants 1.6 1.8 2.8 2.7 10.5 11.2
maximum 9.999 inhabitants 2.1 0.8 2.9 1.9 8.8 9.4
Source: 1978 figures: Levnadsforhiillanden 1978. Rapport 24, SCB. 1984185 figures: personal
communicatton from Lars Hall, Statistics Sweden.
'Violence resulting in visible marks or more serious injuries.
tock, 1981, p. 11). It was concluded in Chapter 1 that there has been a
significant upward trend for traditional crimes (violence, vandalism, and
theft) on the national level in Sweden in the postwar period. In this section,
the trends in police-reported traditional crimes for the period 1968 to 1988
will be compared for the three big cities and the rest of Sweden to see
whether their crime trends differ. There have been two major changes in
recording and statistics-gathering in Sweden-one in 1965 and one in
1968-both believed to have had an increasing effect on the crime rate; so
therefore, 1968 was chosen as the starting point for the trend comparisons.
The basic measure chosen was the average yearly linear change per
10,000 inhabitants (i.e., the regression coefficient). To be meaningful, such
an approach requires that the trends are linear in fashion, and in all cases
the visual inspection of the scattergrams and the calculated values of the
R2, justified a treatment of the trends as basically linear.
The use of the common measure of the percentage of change to compare
changes over time in the rate of crime between areas, was considered less
satisfactory, because it would mean measuring change relative to the rate
at the starting point of the comparison (in our case, 1968). Areas with high
rates at the starting point had to have a greater actual increase/decrease
than areas with a lower starting rate to end up with the same percentage of
change. The picture of the development of crime in big cities and other
parts of Sweden was also, in many cases, very different when the measure
of change was the percentage of increase/decrease.
The findings of the trend studies (see Table 2.6) show that (a) assaults
Explaining the Difference 13
TABLE 2.6. Crime rates per 10,000 inhabitants in 1968 and 1988, and regression
coefficient (and R2) for the period 1968 to 1988, for crimes of assault, vandalism
and theft, separately for the big cities and the rest of Sweden.
Greater Greater Greater Other

Crime Stockholm Goteborg Malmo Sweden
Crimes of theft
1968 727 592 518 325
1988 1217 967 1125 598
Regression coefficient 28.8 22.0 26.7 11.9

R2 0.77 0.86 0.71 0.88
Vandalism
1968 43 28 36 36
1988 130 108 123 92
Regressiqn coefficient 4.2 3.8 4.7 2.8

R2 0.94 0.96 0.97 0.95
Assault
1968 34 27 34 17
1988 66 51 59 38

R2 0.93 0.84 0.88 0.91
(serious and petty, including homicides), vandalism, and theft have in-
creased significantly over the studied period both in the big cities as well as
in the rest of Sweden, and (b) the level of increase for all three groups of
crime has been much faster in the big city areas than in the rest of Sweden.
This means that over the studied period (1968 to 1988), the difference be-
tween the big cities and the rest of Sweden in the rate of violence, vandal-
ism, and theft has increased significantly. For instance, in 1968, Greater
Stockholm had 17 assaultive crimes more per 10,000 inhabitants than the
non-big-city areas of Sweden, whereas in 1988, Greater Stockholm had 28
more assaultive crimes per 10,000 inhabitants than the non-big-city areas of
Sweden.
Explaining the Difference

A natural thing to do when trying to explain the higher rates of crime and
offending in urban areas is to look for the special characteristics of the city
that may be thought of as influencing crimes and offending. The city has
been characterized in manyways; Weber (1966, p. 67) talks about the city
as a marketplace, and Lofland (1973) as a world of strangers. These two

characterizations can be said to correspond to the following two dominat-
ing explanations of the city's higher rates of crime and the increase in crime
with the rate of urbanization:
Greater opportunities for crime exist in the city (e.g., availability of suit-
able targets, higher levels of temptations, a developed public entertain-
ment life, etc.) .
Weaker social control exists in the city (e.g., there are lower detection
rates, it is easier to live as a social deviant, the city is a breeding ground
for criminal subcultures, etc.).
Factors like these were pointed out in studies made in the late 19th cen-
tury; see, for instance, Aschaffenburgh (1911, p. 62).
Cohen and Felson's (1979) influential article on routine activities and
crime presents a simple but fruitful tool for analyzing area differences and
changes over time in crime rates. 3 They state that a minimum requirement
for Ii direct-contact predatory crime 4 to occur is the convergence in time
and space of a motivated offender, a suitable target, and in the absence of
capable guardians.
Hence, differences in crime rates among areas or changes in crime rates
over time may be related to changes in some or all of the three components
necessary for a crime to occur. The main thesis in Cohen and Felson's
(1979) article is that in the post-war period, there has been a significant
decrease in human activities (routine activities) in the home and a corre-
sponding increase in activities taking place outside the home, and that this
has increased the opportunities for motivated offenders to commit crime:
In particular, we shall argue that this shift in the structure of routine activities
increases the probability that motivated offenders will converge in space and time
with suitable targets in the absence of capable guardians, hence contributing to
significant increases in the direct predatory crime rates over these years. (pp. 593-
594).
A main point made in Cohen & Felson's article is that it is not necessary for
the motivated offenders to increase in the population to have a significant
increase in crime.
Following the logic of Cohen & Felson's (1979) approach, one may say
that differences in the crime rate between areas (e.g., urban and rural
areas) may occur because there are in one, as compared to the other, more
offenders but equal opportunities for crime, an equal rate of offenders but
more opportunities, or both more offenders and more opportunities. With
3. Routine activities are defined as "any recurrent and prevalent activities which
provide for basic population and individual needs" (Cohen & Felson, 1979, p. 593).
4. Direct-contact predatory crimes are defined as crimes in which someone takes or
damages the person or the property of another (Cohen & Felson, 1979, p. 589).
Explaining the Difference 15
opportunities is understood the presence of suitable targets in the absence

of capable guardians (i.e., formal and informal surveillance).
It has been suggested that participation and frequency of crime (see
again Table 2.1) are independent factors and that frequency may be more
related to opportunities and participation to factors thought to influence
the individual's criminal propensity (LeBlanc & Frechette, 1989, p. 68).
Unfortunately, very little is known about how much of the variation in
crime rates among areas and in area crime rates over time is a reflection of
differences or changes in participation and/or frequency of crime (by resi-
dents and visitors), and how much these two aspects of offending, in turn,
are a reflection of differences or changes in factors influencing an indi-
vidual's criminal propensity or factors influencing opportunities.
3
The Urban Offender
The evidence from criminological research suggests that, at any given point
in time, the propensity to offend (i.e., break the law) varies significantly in
the urban population, ranging from those who occasionally may fall for an
extreme temptation (the pure opportunistic offender) to those who more
regularly search for opportunities to commit crimes (the chronic offender).
(See, e.g., Leblanc & Frechette, 1989, pp. 181-182). As to violent be-
havior, the same appears largely to hold true, although it is perhaps better
to speak about a differential readiness to react with violent actions in differ-
ent kinds of situations. The propensity to offend shows a general variation
with demographic and social characteristics such as sex, age, social class,
and so on, as most textbooks in criminology will report (e.g., Nettler, 1974
pp.98-135).
Recently, there has been a strong emphasis on the value of a develop-
mental perspective on offending, acknowledging that an individual's cri-
minal propensity is something that may grow and change in strength over
time but that may also diminish, and that the factors that influence offend-
ing at different stages in a process of drifting in or drifting out of a "crimin-
al life-style" may vary (Farrington, 1988a; LeBlanc & Frechette, 1989;
Loeber & LeBlanc, 1990). Farrington has summarized this perspective by
saying that:
It is plausible to propose that behavior is a function of the interaction between the
person and the situation. Immediate situational causes of offending can be distin-
guished from long-term causes. Individual differences in criminal propensity, built
up over time in a learning process, may interact with immediate situational factors
such as opportunities, costs, and benefits, so that the potential becomes the actual-
ity (the criminal event). (pp. 319-320)
The criminal event will be the focus of study in Chapter 4.

In this chapter, which is divided into two parts, the focus will be on the
characteristics of the urban offender and his or her pattern of offending and
its development. The first part predominantly builds on data from the
Stockholm 1982 Crime Survey (see Appendix A) and gives a cross-
16
Offenders in Urban Crime 17
sectional picture of selected characteristics of the urban offender in crimes

of violence, vandalism, and serious theft (burglaries and thefts of and from
cars). The second part builds upon research carried out on the offending
patterns in a 1953 Greater Stockholm cohort (Project Metropolitan).
Although all types of crimes are included in the cohort study, a special
focus will be given to the traditional crimes (violence, vandalism, and
theft) because they are the major concern of this book. After some of the
key findings are presented these crimes will be dicussed in the concluding
section of this chapter.
Offenders in Urban Crime

In this section, some of the major correlates of urban offending will be
presented. The correlates to be dealt with are sex, age, ethnicity, social
class, previous involvement in criminality, and abuse of alcohol and drugs.
The data presented refer predominantly to findings from the Stockholm
1982 Crime Survey (see Appendix A).
Sex
The commission of traditional crimes is predominantly a male business. It
is well established that females have a very low involvement in traditional
crimes. The female involvement tends to be higher in less serious crimes.
The highest female involvement of those crimes included in the Stockholm
1982 Crime Survey is in molestation, followed by violence toward a public
official, serious assault, and vandalism, (see Table 3.1). In this context, it
should be pointed out that the cases of violence toward a public official
generally were of a less serious nature when involving a female than a male
offender. Moreover, the fact that the female involvement in police-
recorded serious violence is higher than for the female involvement in
petty assaults is likely to be related to two circumstances: First, many of
the cases of serious violence with female offenders can be described as
"defense situations" where the female was under, or previously had been
under, attack from the (almost always) male victim, and was defending
herself against a physically superior person, often using a weapon, which
generally means more severe injuries. Second, one may speculate whether
the reportability of male victims in less serious cases of assault by females
may be lesser than the corresponding reportability for female victims.
That there is an overall great difference in the rate of offending between
males and females is well-known. However, there are also significant dif-
ferences in the patterns of offending between males and females, an issue
that has not received the same attention and is discussed in the section
below on offending and its development.
18 3. The Urban Offender
TABLE 3.1. The sex distribution of offenders by different legal categories of crime
(the city of Stockholm, 1982).
Males Females
Crime (%) (%)
Serious assault a 90 10
Petty assault 94 6
Violence towards a public official 83 17
Robberies against the person 98 2
Rape 100 0
Molestation 81 19
Vandalism 91 9
Residential burglary 93 7
Nonresidential burglary 95 5
Thefts of cars 95 5
Thefts from cars 95 5
Note. The legal definitions of the crime categories are given in Appendix B.
a Including homicide.
Age
Another well-established difference in offending is its variation by age. The
age distributions for the different crimes included in the Stockholm 1982
Crime Survey is shown in Table 3.2. When comparing the age distributions
of different categories of crime, it should be noted that it is valid only to
compare the pattern of age variation; comparison among crime categories
of the rate at given ages is problematic due to the great differences in dark
figures and clearance rates. In general, crimes against the person have a
higher dark figure and higher clearance rate compared to crimes of theft
and vandalism (see Persson, 1980; Wikstrom, 1987b).
The results presented in Table 3.2 show significant variations in the age
distribution of offenders among the different categories of crime. Robbery,
vandalism, nonresidential burglary, and thefts of cars have a peak for
offenders aged 15 to 19. Violence toward a public official and residential
burglary have a peak in the next age group, 20 to 24. Finally, serious
assault, rape, molestation, and thefts from cars peak for offenders at higher
ages, 30 to 34. Petty assault does not have any significant peak ages, but
rather a peak level for offenders from the ages of 15 to 44.
It is important to point out in this context that the social contexts of the
crimes (to be further discussed in Chapter 4) vary significantly with age for
crimes of assault and vandalism. Although the great majority (around two
thirds) of the assaults (serious and petty) committed by offenders below the
age of 20 are committed in public places (streets, squares, public transport,
and places of public entertainment), this proportion continuously de-
TABLE 3.2. The age distribution of offenders in different legal categories of crime per 10,000 in respective age group; peak ages in bold type
(the city of Stockholm, 1982).a
Age Serious Petty Violence toward Robbery Rape Molestation Vandalism Residential Nonresidential Thefts of Thefts from
assaultb assault public official against person burglary burglary cars cars
10-14 0.0 11.7 0.0 0.0 0.4 4.7 23.7 0.0 23.7 0.0 0.0
15-19 2.2 86.2 25.4 32.9 2.2 16.0 119.2 13.2 248.4 53.3 51.7
20-24 3.9 89.4 42.5 15.8 2.7 20.3 69.8 132.7 171.3 45.2 47.2
25-29 6.7 91.0 30.9 13.2 2.1 26.3 60.1 59.9 157.7 26.6 45.3
30-34 7.6 85.3 27.3 10.6 3.8 31.8 49.3 32.2 140.0 23.7 75.1
35-39 7.5 90.3 21.9 13.6 3.2 18.3 50.8 58.7 68.2 21.3 20.1
40-44 6.4 91.8 14.0 4.1 2.6 27.1 26.2 27.1 57.7 14.6 19.2
45-49 4.1 49.6 12.3 2.4 1.0 17.4 41.0 20.1 24.6 6.8 0.0 0
50-54 4.1 19.1 4.4 0.9 0.6 16.8 2.9 12.3 17.6 0.0 9.7 l
::l
55-59 0.0 22.6 2.8 0.0 0.7 7.1 4.7 1.9 1.4 1.2 0.0 0..
(1)
60 and above 0.0 6.2 0.8 0.0 0.1 4.8 1.1 0.0 0.3 0.0 0.0 ....
'"5'
a Including
homicides. C
....
bOnly offenders residing in Stockholm included. cr"
I'l
::l
n
::to
S
(1)
......
'-D
creases with age. At ages 20 to 29 just about one half of the offenders
committed assaults in public places. At ages 30 to 39 and above, a clear
majority of the offenders committed assaults in nonpublic space. For those
aged 40 and older, the majority of assaults were committed within the
family or among acquaintances in residences. Similar age-related differ-
ences can be observed for vandalism, where just above two thirds of the
cases occur in public for offenders below the age of 20, just below one half
for offenders aged 20 to 29, and clearly less than one half for offenders aged
30 and older. The relevance of pointing this out is to say that assault and
vandalism in public show a different age pattern than that for assaults and
vandalism in private and semiprivate spaces.
Ethnicity
Of the population of the city of Stockholm during 1982, 8% were foreign
citizens. In the age group 16 to 44, this proportion was slightly higher (i.e.,
13%). However, citizenship is a less-than-perfect measure of ethnicity be-
cause many first-generation immigrants have acquired Swedish citizenship,
and some people with foreign parents (second-generation immigrants) may
have kept their foreign citizenship. Therefore, a comparison of offenders
by citizenship, such as the one that will be conducted in this section, has its
drawbacks. It would have been best to have the possibility to compare the
patterns of offending for the groups of first-generation immigrants, second-
generation immigrants, and the rest ofthe population. This was, however,
unfortunately not possible within the scope of this study.
The greatest number of residents with foreign citizenship in Stockholm
are of Finnish origin, whereas the countries from which most of the Stock-
holm residents with a non-Nordic foreign citizenship come are Greece,
Turkey, and Yugoslavia. In the comparison of offenders by ethnicity, I
shall show this for three categories: Swedish, other Nordic, and non-
Nordic. It was not judged possible to have a finer divison because of the
generally small number of offenders for many nationalities.
The findings (see Table 3.3) show that those with a foreign citizenship,
given that they are 3% (Nordic) and 5% (non-Nordic) of the Stockholm
residents, are clearly overepresented among the offenders, with one signif-
icant exception, and that is for non-Nordic citizens' involvement in serious
property crimes where they, by and large, are an expected proportion of
the offenders, perhaps even a somewhat lesser proportion than expected,
because there is a higher percentage of non-Nordic foreigners among the
population in the most crime-active ages. The highest proportion of foreign
offenders is found for crimes of assault (serious and petty) and especially
rape. An alternative way to say this is that these are the crimes with the
lowest percentage of Swedish offenders because, without having any point
of reference, it is really difficult in comparisons of this type to say whether
it is the one category that has a high level or the other that has a low level.
TABLE 3.3. The distribution of offenders' ethnicity by different legal categories of

crime (the city of Stockholm, 1982).a
Crime Swedish Other Nordic Non-Nordic
Serious assault b 75 14 11
Petty assault 73 9 18
Violence toward a public official 77 13 10
Robberies against the person 84 6 10
Rape 50 17 33
Molestation 80 6 14
Vandalism 80 8 12
Residential burglary 91 7 2
Nonresidential burglary 84 11 5
Thefts of cars 86 11 3
Thefts from cars 87 5 8
Note. The legal definitions of the crime categories are given in Appendix B .
Only offenders residing in Stockholm included.
blncluding homicide.
The decision taken on this may be highly theoretically relevant, because it

appears to be quite a different thing whether it is one group's high rate or
another's low rate that warrants an explanation. For instance, from the
figures presented, it is difficult to say whether it is the Swedes who have a
low rape rate and the foreigners a "normal" rape rate, or whether it is the
foreigners who have a high rape rate and the Swedes a "normal" rape rate.
Questions of this type should perhaps be given more attention than they
have been given so far in rate comparisons between different social groups.
Social Class and Social Marginalization

Although there has been an intense debate among scholars as to whether
or not there is a relationship between social class and offending (Tittle,
Villemez, & Smith, 1978; Hindelang, Hirschi, & Weis, 1979; Braithwaith,
1979, 1981; Thornberry & Farnworth, 1982) it seems clear to this author
that especially for the kinds of crimes we are concerned with here (i.e.,
traditional crimes), the evidence points to a clear difference in the rate of
offending between the social classes. The state of the art may briefly be
summarized as follows (Wikstrom, 1983): There are significant differences
in the rates of offending by social class, but social class is not a very good
predictor of offending. This is basically so because even if the majority of
offenders in traditional crimes belong to the lower social classes, a large
part of the lower social classes are nonoffenders. The Swedish experience
on this issue does not depart very much from the Anglo-American (Jons-
TABLE 3.4. The previously recorded criminality (all kinds) by extent for offenders
by different legal categories of crime (the city of Stockholm, 1982).
Extent of previous crime
Crime None ('Yo) Recidivist ('Yo) Persistent ('Yo)
Serious assault" 31 27 42
Petty assault 44 29 27
Violence toward a public official 32 24 44
Robbery against the person 29 24 47
Rape 39 34 27
Molestation 69 14 17
Vandalism 39 31 30
Residential burglary 7 13 80
Nonresidential burglary 27 25 49
Thefts of cars 18 19 63
Thefts from cars 33 24 43
a Induding homicides.
son, 1969 pp. 218-222; Olofsson, 1971 pp. 146-151; Werner, 1971; SOU,
1976; Tham, 1978 pp. 130-136; Janson, 1982).
Perhaps more striking than the dominance of offenders belonging to low-
er social class backgrounds, when looking at an urban offender population
cross-sectionally, is the very high degree of previous records for crime and
the extent of such records among the offenders. In the Stockholm 1982
Crime Survey, offenders were classified according to their previous crimin-
al record (for all kinds of crimes) as follows:
1. None (i.e., no previous record); the crime included in the survey was
the offenders first recording.
2. Recidivists (i.e., those with a previous record but not qualifying for
being classified as persistent-(see below).
3. Persistent (i.e., those with at least one recording for crime in at least
four different years previous to 1982).
The findings, presented in Table 3.4, show the following:
The majority of the offenders, with the exception those who committed
molestation, have a previous record for crime, ranging from 56% in petty
assaults to 93% in residential burglaries .
For many of the crime categories, in particular for crimes of serious theft,
robbery, violence toward a public official, and serious assault, the pro-
portion of offenders with an extensive previous record is very high,
ranging from 42% for serious assault to 80% for residential burglaries.
TABLE 3.5. Extent of previous recordings for crime (all kinds) in a 1953 Greater
Stockholm cohort (Project Metropolitan) at the age of 25/26 (June 1979).
Recidivisfs a
None (including one-timers) Persistent
(%) (%) (%)
Total cohort 81.2 16.4 2.4
a Note that all offenders (even one-timers) are included in this table in the recidivist category;
otherwise, the categones are defined the same way as in Table 3.4.
The picture is clearly one of the urban offender as a person with a heavy
criminal involvement, at least as regards the somewhat more serious tradi-
tional crimes. If one compares the proportion of offenders previously re-
corded with what could be expected from a normal population (i.e., the
amount of recordings in the 1953 Greater Stockholm cohort for offenders
up to the age of 25 1) the difference is dramatic (see Table 3.5).
For 5 out of the 11 categories of crime it was possible in the Stockholm
1982 Crime Survey to extract information about whether the offender was
known as an intravenous drug addict or not (see Appendix A for more
information on this variable). For all crime categories, information was
available about whether or not the offender was previously recorded for a
drug offense. Because there was a rather close correspondence between
the level of offenders being known as intravenous drug addicts and being
recorded for previous drug offenses, the latter may be taken as an indica-
tion of the proportion of drug abusers in the crime categories where data
about intravenous drug abuse is lacking. It should be mentioned in this
context that a state commission, using a so-called snowballing technique,
tried to estimate the number of intravenous drug abusers in the Greater
Stockholm area in 1979. The commission estimated that the intravenous
drug abusers consisted of less than 1% of the total Greater Stockholm
residential population (Ds S, 1980, p. 92).
Clearly adding to the picture of urban offenders in more serious tradi-
tional crimes as socially marginalized ("habitual" criminals and/or abusers
of drugs and alcohol) is the fact that a very high proportion of them, espe-
cially in crimes of gain (robbery and theft), are known drug addicts (Table
3.6). Although no measure of alcohol abuse was included in the Stockholm
1982 Crime Survey, it is well-known from previous Swedish studies, at least
with regard to the somewhat older violent offenders, that to a rather high
degree they are known for alcohol abuse (Wikstrom, 1980; Kuhlhorn,
1984, pp. 142-146).
1. Judging on the basis of the pattern of decay with age in first-timers (see further
below) in the cohort, the proportion that will debut in crime after the age of 25 can
be estimated to around 4 to 5%.
TABLE 3.6. Percentage of offenders known for intravenous drug abuse,a and per-
centage of offenders with a previous record of drug offenses (the city of Stockholm,
1982).
Known intravenous Previous record for
Crime drug abuse (%) drug offenses (%)
Serious assaultb 13 23
Petty assault 6 8
Violence toward a public official N.A. 17
Robbery against the person 26 27
Rape N.A. 10
Molestation N.A. 9
Vandalism 8 13
Residential burglary 49 68
Nonresidential burglary N.A. 35
Theft of cars N.A. 44
Thert from cars N.A. 49
"Data about the offenders' intravenous drug use was only collected for some of the included
crimes.
blncluding homicides.
N.A. = Not available in study.
Crime and Its Development in the Urban Population

The cross-sectional picture of the urban offender in more serious crime is
predominantly one of a person who is heavily involved in crime and who in
many cases abuses drugs and/or alcohol. In this section we shall, among
other things, consider how this group emerges by looking into the develop-
ment of crime in a Greater Stockholm cohort up to the age of 25-26 years.
In this section, some findings from studies on crime and its development
in a Greater Stockholm 1953 cohort (Project Metropolitan) will be pre-
sented and compared with findings from Anglo-American research. 2).
The studied cohort is defined as all those born in 1953 and residing in the
Greater Stockholm area in 1963. In total, the cohort comprises 15,177
males and females. For a general description of the project, its fields of
interest, and its data, see Janson (1984).
The findings presented here will cover cohort members between the ages
2. The findings presented here are predominantly taken from several studies made
by the author while working on Project Metropolitan (see Wikstrom, 1985, pp.
117-133; Wikstrom, 1987a; Wikstrom, 1989a; Wikstrom, 1989b; Farrington &
Wikstrom, 1990; Wikstrom, 1990).
Crime and Its Development in the Urban Population 25
of 13 and 25. Some results, however, will cover the period up to the middle
of 1979, the year during which the cohort members reached the age of 26.
The number of crimes recorded for the cohort members is calculated in
total on an annual basis and divided into seven subclasses: theft, fraud,
vandalism, violent crimes, traffic crimes, narcotic crimes, and other crimes.
It should be pointed out that in this classification, robbery has been
counted as a violent crime; that receiving of stolen goods is included in
theft; that arson is included under vandalism; and, finally, that the category
of "other crimes" is very heterogeneous, including such crimes as defama-
tion and crimes against the Taxation Offense Act. (For more detailed in-
formation about the contents ofthe classes of crime, see Wikstrom, 1990.)
Participation in and Frequency of Crime

Crime is often thought of as a deviant behavior, but for male subjects-
especially in big U.S. cities but also in big British and Swedish cities-it
appears not to be uncommon to have been recorded for a crime at some
point during youth and young adulthood. Wolfgang, Figlio, and Sellin
(1972) report from their well-known 1948 Philadelphia cohort study that
35% of the males up to the age of 18 were recorded for crimes; and, 47% of
the focused on up to the age of 30 were recorded for crime (Wolfgang,
Thornberry, & Figlio, 1987). Another well-known longitudinal study,
which focused on a sample of 1953-born white, working-class males in Lon-
don (West & Farrington, 1977), reports that 30.8% of the males studies
were convicted by the age of 21. Farrington (1988b, p. 46) reports that 37%
of the same group of males were convicted by the age of 32. Moreover, for
certain demographic groups in large U.S. cities, it even looks to be deviant
not to have been recorded for crime. Wolfgang et al. (1987) report from
the Philadelphia study (referring to subjects at age 30) that "for the non-
whites and to a somewhat lesser extent the lower SES subjects, official
criminality is more the rule than the exception" (p. 21).
Looking at the Greater Stockholm cohort (see Table 3.7), during the
studied period, from the age of 13 to the age of 25/26, nearly one fifth
(19%) of the cohort members were recorded by the police for a crime
included in the study. More than one 10th (12%) were recorded more than
once. The 2,837 offenders in the cohort were responsible for almost 24,000
recorded crimes. One half of these crimes (51 %) were theft. The frequency
(i.e., crimes per offender rate) is highest for theft and lowest for vandalism,
violent crimes, and other crimes.
The participation rate (i.e., the percentage of cohort members ever
being recorded for crime during the studied period) is much less for
females than for males; 6% of the females, as contrasted to 31 % of the
males, were recorded for at least one crime included in the study. Among
those recorded for crimes, females are much less active than their male
TABLE 3.7. Participation and frequency in crime for the Greater Stockholm
Cohort, ages 13 to 25/26 (from 1966 to June, 1979) by sex and social class of
offender.
Subgroup of offenders or type of crime Participation (%) Frequency
Total 19 8.1
Males 31 9.1
Females 6 4.5
Lower working class 26 10.2

Working class 21 9.1
Lower middle class 17 7.1
Upper middle class 12 5.1
Theft 11 7.0
Fraud 3 3.3
Vandalism 3 1.6
Violent crimes 4 2.2
Traffic crimes 8 3.5
Narcotic crimes 2 3.7
Other crimes 7 1.9
counterparts. The frequency is twice as high for males (9.1) as for females
(4.5).
The social class of the cohort members parents was measured at two
points in time; at the cohort members' birth (1953) and at their age of 10
(1963). In the present analysis, only data about the parents' social class at
the cohort members' age of 10 wlll be used. A fourfold classification will
be used, dividing the parents' social class into lower working class
(N = 2,416), working class (N = 3,306), lower middle class (N = 6,396) and
upper middle class (N = 2,587)-(see Wikstrom, 1987a, pp. 15-17). Since
the upper class was such a tiny part of the highest soclal class, it was in-
cluded in the upper middle class. The basis for the social class classification
is the type of occupation of the head of the cohort member's family, gener-
ally the father. For 412 of the 15,117 cohort members, or 3%, the head of
the family had no occupation, or information on occupation was lacking.
The criminality of those cohort members belonging to this group is higher
than for those whose parents social class was known.
The participation rate varies significantly among the social classes. The
participation rate is more than twice as high for the lower working class
than for the upper middle class. Not only is the participation in crime less
for higher social class members, but they are also less active in crime, as the
calculation of the frequency in crime for offenders from different social
classes shows-the frequency for the lower class offenders is twice as high
as that for the upper-middle-class offenders.
The Distribution of Crime in the Urban Population 27
The Distribution of Crime in the Urban Population

Results such as those presented above give the picture that crime is both
widespread and frequent in male urban populations. However, what has
also been shown in the above-mentioned studies is that most individuals
recorded for crime are occasional offenders, only having been recorded for
one or a few crimes, whereas there is a small group of offenders who are
responsible for a large part of the crimes.
Wolfgang et al. (1972, p. 88) showed that 18% of the offenders in the
Philadelphia cohort up to the age of 18 were responsible for 52% of the
recorded police contacts. Of all members of the Philadelphia cohort, 6%
accounted for 52% of the crimes. In a longitudinal study of a London
working-class neighborhood sample, Farrington (1984) found that up to
the age of 24 "about 6% of the sample accounted for 46% of the convic-
tions" (p. 237).
Various Swedish studies also indicate that a few offenders commit a large
part of the crimes. In a study of breaking-and-entering offenders in Stock-
holm, Persson, (1976) shows that 10% of the offenders during the studied
period accounted for 50% of the cleared-up breaking-and-entering cases.
Another Swedish example is a study of a representative sample of men in
the General Criminals Register (Tham, 1978). It shows that 17% of those
convicted account for 45% of the convictions. In a recent report from a
Swedish cohort study conducted in a medium-sized city, the authors show
that up to the age of 29, 10% of those convicted for a crime accounted for
66% of the crime occasions recorded in the convictions (Stattin, Magnus-
son, & Reichel, 1986 p. 17).
The observation that a few individuals commit a large proportion of the
crimes is not limited to studies of recorded criminality. Two Swedish stu-
dies of self-reported crimes also show that a few individuals are responsible
for a lot of the crimes (Elmhoro, 1969 p. 129; Suikkila, 1983, p. 206).
In the 1953 Greater Stockholm cohort, the number of crimes recorded
for individual offenders ranged from 1 to 361 during the studied period.
However, most offenders were recorded for only one (37%), two (16%) or
three crimes (10%). As regards the significance of those few individuals
committing a large number of crimes, 50% of the recorded crimes (11,937
crimes) were committed by a sroall group of 161 offenders known for 32
crimes or more. These 161 offenders constitute 1% of all cohort members
and 6% of the known offenders.
In a recent article, Fox and Tracy (1988) used the Gini coefficient (called
alpha in their paper) and the Lorenz curve to describe the distribution of
crime by cohort members and offenders, respectively, in the two Phi-
ladelphia cohorts (1945 and 1958 cohorts). For closer descriptions of the
Gini coefficient and the Lorenz curve, see, for instance, Theil (1972, pp.
106-108) or Alker and Russell (1964, pp. 212-214). The alpha will be 0 if
the crimes are perfectly evenly distributed among the cohort members (or
TABLE 3.8. The skewness in the offender distribution as measured by alpha (Gini
coefficients ).
Alpha N
Total cohort, both sexes .94 15,117

Offenders only, both sexes .71 2,837
Males only .91 7,719
Male offenders only .72 2,389
Males only, excluding the categories
traffic and other crimes .94 7,719
Male offenders only, excluding the
categories traffic and other crimes .73 1,796
Females only .98 7,398
Female offenders only .63 448
offenders) and 1 if the distribution of the crimes among the cohort mem-
bers (or offenders) is maximally unequal. Fox and Tracy claim this to be a
better measure of the crime distribution than the commonly used measure
of X% of the offenders as being responsible for X% of the crimes. A major
advantage with alpha, according to Fox & Tracy, is that "regardless of the
size of cohorts being studied or differences in the concentration of delin-
quents or the total number of offenses that they have committed, the index
can be used to compare the offense distributions observed" (pp. 272-273).
They get alphas for the full male cohorts of .82 (1945) and .84 (1958) and,
for offenders only, of .47 (1945) and .51 (1958) (pp. 266-267).
The same exercise was carried out for the Greater Stockholm cohort.
The alpha (Gini coefficient) for the Greater Stockholm cohort was .94 for
the total cohort and .71 for offenders only. The alpha was also calculated
separately for the two sexes, for males, excluding the traffic crimes, and
the crimes belonging to the heterogeneous category of other crime. (see
Table 3.8). There were no dramatic differences in the value of the alphas
among the different categories for which it was calculated. The result indi-
cates a stronger concentration of crimes in the Stockholm cohort than in
the Philadelphia cohorts. However, one should be careful before jumping
to conclusions, because, as stated by Fox and Tracy (1988),
The obtained alpha will depend on whether the sample consists of only offenders or
of both offenders and nonoffenders, on whether all types of offenses are included or
just serious or violent crimes, and on whether or not the sample is restricted to a
particular age range. (p. 272)
It cannot be excluded that the Philadelphia cohorts and the Stockholm
cohort may show some differences as regards the type of factors mentioned
by Fox and Tracy (1988) that may disturb a direct comparison. The Lorenz
curves for the total male cohort and the male offenders only are shown in
The Distribution of Crime in the Urban Population 29
100
90
80
.,"'
E
.;: 70
<J
., 60
C
.,...
<J
50
.,
Cl.
...
.~
..!!!
40
::::J
E 30
::::J
U
20
10
10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
Cumulative per cent male cohort members
FIGURE 3.1. The Lorenz curve for the distribution of crime for the full Greater
Stockholm male cohort (N = 7,719).
100
90
80
.,"'
. 70
....,c:
<J
60
.,...
<J
50
.,
Cl.
>
.;::; 40
..!!!
::::J
E 30
::::J
U
20
10
10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
Cumulative per cent male offenders
FIGURE 3.2. The Lorenz curve for the distribution of crime for male offenders only
in the Greater Stockholm cohort (N = 2,389).
Figures 3.1 and 3.2, respectively. The Lorenz curves gives more detailed
information on what kind of distribution lay behind the Gini coefficient (or
alpha). Following the praxis of Fox and Tracy, the normal way of present-
ing the Lorenz curve has been mirrored.
Impressive as the figure of the distribution of crimes by cohort members
is, it is not, however, without fault. It is likely that low-rate offenders are
less represented among the recorded offenders than frequent offenders,
which contributes to an overestimation of the skewness of the distribution
of crimes by cohort members (Wikstrom, 1987a, pp. 4-8). Further, but of
less significance, the figures are calculated on the number of crimes each
offender is known for; obviously, some of these crimes might have involved
several cohort members, meaning that some crimes might have been
counted more than once. All in all, it seems unlikely that the bias pointed
to would alter the main conclusion that a minority of the offenders account
for a great part of the cohort members' criminality.
'the discovery of the skewed distribution of crimes by offenders has led
to an interest in the so-called chronic (or persistent) offender, that is, the
offender belonging to the small group of offenders who commit a large part
of the crimes, although it has not been easy to establish any criteria for
which offenders should be counted as chronic and which should be not
(see, e.g., Wolfgang et aI., 1972, Chap. 6; Blumstein et aI., 1985). It has
been argued that the early prevention of the offenders from developing
into "chronics" could substantially reduce crime. As was shown in the pre-
vious section, the cross-sectional picture of the majority of urban offenders
in more serious, traditional crimes was one of a chronic offender.
Specialization and Versatility in Crime

A widely dicussed topic in criminology is whether or not criminality is a
unidimensional phenomenon. The answer to this question depends, among
other things, upon the definition of specialization. (For different meanings
of specialization, see LeBlanc & Frechette, 1989, p. 102.) However, the
general picture that emerges from the Anglo-American research on this
topic is one of a versatile rather than a specialized offender. Most persis-
tent offenders seem to be jacks-of-all-trades rather than specialists in a
single type of crime.
Hindelang, Hirschi, and We is (1981) draw the following conclusion from
a review of self-report studies:
These studies strongly suggest, then that varieties of delinquency are not indepen-
dent, but more or less consistent with each other. Thus, there is nearly universial
support among the studies examined for the conclusion that at least one dimension,
perhaps loosely configured, of delinquency exists. (pp. 67-70)
Specialization and Versatility in Crime 31
Authors of Swedish self-report studies disagree about the specificity of de-

linquent behavior. Some interpret their results as showing unidimensional-
ity (Elmhorn, 1969, p. 93; Suikilla, 1983), and others interpret them as
showing multidimensionality (Olofsson, pp. 1971, p. 80; Duner & Hag-
lund, 1974, p. 33). It should be remembered that self-report studies mostly
concern young people and to a large degree are confined to less serious
offenses or delinquency.
Concerning officially recorded criminality, Hindelang et al. write that
"efforts to establish the dimensionality of official data, as we have seen, are
extremely rare," and they conclude that "official deliquent acts are only
weakly correlated among themselves" (p. 71).
Walker, Hammond, and Steer (1967) studied 4,301 Scottish males, who
were convicted for the first time in 1947, for a period of 11 subsequent
years, in which their convictions were recorded. Walker et al. also had
access to a sample of 4,239 London males convicted in March or April of
1957; in this case, earlier convictions (this was not a first-conviction sam-
pie) and subsequent convictions for a period of 5 years were studied. Hav-
ing focused on violence, they draw the conclusion, among others, that (1)
"with each successive conviction for violence the probability of a further
such conviction increases sharply," (p. 469), and that (2) "loosely speak-
ing, [there is] an increasing tendency to 'specialize' in offences involving
violence" (p. 470). The increasing tendency to specialize refers to a rela-
tionship between the number of convictions for violence and the percen-
tage of subsequent convictions (within 3 years) that involve violence. The
term specialize is perhaps not so appropriate here, because the criterion
for specialization is that the conviction includes violence (perhaps among
other types of crimes).
In a study by Peterson, Pittman, and O'Neal (1962), which focuses on
assaultive versus nonassaultive offenders, support is presented for the
hypothesis that "persons are arrested for assaultive crimes or non-
assaultive crimes, but not both" (p. 46). The study was conducted in St.
Louis, Missouri (USA), on a sample of 88 males, aged 40 and above, who
had been arrested for serious violent crimes (homicide, aggravated assault)
or burglary. The high age of those in the sample, as well as the criterion for
inclusion in the sample and the relaffvely small size of the sample, should
be noted.
All of these studies of recorded crimes indicate some specialization.
However, in the Philadelphia birth cohort study, Wolfgang et al. summa-
rize their results concerning the repetitiveness according to type of offense
in the following way:
The choice of the type of the next offense is only very slightly related to the type of
prior offense or offenses. This finding leads us to the conclusion that the next type
of offense-be it injury, theft, damage, combination, or nonindex-cannot very
well be predicted by examination of the prior offense history, at least when the
history is represented by our typology. There is practically no evidence to support a
hypothesis of the existence of offense specialization among juvenile delinquents.
(p.254)
A U.S. study of 1,619 juvenile offenders aged 8 to 17 in Pima County,
(Arizona), which was carried out by the same method (transition probabil-
ity matrix) as that of Wolfgang et aI., reaches the same conclusion about
specialization: "There was no evidence that male or female juveniles
specialize in a particular type of offense as their official career develops,
although the nature of their involvement differs" (Rojek & Erickson, 1982,
p.26).
In studying specialization and versatility of offenders in the 1953 Greater
Stockholm cohort, I shall rely upon an analysis of patterns of correlations
and, as I have termed it, the specificity ratio. One might say that the corre-
lational analysis attempts to study the existence of patterns of versatility,
whereas the calculation of the specificity ratio focuses upon specialization
in crime.
The Specificity Ratio

Before exploring patterns of versatility in crime among the high-rate offen-
ders, it seems natural to consider the question of the proportion of special-
ized offenders in the cohort. The criterion used here to define a specialized
offender is that more than two thirds of his or her recorded criminality
must be of the same type according to the crime classification employed in
this study. However, the category of crimes referred to as "other crimes"
was excluded because it was not judged to be meaningful to speak about
specialization in other crimes.
The specificity ratio is calculated in the following way:
All offenders known for fewer than three crimes were excluded from the
calculations.
For all offenders known for a specific crime category (e.g., fraud), it was
calculated how many of their total crimes were of that kind (e.g., fraud!
total crimes).
The decision to exclude those known for fewer than three crimes is of
course somewhat arbitrary. It was guided by two considerations: First,
there is not much point in speaking about specialization where first- and
second-time offenders are concerned. Second, excluding more offenders
(e.g., all known for fewer than five crimes) would have meant the loss of a
large part of all offenders. It should be noted that for those offenders
known for three or four crimes, all of their known crimes had to be of the
same type for them to be counted as specialized offenders.
Of all offenders known for three crimes or more, 27% were specialized.
TABLE 3.9. The specificity ratio by type of crime (only offenders known for three or
more crimes included).
Offenders known for:
Percent
crimes Theft Fraud Traffic Narcotic Violent Vandalism
0-25% 24 63 48 70 73 84
26-50% 28 19 34 21 20 13
51-75% 25 7 13 5 5 3
76-100% 23 11 5 3 2
N 1,012 407 748 280 455 299
Note. The same offender may appear in several columns, although, for obvious reasons, an
offender can only appear with 51 % or more of his crimes in one specific crime category.
Most of these offenders were specialized in theft (69%), followed by fraud

(13%) and traffic crimes (12%). Comparing the proportion of specialized
offenders in different types of crimes one may state that crimes of gain
(theft, fraud) have the highest proportion of specialized offenders, whereas
crimes of overt aggression (violence, vandalism) have the lowest propor-
tion of specialized offenders (see Table 3.9).
Sex and Social Class Differences

Comparing the specialization in crime by sex one finds that females are
much more specialized in crime than males. According to the employed
criteria of specialization, 42% of the females known for three or more
crimes and 24% of the males known for three or more crimes were special-
ized. Among the specialized offenders it was most common to be special-
ized in theft. That was so for both males (72%) and females (55%). The
second-ranking crime was traffic crime for males (14%) and fraud for
females (34%).
Comparing the proportion of male and female specialized offenders in
different types of crimes (see Table 3.10) one finds that although there are
more specialized female offenders in all crime categories, with the excep-
tion of traffic crimes, the main difference is the much higher proportion of
females specializing in fraud.
As regards social class differences, there is no marked social class differ-
ence in the proportion of specialized offenders. The highest proportion of
specialized offenders is among those with a lower-working-class back-
ground (28%) and the lowest proportion among those with a middle-class
background (25%). With the exception of traffic crimes, where there is a
tendency for upper-middle-class offenders to be somewhat more special-
ized, there are no marked differences between offenders from different
social classes in specialization with regard to specific crime categories (see
Wikstrom, 1987a, Table 39, p. 63).
TABLE 3.10. The specificity ratio by type of crime and sex of offender; only offen-
ders known for three or more crimes (figures in percentages).
Offenders known for:
Theft Fraud Traffic Narcotic Violent Vandalism

Percent
crimes M F M F M F M F M F M F
0-25% 24 21 72 23 38 32 73 55 74 54 83 81
26-50% 29 25 16 36 42 50 19 35 20 26 13 14
51-75% 25 24 6 10 13 14 6 0 4 18 3 0
76-100% 22 30 6 30 7 4 2 9 2 3 5
Note. For the female offenders in the cases of traffic crimes, vandalism, and violent crimes the
percentage is calculated on 20-40 offenders.
Patterns of Versatility: A Correlational Analysis

There are two main options when carrying out a correlational analysis of
the relationships among different types of criminality. One is to use dicho-
tomies (known-not known for the crime in question); the other is to use
the incidences of the crimes in question. The first method focuses upon the
question of whether the offender known for one type of crime is also
known for other types of crime. The second method focuses upon the ques-
tion of whether offenders highly active in one type of crime are also highly
active in other types of crimes-that is, it focuses on the high-frequency
offenders' patterns of offending. (The reader is reminded of the highly
skewed crime distribution.)
From the fact that most of the offenders are known for one or a few
crimes, it can be anticipated that dichotomies will yield low correlations
among types of crimes. That turns out to be the case. Furthermore, it is
rather pointless to speak about specialization or versatility in crime for the
group of low-rate offenders. The question about specialization in crime is
restricted to high-rate offenders, in particular to those who might be de-
scribed as having a criminal career. Therefore, the correlational analysis
will be made on the offenders' incidences of crimes of different types, and
the focus will be on patterns of versatility in crime among high-rate offen-
ders.
The zero-order correlations between different types of crimes are shown
in Table 3.11. An oblique factor analysis (Promax), allowing for a max-
imum of three factors, explained 65% of the variance. The eigenvalue of
the third factor was 0.94. The first and strongest factor had highest loadings
on theft, violent crimes, and vandalism, and the second factor had highest
loadings on traffic crimes, narcotic crimes, and other crimes, whereas the
third had only a single variable of a higher loading, namely, fraud (see
Table 3.12). The first factor might be labeled Traditional Criminality, the
second Modern Criminality and the third simply Fraud. The interfactor
correlations were all moderate, strongest between traditional and modern
TABLE 3.11. Zero-order correlations of crime categories (incidences of crime for

cohort members aged 13 to 25/26).
Violent Vandalism Fraud Traffic Narcotic Other
Theft 39 44 14 40 18 18
Violent 39 13 29 16 26
Vandalism 8 17 13 16
Fraud 16 9 13
Traffic 16 53
Narcotic 33
Note. Coefficients multiplied by 100 (N = 2,837); coefficients 30 and higher in bold type.
TABLE 3.12. Factor structure and communalities (all offenders).

Variables Traditional Modern Fraud h2
Theft 79 33 21 63
Violent crimes 73 34 17 54
Fraud 15 16 98 95
Traffic crimes 41 74 31 59
Narcotic crimes 16 64 -2 43
Other crimes 24 86 19 74
Contribution 36 16 13
Note. Coefficients multiplied by 100; loadings 40 and higher in bold type.
criminality (.33), followed by modern criminality and fraud (.22) and tradi-
tional criminality and fraud (.18).
Sex and Social Class Differences

Factor analysis was carried out separately for offenders of the two sexes.
As might be expected, the result of the analysis for males was close to that
for all offenders because males dominate highly among the offenders.
However, for females, the result was more deviant (see Table 3.13). The
most important factor was the Modern Criminality factor. Instead of a Tra-
ditional Criminality and a special Fraud factor, the female crimes split up
to an Overt Aggression factor (violence, vandalism) and a Crimes of Gain
(fraud, theft) factor.
The interfactor correlations are moderate and range between 0.19 and
0.23. Factor analysis of the crimes were also carried out separately on the
four different social classes, extracting three factors in each case. The result
revealed that it was largely possible to interpret the factor analysis in the
same way for each social class as the analysis for all offenders (see Wik-
strom, 1987a, pp. 67-68).
TABLE 3.13. Factor structures and communalities (female offenders).

Variables Modern Overt aggression Crimes of gain h2
Theft 46 44 64 59
Violent crimes 7 81 17 67
Fraud 9 0 85 76
Traffic crimes 89 12 22 79
Narcotic crimes 64 20 46 51
Other crimes 61 12 7 85
Contribution 35 17 14
Note. Coefficients multiplied by 100; loadings 40 and higher in bold type.
Age Patterns
So far, offending in the 1953 Greater Stockholm cohort has only been de-
scribed by its members' participation in and frequency of crime, by the
distribution of crime in the cohort, and by the degree of specialization and
versatility of crime in the cohort. Now it is time to consider the develop-
ment of offending in the cohort against this background.
It is well-known that criminality is not evenly distributed for different
ages (Sveri, 1961, Farrington, 1986b). Several studies show that the peak
age for criminality tends to be somewhere in the age range of 15 to 17.
Farrington (1984) has shown that "self-reported and official delinquency
tend to peak at about the same age" (p. 253).
There are, however, differences among types of crime with respect to the
age distribution of offenders. Violent crimes peak later than property
crimes. Hirschi and Gottfredson (1983) point out that this pattern is well-
established for official data but not for self-report data. They interpret this
as a result of the fact that seriousness of violence is age-related, unlike the
seriousness of property offenses and state that" 'injury' offenses by the
very young are unlikely to be sufficiently serious to attract the attention of
officials" (p. 558).
The peak age range for total crimes in the Stockholm cohort is from 15 to
17, with the highest incidence at the age of 17. However, the peak ages for
different types of crime vary significantly (see table 3.14); for example, the
peak age for crimes of theft and vandalism is 15, the peak age for fraud is
from 21 to 24 (with the highest incidence at age 23), the peak age for
violence is 19, and the peak age for other crimes is 20.
Traffic crimes and narcotic crimes cannot be said to have any distinct
peak age; the highest levels of narcotic crimes are found between age 20
and 23, and traffic crimes have a slightly fiuctating level of around 360-400
crimes per year between the ages of 16 and 25, with peaks at ages 16 and
25, and a dip at age 21.
Age Patterns 37
TABLE 3.14. Number of recorded crimes for the 1953 Greater Stockholm cohort.
Age Theft Fraud Vandalism Violence Narcotic Traffic Other Total
13 862 15 73 10 2 0 10 972
14 1,414 24 45 13 13 1 18 1,528
15 1,899 49 83 43 119 136 163 2,492
16 1,587 67 67 88 49 405 177 2,440
17 1,624 80 71 151 82 361 297 2,666
18 1,039 88 49 105 117 377 285 2,060
19 727 180 39 178 89 387 245 1,845
20 610 208 49 134 124 370 364 1,859
21 443 242 47 92 122 338 314 1,598
22 419 233 38 105 118 366 318 1,597
23 373 256 30 130 129 364 207 1,489
24 434 222 52 93 93 394 199 1,487
25 390 142 55 93 81 408 76 1,245
Note. Crimes recorded in the first half of 1979 not included.

Source: "Age and Crime in a Stockholm Cohort" by P.-O. Wikstrom, 1990, Journal of Quan-
titative Criminology, 6.
The structure of crime changes significantly with age (Wikstrom, 1990).

At the youngest of the studied ages, crimes of theft totally dominate the
picture, but with increasing age the crime structure gets more diversified.
Many of the crimes grouped together in this study are heterogeneous in
nature. The intraclass structure of crimes grouped together may change
with age. Further, it is likely, at least for some specific types of crimes, that
there are changes in the circumstances of the crimes by age, as shown ear-
lier in this chapter for crimes of assault and vandalism.
The age-specific incidence of recorded offenses shows the peak age for
offenders to be higher than for the crimes. Although the peak age of offen-
ders is 19, the figure for the age of 17 is close to it, with a dip at age 18, so
the peak age range for offenders might be said to be 17 to 19 (see table
3.15). Comparing the development of the age-specific crime and offender
rates as an index, Figure 3.3 shows that there is not such a clear peak for
the offenders as for the crimes. As regards specific types of crimes, one
major difference is that the peak age for offenders in theft is 13, as opposed
to 15 for the crimes of stealing, and that there is a continuous decrease of
the number of offenders from the age 13 onward, while the crime inci-
dences increase for the first of the studied ages. Another significant differ-
ence is the continuous decrease in traffic crime offenders from the peak age
of 16, which has no correspondence in the traffic crime incidences.
The Invariance of the Age Distribution

Hirschi and Gottfredson (1983) have claimed that the age distribution is
invariant across social and cultural conditions (i.e., time, place, demo-
TABLE 3.15. Number of offenders in the 1953 Greater Stockholm Cohort.

Age Theft Fraud Vandalism Violence Narcotic Traffic Other Total a
13 378 14 51 8 2 0 10 454
14 359 17 40 12 7 1 17 421
15 355 32 53 35 31 75 59 448
16 322 46 52 66 25 225 113 543
17 344 47 51 104 47 212 149 576
18 324 50 42 75 71 197 143 553
19 258 58 36 116 59 208 150 579
20 214 66 38 98 53 179 200 557
21 189 74 42 71 62 169 188 542
22 167 79 34 77 58 158 160 494
23 157 78 29 80 64 143 110 415
24 165 69 35 66 48 124 81 384
25 150 48 42 59 43 130 55 357
aSubclasses do not sum to total because offenders might be known for more than one class of
crimes.
Source: "Age and Crime in a Stockholm Cohort" by P.-O. Wikstrom, 1990,Journai ofQuan-
300
250
200
Crimes
150
Offenders
100 ... ... .

. ... ....
50
0
15 20 25
Age
FIGURE 3.15. Number of total offenders and total crimes of the 1953 Greater Stock-
holm cohort as an index (index age 13 is 100).
Source: Wikstrom, 1990.

Age Patterns 39
graphic subgroups, and type of crime). Hirschi and Gottfredson further

assume that age has a direct effect on crime and that "the age distribution
of crime cannot be accounted for by any variable or combination of vari-
ables currently available to criminology" (p. 554). The claim that the age
effect is invariant is an important empirical point of departure for their
assumption that age has a direct effect on crime.
In opposition to that, Farrington (1986a) claims that "considerable evi-
dence indicates that the relation between age and crime is not invariant"
(p. 191). Many researchers, both in Sweden (e.g., Sveri, 1961, 1965, Jan-
son, 1970) and elsewere (e.g., Greenberg, 1985, Farrington, 1986), have
offered social explanations for the age-crime relationship. Farrington
(1986) points, for instance, to the importance of peer influence at young
ages (group delinquency) and to results indicating that the motives for
crime may vary with age-that is, the motives have to do with thrill and
excitement at younger ages and with more rational reasons at older ages.
The present study does not cover the full lifespan of offenders but is
restricted to the period of youth and young adulthood, a period in which
the total crime rate peaks and thereafter starts to decline. However, within
this age range the results from the present study show that the age distribu-
tion, both as far as the crime and offender rate are concerned, varies for
demographic subgroups (sex, social class) and for types of crime.
Sex Differences
Looking at the age-specific crime rate and crime per offender rate for males
and females reveals significant differences. The male crime rate is highest
in the ages 15 to 17, which is also the period with the highest crime-per-
offender rate for males. The female crime rate is highest in the ages of 22
to 24, which is also the period with highest crime-per-offender rate for
females (Wikstrom, 1990).
As regards differences in the male and female crime rate, the difference
is largest at the ages of 16 to 17, when the male rate is 23 to 25 times higher
than the female rate, as contrasted to the oldest of the compared ages,
when the male rate is around 5 times higher than the female rate. Also, the
difference in crime-per-offender rate is highest at the youngest ages,
whereas there is no, or practically no, difference in the crime-per-offender
rate at the oldest ages (Wikstrom, 1990).
Social Class Differences

Looking at the age-specific crime rates for the different social classes shows
that the peak age in crime rates is highest for the lower working class (age
17), as compared to the working class (age 16) and the middle classes (age
15). At every age, the lower working class has the highest crime rate and
the upper middle class the lowest. However, the differences in the crime
rate among the social classes tend to decrease with age. As regards the
age-specific crime-per-offender rate, all social classes have a peak at age
15, except the working class, which has a peak at age 16 (Wikstrom, 1990).
Looking at the offender rates, the middle-class offender rates tend to
peak later than the working-class offender rates. The two working classes
have a peak in offender rates at the age of 17, whereas the middle-class
offender rates tend to peak around the age of 20 (Wikstrom, 1990).
Patterns of Offending by Type of Offender

According to Criminal Activity
Gottfredson and Hirschi (1986) have claimed that the age distribution of
"career" and "noncareer" criminals might be identical, and to support that
assumption they use data from Farrington (1983) to compare the age dis-
tribution of first convictions and recidivist convictions in the age range of
10 to 23. Gottfredson and Hirschi conclude, "Apparently, the age distribu-
tion of career criminality is identical to the age distribution of noncareer
criminality in Farrington's data" (p. 229).
Using the same type of strategy as Gottfredson and Hirschi, excluding
the first of the studied ages, the offenders at each age in the present study
were divided into first-time offenders and recidivists. First-time offenders
are defined as those who are recorded for the first time during the age
(year) in question, regardless of how many times they are recorded during
that age. Recidivists are those who have committed recorded crimes at any
previous age. The comparison of the age distribution of the first-time offen-
ders and the recidivist offenders in the Stockholm cohort does not indicate
identical age distributions over the age range studied.
The number of first-time offenders decreases continuously by age,
whereas the number of recidivist offenders increases up to the age of 20,
when a decrease starts-however, not as significant as that for the first-
timers. There is a 64% decrease in number of first-time offenders from the
ages of 20 to 25. The corresponding decrease in recidivist offenders is 23 % .
At age 17, more than one half of the recorded offenders are recidivists, and
that proportion is as much as 82% at age 25 (see Table 3.16). On basis of
the pattern of decay for the first-time offenders, it might be anticipated that
only a very small proportion of the cohort members (4 to 5%) will start in
crime after the age of 25.
One might rightly object to the comparison of first-time and recidivist
offenders as a way of comparing career and noncareer criminals, because
using this definition ignores the fact that all recidivists (career criminals) at
some age have been first-timers (noncareer criminals). However, all occa-
sional offenders will be among the first-timers, and because they are a large
proportion of all offenders, a comparison of the age distributions of first-
timers and recidivists might be viewed as an approximation of the age dis-
Age Patterns 41
TABLE 3.16. Number of offenders, number of first-time offenders, number of

recidivist offenders, and percent recidivist offenders of all offenders in the 1953
Greater Stockholm Cohort.
Year Age Offenders First-time offenders Recidivist offenders % recidivists
1966 13 454 454 0 0

1967 14 421 320 101 24
1968 15 448 266 182 41
1969 16 543 292 251 46
1970 17 576 276 300 52
1971 18 553 222 331 60
1972 19 579 221 358 62
1973 20 557 178 379 68
1974 21 542 186 356 66
1975 22 494 150 344 70
1976 23 415 90 325 78
1977 24 384 86 298 78
1978 25 357 64 293 82
tribution of career and noncareer criminals. Of all offenders, 37% are one-
timers, and as much as 63% have committed no more than three crimes.
It has already been shown that with increasing age there is an increasing
proportion of recidivist offenders. Looking at the crimes committed at each
age, the increasing importance with age of the recidivist offenders for the
criminality of the cohort is even more striking. At age 15, as many as 61 %
of crimes are committed by recidivist offenders, and at age 25 the recidivist
offenders account for 92 % of the crimes (see Table 3.17.) The fact that the
recidivists account for a higher proportion of the crimes than their pro-
portion of the offenders indicates that recidivist offenders have a higher
lambda than first-timers.
Sex Differences
For both males and females, the rate of first-time offenders shows a con-
tinuous decrease, and the rate of recidivist offenders shows a continuous
increase over the ages studied. However, the decrease is much faster for
the males than for the females. There are nine times more male beginners
at age 13 than at age 25. The corresponding figure for females is three times
more. In contrast, the increase in recidivist offenders is faster for females
than for males. There are five times more female recidvist offenders at age
25 than at age 14. The corresponding male figure is two and one half times
more (see Table 3.18).
TABLE 3.17. Number of crimes, crimes by first-time offenders and by recidivist

offenders, lambdas for first-time and recidivist offenders, and percent crimes by
recidivist offenders for 1953 Greater Stockholm cohort.
Crimes by
first-time Crimes by % crimes by
Age Crimes offenders Lambda recidivists Lambda recidivist
13 972 972 2.1 0 0

14 1,528 841 2.6 687 6.8 45
15 2,492 967 3.6 1,525 8.4 61
16 2,440 844 2.9 1,596 6.3 65
17 2,666 663 2.4 2,003 6.7 75
18 2,060 501 2.3 1,559 4.7 76
19 1,845 401 1.8 1,444 4.0 78
20 1,859 378 2.1 1,481 3.9 80
21 1,598 356 1.9 1,242 3.5 78
22 1,597 272 1.8 1,325 3.8 83
23 1,489 154 1.7 1,335 4.1 90
24 1,487 134 1.6 1,353 4.5 91
25 1,245 105 1.6 1,140 3.9 92
TABLE 3.18. Offenders, first-time offenders, and recidivist offenders by sex per
1,000 males respective to females in the 1953 Stockholm cohort.
Males: Females:
first-time Recidivist first-time Recidivist
Age Offenders offenders offenders Offenders offenders offenders
13 51 51 0 8 8 0
14 48 35 13 6 6 0
15 52 29 23 6 5 1
16 65 34 31 6 4 4
17 67 30 37 8 5 3
18 65 24 41 7 5 2
19 66 23 43 9 6 3
20 64 20 44 8 4 4
21 63 20 43 8 4 4
22 55 16 39 9 4 5
23 46 9 37 8 3 5
24 42 8 34 8 3 5
25 39 6 33 8 3 5
Age Patterns 43
At every age, there are more male than female offenders, both first-time
offenders and recidivist offenders. However, the gap between males and
females is less at the oldest of the compared ages. There seems to be a peak
in the male/female rate differences around the ages 15 to 17, thereafter
there is more or less a continuously decreasing sex difference.
Social Class Differences

For all social classes, the rate of first-time offenders tends to decrease with
age. The social class differences for the rate of first-time offenders is sig-
nificant at the youngest of the studied ages, but vanishes at the oldest
ages. This means that the social class offender rate difference at the oldest
of the compared ages is mainly due to a difference in the rate of recidivist
offenders (Wikstrom, 1990).
The Invariance of Frequency (Crimes-Per-Offender Rate)

Gottfredson and Hirschi (1986, pp. 228-229) claim that lambda (i.e. fre-
quency) is invariant (i.e., does not vary by age). Also, Blumstein Cohen,
Roth and Visher (1986) make a similar but somewhat weaker claim, saying
that there is "little evidence of strong systematic changes with age in
offense-specific frequency rates for active offenders" (p. 68). But later in
their text they qualify that statement by saying that:
Preliminary evidence suggests that while mean individual frequencies appear to
be relatively stable over age for most single offense types, total frequencies-
reflecting the combination of all offense types committed-vary more with age,
increasing during juvenile years and decreasing during adult years. (p. 70)
Gottfredson and Hirschi (1986, p. 229) base their conclusion partly on

the invariance of lambda by age on results calculated with data from an
unpublished work by Farrington from 1983 on the number of convictions
per convicted person. If lambda (i.e., frequency) is understood as a mea-
sure of criminal activity, it is likely that the rate of number of convictions
per convicted is a less sensitive measure of lambda than number of re-
corded crimes per recorded offender. The number of crimes included in a
conviction may vary considerably among convictions. Further, it is likely
that there is an annual administrative restriction in the possible number of
convictions per year for a specific offender regardless of the number of
crimes he or she committed during a year or at a certain age. Blumstein et
al. (1985) state that the results concerning the invariance of lambda by age
are still preliminary "because of the generally small samples of active
offenders (sometimes less than 35) used to generate age-specific rates and
because the available analyses do not yet extend past ages in the 20s for
adults" (p. 69).
TABLE 3.19. Crimes per offender in the 1953 Greater Stockholm cohort.
Age Theft Fraud Vandalism Violence Narcotic Traffic Other Total
13 2.3 1.1 1.4 1.2 1.0 1.0 2.1

14 3.9 1.4 1.1 1.1 1.9 1.0 1.1 3.6
15 5.3 1.5 1.6 1.2 3.8 1.8 2.8 5.6
16 4.9 1.5 1.3 1.3 2.0 1.8 1.6 4.5
17 4.7 1.7 1.4 1.4 1.7 1.7 2.0 4.6
18 3.2 1.8 1.2 1.4 1.6 1.9 2.0 3.7
19 2.8 3.1 1.1 1.5 1.5 1.9 1.6 3.2
20 2.8 3.1 1.3 1.4 2.3 2.1 1.8 3.3
21 2.3 3.3 1.1 1.3 2.0 2.0 1.7 2.9
22 2.5 2.9 1.1 1.4 2.0 2.3 2.0 3.2
23 2.4 3.3 1.0 1.6 2.0 2.5 1.9 3.6
24 2.6 3.2 1.5 1.4 1.9 3.2 2.5 3.9
25 2.6 3.0 1.3 1.6 1.9 3.1 1.4 3.5
Note. No traffic crimes recorded at age 13.

The results of the present study show that frequency (lambda) in the
Stockholm cohort does vary with age and, further, that the variations are
different for different types of crime.
The calculation of frequency (i.e., the age-specific crime-per-offender
rates) reveals higher rates for total crimes for offenders aged 15 to 17, with a
peak at age 15 (see Table 3.19). As regards specific types of crimes, there is
an increase in the crime-per-offender rate for theft, with a peak at age 15
and thereafter a decrease in rate to the age of 21, where the rate seems to
stabilize at around 2.5 crimes per offender. Fraud and traffic crimes have a
continuously increasing crime-per-offender rate over the ages with a signif-
icant jump upward for fraud at age 19 and for traffic crimes at age 15 and
at age 24. Also, the crimes-per-offender rate for violent crimes might be
described as continuously increasing with age, but the increase is rather
small, from around 1.2 crimes to around 1.5 crimes per offender. Vandal-
ism has generally the highest crimes-per-offender rate for the youngest of
the studied ages. Narcotic crimes have, after an increase, a peak at age 15
. and thereafter a decrease followed by a jump upward, stabilizing at a rate
around two crimes per offender at age 20. The heterogeneous category of
other crimes shows more irregular rates than any of the specific crime
categories.
In Blumstein et al. (1986), it is argued that "if active in a crime type,
females commit that crime at rates similar to those of active males" (p. 67).
The results of the present study contradict to that statement, because they
show that lambda in the Stockholm cohort is not invariant by sex. Further,
in the present study the lambda also shows significant differences among
offenders from different social classes.
Discussion 45
A divison of offenders into first-timers and recidivists at each of the

studied ages shows that the lambda at every age is much higher for the re-
cidivist offenders than for the first-time offenders (see again Table 3.17).
Discussion
According to Blumstein et al. (1986), "A criminal career is the character-
ization of the longitudinal sequence of crimes committed by an individual
offender" (p. 12). They go on to say that the criminal career approach
"partions the aggregate rate into two primary components: participation,
the distinction between those who commit crime and those who do not,
and frequency, the rate of activity of active offenders." Changes in aggre-
gate crime rates may reflect changes in (1) the level of participation, (2)
individual frequency, and (3) duration of activity. (p. 13). It is largely
beyond dispute that the overall total crime rate peaks in the youth period
and thereafter declines, although closer examination shows that there
might be significant variations among times, places, and types of crimes
and for demographic subgroups.
The Peak in Crime in Youth

It has been claimed by Farrington (1986a) that "it seems that the peak age
seen in official statistics reflects a peak age in the prevalence of offending"
(p. 215). However, the results from the Stockholm cohort show that the
peak age in total crime in youth (15 to 17 years) is a consequence of higher
individual frequencies (lambdas) rather than higher participation rates (see
again Fig. 3.3).
The Decline in Crime After the Peak in Youth

Dividing offenders into first-timers and recidivists shows the increasing im-
portance of the age of the recidivists for the criminality of the cohort (see
above). In other words, there is a decreasing input of new offenders. On
the basis of the pattern of decay in first-time offenders up to the age of 25,
one might estimate that there will be very few first-time offenders in crime
after age 25 (around 4 to 5 %). This fact seems to have important implica-
tions. The decrease in offenders after the age of 20 is mainly due to a
decrease in first-timers, whereas after a sharp increase, the recidivist offen-
ders stabilize and start a slow decrease. One may assume that after the
studied ages (i.e., age 26 and onward) the decline expected in the number
of offenders is mainly due to the average criminal career length of the
recidivist offenders.
After the peak in youth, the decrease in crimes is likely to reflect the
decrease in participation (mainly because there is not much input) and
average length of criminal careers. The lambda seems to be fairly invariant

after the higher rates at the peak ages in crime (see again Table 3.19).
The shape of the decrease in the number of crimes at older ages might
therefore be viewed mainly as a consequence of the length (duration) of
active offenders' criminal careers. The decline in the crime rate seems
mainly to be due to the degree with which recidivist offenders (for what-
ever reason) end their criminal careers.
Many Anglo-American studies have shown that there is a rather high
degree of continuity in offending from youth to young adulthood (e.g.,
Farrington, 1988a, p. 315). For the offenders in the 1953 Greater Stock-
holm cohort, it has been demonstrated (Wikstrom, 1987a, pp. 44-54) that
young debut ants in crime tend to have a higher rate of recidivism and
longer persistence in crime than those who get recorded for crime for the
first time at older ages. That is so even controlling for possible years of
persistence by age of debut (given that the offending was only studied for
individuals up to the age of 25). As an overall conclusion, one may say that
more serious offending in the male urban population predominantly, and
especially after the youth period, is committed by a small group of persis-
tent offenders who often have started early with crime.
I shall conclude this chapter by commenting somewhat on the sex and
social class differences that were identified in patterns of offending, be-
cause these differences do not seem to have received any great attention in
the literature on patterns of offending and because these differences may
have important theoretical implications for the explanation of offending. I
shall also give some speculations about why the patterns of offending, in
some important respects, show differences between the two sexes and
among different social classes.
Because the great majority of the offenders are male, the pattern of
offending for the total cohort is close to that of the male pattern. However,
a comparison of the male and female patterns showed significant differ-
ences. Females are much less often recorded for crime than are males (6%
as opposed to 31 %). Among those recorded for crime, females are much
less active than their male counterparts, although the concentration of
crimes to a small group of offenders was about the same for both sexes.
Females are much less involved in crimes of overt aggression and in traffic
crimes than in crimes of gain and narcotic crimes. It is only in the case of
fraud that the female proportion of offenders and crimes exceeds one fifth.
Of the offenders known for three and more crimes, females are much
more specialized than males (42% as opposed to 24%). Although the
majority of offenders who specialize do so in stealing, the proportion is
significantly lower for females (55%) than for males (72%). About one
third of the specialized female offenders specialize in fraud.
In the age range studied, the female crime rate increases with age in
contrast to the male rate, which drops in the oldest ages. The drop in the
male crime rate is mainly due to a drop in crimes of stealing, whereas most
Discussion 47
other types of crime show an increase over the ages. There are 18.5 times
more male crimes at age 13 to 16, compared with 6 times more male crimes
at age 21 to 25/26. Consequently, the proportion of all crimes committed
by females increases with age but never reaches as high as one fifth.
Age at onset tends to be higher for females than for males. Although
there is a great difference in the number of female and male first-time
offenders at age 13 (6 times more males), the difference at age 25 is signif-
icantly smaller (2 times more males). In contrast to the males, females
with a late start tend to be more persistent than those with an early age at
onset. The female and male crime structure tends to become more similar
with increasing age.
All in all, male and female criminality tend to narrow in many respects
with increasing age. Another way to put it is to say that it is in youth that
the differences between male and female criminality are most pronounced.
One hypothesis to account for this might be that females are more pro-
tected from criminal influences during the most criminogenic period, or
that youth is not criminogenic in the same way for females as it is for males.
That might depend on such factors as closer parental control and fewer
group activities among females in youth. Much crime in youth is connected
with group activities (Sveri, 1965), and poor parental control is one major
correlate with criminality found in other studies (e.g., Farrington, 1984).
In this context, it can be noted that the crime with the greatest female
involvement is fraud, mainly a nongroup kind of crime with a rather high
median age at onset. It might also be that the revealed pattern of narrow-
ing has something do to with changes in the female position in society
during the period studied.
The social class differences in crime are much greater for crime rates
than for offender rates, indicating not only a higher proportion of offenders
in lower classes but also a higher activity in crime, although the small pro-
portion of the offenders who account for one half of the crimes is about the
same in the different social classes. The social class differences in crime
rates are greater for traditional crimes, in particular for violent crimes,
than for modern crimes. There are no marked differences in the degree of
specialization in crime among offenders from different social classes. It is
only the upper-middle class offenders who have a deviating crime struc-
ture.
Working-class crime develops differently from middle-class crime. The
latter increases over all age periods, whereas the former drops off in the
last age group. The social class differences in incidence of crime narrow
with age.
Age at onset tends to increase with the social status of the offender. The
difference among the social classes in beginners in crime vanishes with age.
There are three to four times more lower-working-class offenders with a
debut in crime at age 13, whereas the number starting in crime at age 25 is
about the same in all social classes.
All in all, just as for the sex differences, the social class differences in
crime tend to narrow in many respects with increasing age of the cohort. It
might be possible to have a hypothesis about the reasons for this similar to
the one for sex differences. The protection from criminogenic influences in
youth might be class-related. Parental control and the kind and amount
of group activities might vary among the social classes, assuming, for in-
stance, that parental control is generally greater and group activities are
fewer and less delinquency-oriented in higher social classes. It might
also be the case that the social class of origin becomes less important with
increasing age.
All in all, it may be that differences in the rate of offending between the
two sexes and among different social classes, are partly related to general
variations among members of these groups in the degree of social control
they are subjected to during early youth, the most criminiogenic period in
life (LeBlanc & Frechette, 1989, p. 81), a period which may be critical to
the .development (or lack of development) of bonds to conventional society
(Hirschi, 1969).
4
The Social Contexts of Urban Crime
There are many ways in which crimes may be classified (Glaser, 1974,
pp. 45-78). The legal definition of crime is a common point of departure for
crime classifications. The legal definition specifies kinds of behavior that
are illegal (e.g., hitting, vandalizing, and stealing) and sometimes specific
under what conditions they are illegal but normally gives rather limited
information about the social contexts in which a criminal act takes place.!
The social circumstances of legally defined categories of crime can be very
heterogeneous. Therefore, a study of the social contexts of legally defined
categories of crime may in itself contribute to our understanding of the
behavior in question and its causes. Moreover, a crime classification based
on the social contexts of crime may be a more fruitful point of departure
than a legal classification for other types of analysis (e.g., ecological and
environmental analyses of the crime distribution and its correlates).
In this chapter, a classification and analysis of the social contexts of
selected traditional crimes will be made. The study covers violent crimes
(i.e., homicide, assault, violence to a public official, rape, robbery, and
molestation), vandalism, and serious property crimes (i. e., burglaries and
thefts of and from cars).2 The basic data analyzed are taken from the
Stockholm 1982 Crime Survey, a detailed study of a sample of about 7,500
police crime investigation records. The figures presented are weighted to
1-year figures by the different sampling fractions applied (see Appendix
A).
1. The same holds true, to a large extent, for the official crime statistics, which are
normally based on the legal definitions of crime.
2. The legal definitions of the studied crimes are given in Appendix B. Molestation
is not really a violent crime but rather a crime against the peace and will not be
specifically discussed. The social contexts of the crime of molestation have pre-
viously been studied by Nilsson (1988).
49
50 4. The Social Contexts of Urban Crime
Contextual Crime Analysis

A social act might simply be defined as behavior that takes place in a social
and physical environment and involves one or more persons. Crimes are
social acts that are considered as crimes because they are legally defined so.
The contextual analysis of crime focuses on crimes as social acts and deals
with the sociolegal aspects of the definition of certain acts as crimes, and
the study and classification of the social circumstances of crime.
Wilkins (1964) states that:
Human actions, even as interpreted within a society at a fixed time, do not divide
into black and white, good and bad, functional and dysfunctional. The divisions
into crime and no crime, into what are regarded as health and ill health, are cutting-
points on a continuum. (p. 46).
In the present study, no special effort will be made to deal with the impor-
tan,t but complex issue of why certain acts become regarded as criminal.
(For an introductory overview see Hagan, 1987, pp. 32-91.) However, the
issue will be touched upon when discussing the problem of differential dark
figures and clearance among different social contexts of crime.
Classification is an important scientific task. As already stated, the legal
classification of crime is not always the best point of departure for studying
crime as social behavior. The circumstances in which a specific act of crime
takes place may vary considerably. This fact has been especially acknowl-
edged in many studies of violence, in which the heterogeneous nature of
the circumstances of crimes of violence has been shown. The value of a
contextual analysis of crimes of violence has been advocated and demon-
strated in the pioneering works by McClintock and Gibson (1961) and
McClintock (1963, 1974).
There are a large number of relevant factors-only a few of which will it
be possible to consider in the present study-that may vary with the social
context of a crime, such as the following:
Offender characteristics (e.g., age or previous criminal involvement).
The reasons and background for the criminal act (e.g., conflict, thrill, or
gain).
The victimization risk for different social groups.
Public fear.
Consequences of the crime for the individual and the society.
Reactions from the legal system (e. g., discretion or sanctions).
Reactions from public opinion (e.g., formation of interest groups).
Reactions from witnessess (e.g., propensity to intervene).
Different social groups' views on the social acceptability of the act.
In the following sections, I shall analyze and discuss the social contexts of
traditional urban crimes under three headings: urban violence, urban van-
dalism, and urban serious theft.
Urban Violence 51
Urban Violence
Crimes of violence occur in a variety of social contexts. Men assault their
wives at home, people are hit or robbed in the street by strangers, women
are raped by causal acquaintances, police officers are attacked in the course
of their duty, and so forth. Of the three major types of criminal behavior
dealt with in this study-violence, vandalism, and serious theft-the social
contexts of violence are likely to be the most heterogeneous ones.
Although violent crimes are heterogeneous, there seem to be some general
similarities in that much violence appears to be related to situations of
social control or friction between people.
First of all, criminological research shows that the overwhelming major-
ity of assaultive crimes develop out of a conflict situation. This is an experi-
ence found in Swedish studies (e.g., Wikstrom, 1980, pp. 125-127; Kuhl-
horn, 1984, p. 111), British studies (e.g., McClintock, 1963, p. 33), and
North American studies (e.g., Wolfgang, 1958, p. 191; Pittman & Handy,
1964, p. 467). Violence, especially assaults, may thus be viewed as one
way, among many others, to react to friction with other people.
Second, it seems that many violent actions might be interpreted as
aspects of social control (Black, 1984). Judging from the reading of state-
ments in police investigations, this is not only so in crimes of violence in
connection with police arrests, being refused entrance to a restaurant and
so forth, but also in many cases of violence within the family and even to
some extent in the violence that occurs in streets and other public places.
Violence is one means, among others, to try to influence the behavior of
others, or to punish others' undesirable behavior.
The Contextual Analysis of Crimes of Violence Using

Police-Recorded Crimes: Aspects of Classification
Numerous different ways have been proposed and applied empirically to
classify the social contexts of crimes of violence. Judging from previous
research into the social contexts of crimes of violence (e.g., Wolfgang,
1958; McClintock & Gibson, 1961; McClintock, 1963; Amir, 1971; Wik-
strom, 1980; Kuhlhorn, 1984), the main principles, solely or in combina-
tion, for the division of circumstances seem to be (1) the place of crime
commission, (2) the victim-offender relationship, and (3) the actions pre-
ceding the violence or the offender's motive for the violent action.
The motive for the crime is a difficult aspect to study from police records,
because motives are of a private nature. Only the offender knows his or her
motive, and, though stated in the police investigation, it may not always be
the true motive. (For a discussion of the problems in studying motives, see
Amir, 1971, pp. 131-133.) Moreover, in cases of missing offenders, there is
no source of information concerning the offender's motive, although vic-
52 4. The Social Contexts of Urban Crime,
tims and witnesses may give reliable information on victim-offender rela-

tionships and actions preceding the violence. Many different classifications
of offender motives have been proposed. (For an overview, see Megargee,
1984, pp. 93, 98, 100, and 104).
The actors and the proximate milieu may be regarded as components of
a social context. But because human perception is selective, each actor
may have his or her own definition of the situation. This subjective defini-
tion of a situation, although an interesting aspect of the occurrence of vio-
lence (see, e.g., Athens, 1980; Prus, 1978), is not possible to study with the
kind of data available for the present study.
Some authors have tried to describe the violent event action by action
(Shoman, Ben-David, & Rahav, 1975; Felson & Steadman, 1983), and
although that may have some interest, such a description was judged to be
too unreliable with regard to the data used for the present study.
Points of Departure for a Contextual Classification of

Crimes of Violence
It will be suggested here that fruitful starting points from which to build a
basic classification of the social contexts of violent crimes are the behavior
itself (e.g., assault, rape, or robbery), and the private-public dimension of
the circumstances of the crime.
It is a rather common approach to divide different kinds of violent be-
haviors according to whether they are expressive, that is, goals in them-
selves or whether they are instrumental, that is, means to an end (e.g.,
McClintock, 1974). Although a distinction, based on legal labels, between
expressive violence (assaults) and instrumental violence (robbery or rape)
says something about differences in the social situations of the crime, it is
not as clear-cut a divison as it may seem. Many expressive crimes of vio-
lence, as will be evident in the discussion below, seem also to have an
instrumental or controlling component (e.g., trying to make the other
party to comply with one's wishes or views), and some instrumental crimes
of violence appear to have an expressive element. However, there are in
general enough relevant differences among the typical social situations of
assaultive crimes, robberies, and rapes to warrant a separate discussion of
these three kinds of violent acts.
The social circumstances of an assault, robbery, or rape, are likely to be
very different according to whether the act takes place in a private or public
setting. Moreover, a robbery in private, for instance, may have more in
common, as regards the social circumstances of the crime, with an assault
in private than with a robbery in public. The private-public dimension of
violent behavior can be regarded as crucial in describing varying social
contexts of violence. In the following discussion, it will be assumed that the
essentials of the private-public dimension of the crime circumstances can
Urban Violence 53
Intimate
relation
Family
violence
Public
place
__________-+__________ Residence
Street violence
attacks
Strangers
FIGURE 4.1. The private-public dimensions of crimes of violence.
be empirically grasped by using the following two variables for classifica-

tion (see Figure 4.1):
The place ofthe crime (e.g., residence or public place).
The type of interpersonal relationship between the victim and the offen-
der (e.g., family members, acquaintances or strangers).
It is also likely that such factors as the dark figure and clearance of crime
tend to covary with the type of crime in question and its degree of being
private or public. For instance, crimes between intimates in residences are
likely to have a high dark figure and a high clearance rate (the latter be-
cause if the crime is reported the offender will be known), whereas an
assault in the street by a stranger will have a lower dark figure and a lower
clearance rate (Persson, 1980).
The private-public dimension of crime is thus not only interesting as an
analytical tool for the study of the social contexts of crime but also interest-
ing from a methodological point of view when working with police-
recorded data.
In the present study, as already stated, the points of departure for the
description of the social contexts will be the scene of the crime and the
victim-offender relationship. There was no possibility to consider preced-
ing actions because no such data were collected for this study. However,
some knowledge of these points exists from previous Swedish studies made
by the author (Wikstrom, 1980, 1987c), and that information will be used
in the discussion of the various social contexts of violence. Before describ-
ing the contextual classification employed in this study, I shall discuss
McClintock's classification, because it is the major source of inspiration for
the one developed for this study.
McClintock's Classification
A contextual classification that partly builds upon the involved persons'
interpersonal relationship and the place of crime commission is that from
McClintock's (1963, pp. 29-30) London study of crimes of violence (with-
out any moment of theft). McClintock points to several of the empirical
problems of making a classification: the heterogeneous and complicated
nature of the violent event, the difficulties in getting precise information
concerning the circumstances, the discrepancies between the offenders'
and their victims' descriptions of these circumstances, and the problem of
getting information on the reason or the motive for the violence (pp. 27-
28). McClintock's classification is shown in Table 4.1.
A study of McClintock's classification shows that there appears to be
some overlap among the classes, a fact acknowledged by McClintock him-
self. He states that Classes 1 and 2 are motive-based and have priority over
the remainder, which are said to be based on circumstances. However,
even if one takes into account that Classes 1 and 2 are given priority over
the rest, it still seems possible to have some overlap among the classes.
Although perhaps not so common, the cases described in Class 3 may
occur both in public houses (Class 4) or at public places (Class 5). It is
TABLE 4.1. McClintock's classification of crimes of violence (without a moment of

theft); main classes only.
Class Description
1 Attacks in order to perpetrate a sexual offense.

2 Attacks on police officers or on civilians intervening to prevent crime, or to
apprehend a person who has committed a crime, or who is suspected of posses-
sing an offensive weapon.
3 Attacks resulting from family disputes, quarrels between neighbors or between
persons worktng together.
4 Attacks in or around public houses, cafes, and other places of entertainment.
5 Attacks in thoroughfares and other public places.
6 Attacks in special circumstances, including attacks on prison officers, injury result-
ing from criminal negligence, and attacks by persons of unsound mind.
Source: Crimes of Violenc.e (p. 33) by F.H. McClintock, 1963, London: Tavistock. Used by
permission.
Urban Violence 55
TABLE 4.2. McClintock and Gibson's classification of the social contexts of rob-
bery; main classes.
Class Description
Robbery of persons who, as part of their employment, were in charge of money or

goods.
2 Robbery in the open following sudden attack.
3 Robbery on private premises.
4 Robbery after preliminary association of short duration between victim and offen-
der (mainly for heterosexual or homosexual purposes).
5 Robbery in cases of previous association of some duration between victim and
offender (e.g. friends, lovers, workmates).
Source: Robbery in London (pp. 14-15) by F.H. McClintock and E. Gibson, 1961, London:
Macmillan. Used by permission.
assumed here that Class 3 in fact have been given priority over Classes 4
and 5. Moreover, Class 2 may as equally well be based on circumstances as
on motives. It may finally be noted that Class 3 appears to use the victim-
offender interpersonal relationship as a major defining variable, whereas
Classes 4 and 5 obviously are defined according to place of occurence.
McClintock refers, in a later work (1974), to the classification as primarily
based "on the overall situation in which the incident occurred and on the
previous relationship of the parties involved" (p. 14). Although McClin-
tock's classification is the best that I have found in the literature, it is, as
has been demonstrated, not without problems. Therefore, for the present
study I have developed a modified version of McClintock's classification to
describe the social contexts of crimes of violence.
The classification by McClintock excluded crimes of violence with a mo-
ment of theft (Le., robberies). McClintock and Gibson (1961) had earlier
developed a separate classification for crimes of robbery (see Table 4.2).
However, because I wanted to have the same basic classification for all
kinds of violence, in order to be able to make direct comparisons of the
social circumstances among different kinds of violent behavior (Le.,
assault, rape, and robbery), the McClintock-Gibson classification for rob-
beries was not considered.
The Social Contexts of Violence: The Basic Classification

The classification employed in this study has five main classes. The first is a
class of all cases of violence within the family. This is the only main class
given priority over the rest, meaning that all cases of family violen~e re-
gardless of place of occurrence are referred to this class. The overwhelming
majority of the family violence cases in the study occurred in residences. It
is important to point out that cases between fiances and formerly married
or cohabiting persons are als.o included in this class. The latter form a non-
neglible proportion of the cases of violence within the family (see below).
The second class refers to all cases of violence between nonfamily ac-
quaintances that takes place in residences. It should be pointed out that all
cases between nonfamily acquaintances occurring in the proximity of resi-
dences (i.e., cellars, staircases, or house lots) are also included in this
category.
The third class consists of all nonfamily cases of violence in places of
public entertainment (restaurants, bars, etc). Also included in this category
are cases that took place in the entrance area of the establishments, which
was quite a few of the cases in this category (see below). This class is
divided into three subcategories determined by the victim-offender inter-
personal relationships:
1. Relationships between nonfamily acquaintances.
2. Relationships involving a person (victim or offender) on duty or in the
course of work (i.e., police, doormen, restaurant personnel, etc.).
3. Relationships between strangers or causal acquaintances.
In referring cases to subclasses, the second category is given priority over
the rest, which almost always means over the third subclass, because nor-
mally the parties are strangers to each other in cases involving a person on
duty or in the course of work. The reason for specifying cases in which
persons are involved in violent encounters with others as part of their work
(e.g., police officers) or in the course of their work (e.g., a shop employee
who tries to intervene in a case of shoplifting) is that the social situation of
the crime can normally be regarded as very different from that when pri-
vate persons get involved in fights with causal acquaintances or strangers.
Causal acquaintances are classified as those with only a short duration of
acquaintance before the crime incidence (e.g., cases in which the victim
and offender met for the first time one evening in a restaurant and later on,
in that same evening, the victim was beaten up, robbed, or raped by the
offender).
The fourth class contains all nonfamily cases of violence in streets,
squares, and other public places. This class is divided into the same subcate-
gories as the third class, and the same principles to refer cases to subclasses
have been employed. All nonfamily cases occurring on public transport
and in its stations are included in this category.
The fifth, and final, main class contains all nonfamily cases of violence
under other circumstances than those covered by the four first classes.
It was divided into the same three subcategories, according to victim-
offender relationship, as Classes 3 and 4.
The Distribution of Violent Crimes by

Social Context of Crime
The distribution of crimes of violence by social context of crime is shown in
Table 4.3. The contextual distribution for the three different types of
Urban Violence 57
TABLE4.3. Legal categories of crimes of violence by social contexts of violence.

Columne percent (Stockholm, 1982).
Violence Robbery
Social Serious Petty toward public against
context violence a assault official persons Rape Molestation Total
Within in family 18 21 0 1 10 7 13
Acquaintances
in residences 21 14 0 5 11 32 14
Places of public
entertainment 7 18 13 1 2 6 12
Acquaintances 2 0 0 1 2
Involving someone
on duty/at work 2 8 13 0 0 6
Strangers/casual
acquaintances 4 8 0 1 3 5
Public places 30 34 61 71 25 31 42
Acquaintances 2 4 3 3 2 6 4
Involving someone
on duty/at work 2 7 58 5 0 8 13
Strangers/casual
acquaintances 26 23 0 62 23 17 25
Other circumstances 24 13 25 22 52 24 19
Acquaintances 2 2 1 1 2 2
Involving someone
on duty/at work 5 4 24 0 2 4 6
Strangers/casual
acquaintances 17 7 0 21 29 18 11
Number 228 3,775 861 942 142 1,200 7,148

Missing 20 220 21 42 13 309 625
a Homicides and aggravated assaults.
assaultive crimes added together (i.e., serious assault, petty assault, and
violence toward a public officiaP) is shown in Table 4.4.
Around one fourth of all reported violence occurred in what may be
labeled as private (i.e., within the family or among acquaintances in apart-
ments), a bit more than one half occurred in public (i.e., in places of public
entertainment and other public places), and less than one fourth occurred
3. Violence toward a public official may be regarded as a subcategory of petty

assault that has been brought out because petty assaults on public officials are,
according to Swedish law, regarded as more serious crimes than petty assaults on
civilians (see Appendix B).
TABLE 4.4. Social contexts of assaultive crimes: (serious and petty assault and vio-
lence to a public official combined). Columne percent (Stockholm, 1982).
Assaultive crimes
Social context (N = 4,864; missing 261)
Within the family 17

Acquaintances in residence 12
Places of public entertainment 17
Acquaintances 2
Involving someone on duty/at work 8
Strangers/casual acquaintances 7
Public places 39
Acquaintances 4
Other circumstances 15
Acquaintances 2
in other circumstances, which often may be described as semiprivate or

semipublic.
Of all violence cases, one fourth involved a person on duty or in the
course of work. This proportion was much higher (nearly one third) when
considering the assaultive crimes only. The proportion of cases in public
involving acquaintances is, as expected, low. Therefore, crimes in public
are mostly crimes involving strangers or causal acquaintances or crimes
involving someone on duty or in the course of work. The same holds true
for crimes in other circumstances.
In the comparison of different types of violent behavior, as may be ex-
pected, robbery against a person and violence toward a public official are the
most public forms of violence, whereas rape is the least public form. Seri-
ous assaults are somewhat less public than petty assaults. It is noteworthy
that a high proportion of the rapes occurred in other circumstances.
Before discussing violence in various social contexts, a few words are
warranted about the problem of differential dark figures. (For a longer
discussion on differential dark figures, see Wikstrom, 1985, pp. 36-49.) It
is fairly well established that the dark figure of violence, in order of rank of
importance, is determined by the seriousness of the victim's injuries, the
victim-offender relationship, and the visibility of the crime (i.e., place of
crime occurrence).
The most serious cases of violence have a low dark figure regardless of
the victim-offender relationship and the place of crime occurrence. Among
the less serious cases, those occurring among strangers are likely to have a
lower dark figure than those among acquaintances. The dark figure is likely
to be especially high for cases within the family. However, cases between
Urban Violence 59
those with a previous family relationship (i.e., those who have split up)
may have a much lower dark figure than those having an ongoing relation.
In general, for closer acquaintances the dark figure is likely, because ofthe
less visibility, to be higher for cases occurring in residences than in other
places. The importance for the dark figure of the visability of the crime lies
in the differential likelihood of the presence of witnesses who can report
the incident to the police. A previous study by the author (Wikstrom, 1985,
p. 37) showed that it was the victim who notified the police in the majority
of cases of assault (67%), followed by a private person not on duty (18%).
In the same study, it was shown that the proportion of cases in which a
person other than the victim notified the police was highest for crimes tak-
ing place in streets and squares (40%) and lowest in crimes taking place in
apartments (28%).
The fact the the distribution of cases by social context is biased by the
differential selection of cases for reporting does not, however, necessarily
mean that the description of the modal circumstances of the various con-
texts will also be biased.
One obvious bias, though, is that the cases included, on average, will be
of a more serious nature than what holds true for all cases (i.e., reported
and nonreported). Because the crime circumstances and the characteristics
of the involved persons appear to show some difference between serious
and less serious cases of violence,4) and because the cases missed (i.e.,
nonreported cases) generally are of a less serious nature, one is to expect
some difference in the distribution of crime circumstances and involved
persons' characteristics between reported and nonreported cases.
Violence Within the Family

The family is probably the social context in which violence has been most
intensively studied. It is no exaggeration to say that family violence has
developed into a special research area. In a crude way it is possible to
identify two major approaches to the study of the social causes of family
violence. These may be labeled the role perspective, and the social corre-
lates perspective. Proponents of these two approaches are sometimes criti-
cal of each other. However, I believe that this antagonism partly stems
from the fact that the proponents of each approach have not fully recog-
nized that they are basically interested in answering different questions.
The role perspective tries to understand why husbands as husbands
assault their wives, why parents as parents assault their children, and so
forth. The study by Dobash & Dobash (1979) on wife assault seems to be a
4. The comparison (see Tables 4.7, 4.10, 4.13, and 4.16 below) of serious and petty
assault show in some instances significant differences. For example, the offenders in
cases of more serious violence tend more often to have an extensive record of
previous crime and violence than the offenders in cases of petty assault.
good example of this perspective. Dobash and Dobash emphasize the im-
portance of the historically and socially constructed male dominance and
control for the understanding of wife assault (p. 15).
The social correlates perspective tries instead to explain, for example,
why some husbands, and parents are violent against their wives and chil-
dren and why others are not. A good example of research dominated by
this kind of question is that by Straus, Gelles, and Steinmetz (1980).
Within the role perspective, the importance of the legal and social
acceptance of violence in the family is often stressed, whereas the impor-
tance of factors causing friction between the family members plays a minor
role. Within the social correlates perspective, different conditions associ-
ated with the use of violence in the family are stressed. The various condi-
tions may be assumed to affect the violence within the family indirectly as
causes of friction between family members. The main ones pointed to in
the literature appear to be the following:
Low socioeconomic status.
Unemployment.
Pregnancy.
Single parenthood.
Alcohol and drug abuse.
Criminality.
To the extent that these aSSOCiatIOns have been studied in "normal"
populations, the correlations found are generally weak or moderate.
A special cause of the differential use of violence in the family that is
strongly pointed out by many researchers studying the social correlates of
family violence is the transmission of violence, through social learning,
from the family of origin to the present family (e.g., Straus et aI., 1980,
pp. 74, 100, and 122).
In the present study, a rather broad concept of the family is used, involv-
ing also those with a previous family relationship, if that relationship is not
too far back in time (i. e., a couple of years or so), and mothers- and
fathers-in-law. One half of the cases in this group occurred between mar-
ried or cohabiting persons, whereas formerly married or cohabiting per-
sons formed the next largest group (see Table 4.5). The overwhelming
majority of cases of violence within the family occurs in apartments (see
Table 4.6), and nearly one half occur in the home of both involved parties.
The next most common place of occurrence is the victim's home. There is a
clear relationship between the place of occurrence and the type of family
relationship in that the cases involving those with a previous relation occur
to a large extent in the home of the victim (normally the female). Females
dominate heavily among the victims of family violence. Most perpetrators
and victims are older than 30, and many are older than 40 (see Table 4.7).
The cases of violence among parents and children are few, but here we
have to expect a very high dark figure. In fact, in the present study, there
are more cases of children turning violent against their parents than the
Urban Violence 61
TABLE 4.5. Crimes of violence within the family by type of crimea and victim-
offender relationship (Stockholm, 1982). Percent.
Robbery
Serious Petty against
Victim-offender assault assault person b Rape Molestation All violence
relationship (n = 43) (n = 785) (n = 14) (n = 14) (n = 81) (n = 937)
Married/cohabiting 76 54 (25) (25) 11 50

Previously married/
cohabiting 16 26 (50) (68) 78 31
Fiances 0 9 0 ( 7) 4 8
Parent offender 0 3 0 0 0 3
Child offender 8 8 (25) 0 0 8
Mother- or father-
in-law offender
or victim 0 0 0 0 7 1
-See notes to Table 4.6.

bObserve the low number of occurrences.
TABLE 4.6. Crimes of violence within the familya by type of crimeb and place of
occurrence (Stockholm, 1982). Percent.
Robbery
Place assaultC assault person d Rape Molestation All violence
of occurrence (n = 43) (n = 785) (n = 14) (n = 14) (n = 81) (n = 937)
Apartment/proximitye 84 96 100 100 89 90

Home of both 60 50 4 45
Offender's home 4 8 0 7
Victim's home 20 36 81 36
Other's home 0 2 4 2
Other place of 16 4 0 0 11 10
occurrence
_Induding those previously married/cohabiting and fiances.

bNo cases of violence against officials within the family.
cHomicide and aggravated assault.
dNo percent shown for subcategories for cases of robbery against the person and rape due to
the low number of cases.
e Proximity = staircase, cellar, or house lot.
reverse, but these cases consist predominantly of older children (those in

their teens, 20s or early 30s) who have alcohol or drug addiction problems
and who reacted with violence because they were refused money or re-
ceived complaints from their parents about their way of living. The cases
involving parent-to-child violence were almost exclusively of a very serious
nature. Rape within the family is illegal in Sweden, but most included rape
cases within the family referred to a situation in which the relationship had
already broken up.
With regard to the ethnic status-or nationality-of those involved in
TABLE 4.7. Crimes of violence within the family by type of crimea and victim and
offender characteristics (Stockholm, 1982). Percent.
Victim and Robbery
offender Serious Petty against
characteristics assault assault person Rape a Molestation All violence
Sex
Both males 12 5 (25) 0 0 5
Male against female 60 92 (75) (100) 71 89
Female against male 28 2 0 0 25 5
Both females 0 0 0 4 1
Offender's age
19 and below 0 1 0 0 4 1
20-29 16 24 (33) (25) 22 23
30-39 44 39 (33) (50) 22 38
40 and above 40 36 (34) (25) 52 38
Victim's age
19 and below 0 4 (25) 0 0 4
20-29 16 21 (25) (46) 19 21
30-39 40 39 0 (39) 46 39
40 and above 44 36 (50) (15) 35 36
Nationality
Both Swedes 79 66 (67) (62) 58 66
Only offender
foreigner 4 9 0 (21) 11 9
Only victim
foreigner 0 6 (33) 0 23 7
Both foreigners 17 18 0 (17) 8 17
Previous criminality
Neither 36 31 0 (37) 64 34
Offender only 36 43 (67) (46) 27 41
Victim only 4 10 0 0 5 9
Both 23 16 (33) (17) 4 16
Extent of previous criminality
Offender
None 46 42 0 (39) 68 44
Recidivist 29 26 (67) (31) 16 26
Persistent 25 32 (33) (31) 16 31
Victim
None 74 75 (50) (81) 92 76
Recidivist 4 17 (50) (11) 8 16
Persistent 22 8 0 (8) 0 8
Previous violence
Offender
% with assaultb 29 34 (67) (27) 16 32
% with robbery 13 4 0 4 0 4
% with molestation 13 21 (33) (19) 12 20
Victim
% with assaultb 17 3 0 0 4 4
% with robbery 9 1 0 0 0 1
% with molestation 14 3 0 0 0 3
aSee notes to Table 4.6.

blncluding (few if any) cases of homicide and rape.
62
Urban Violence 63
family violence (see Table 4.7), cases between two foreigners are highly
overrepresented, given what can be expected according to their share of
the population. Judging from the reading of the statements in the police
record, this may to some degree be culturally related: Conflicts concerning
a woman's position in the family appear to be a rather common precedent
to the violence.
Although there are some, family violence cases reported to the police
from other than the lowest socioeconomic strata are unusual (Wikstrom,
1980). However, this holds true for all kinds of violence, although among
the victims of violence in public there tends to be a higher proportion of
middle-class people.
Perhaps of greater significance is the large involvement in family vio-
lence of individuals with a record of social problems of different kinds. For
instance, it is predominantly males with a previous criminal record who
are violent against their female family members. And many of the offen-
ders (around one third) have a previous record of violence (see again Table
4.7).5
No data about the relationship between violence and intoxication or
alcohol abuse was collected for this study. However, previous Swedish stu-
dies make it clear that a large proportion of the male offenders in family
violence are known for having alcohol problems. In one study (Wikstrom,
1980) it was found that 44 % of the offenders in family violence were known
for having alcohol problems, and as much as 23% had prior to the violence,
been treated at an institution for alcoholics. These are significantly higher
proportions than for all other contexts of violence, with one exception:
nonfamily violence between acquaintances in apartments.
Judging from the statements in the police investigations, conflicts con-
cerning drinking behaviour and jealousy seem to be common precedents to
family violence. It is often clear from the police material that the (in-
cluded) reported case is not the first one, but often has been preceded by a
number of incidents, many not reported to the police. In this connection it
might be of interest to mention that Dobash and Dobash (1984)-when
they compared police-reported cases of wife assault to descriptions from
interviews with assaulted wives of the first, the worst, and the last violent
incident-found that the pattern of police-reported cases corresponded
most closely to that of the last incident (p. 274).
As mentioned earlier, cases of parental violence against children re-
ported to the police are rather rare. Other Swedish studies of parental
violence toward children recorded by the police or the social welfare agen-
cies show, however, that this kind of violence, when serious, is generally
5. The definition of persistent offenders/victims in thIs chapter is the same as in the

previous chapter (i.e., those recorded at least once at least during 4 separate years
previous to the year studied).
committed by parents with recorded social problems (Lagerberg, 1982,

pp. 82-86; Socialstyrelsen redovisar, 1969; Partanen, 1981).
The question of the size of the dark figure has had a special importance
in discussions about the causes of family violence. Conclusions about
whether violence in the family is normal, common, or deviant behavior
affect the willingness of researchers to accept different theories. For in-
stance, Dobash and Dobash (1979) refute the thesis of a subculture of
violence as an explanation of wife assault because that kind of violence,
according to their belief, is "so widespread and transcends the bounds of
any particular social group" (p. 22).
In the few Swedish interview studies conducted with representative sam-
ples of the relevant population, the number of incidents of violence re-
ported is, not unexpectedly, much higher than that known by the police. In
one study (Edfeldt, 1985, p. 35) 15.5% of the females and 10.5% of the
males stated that they had been subjected to some kind of violence from
their cohabitant. In the same study, 29.6% of the parents admitted to hav-
ing used some form of violence toward their children (p. 48). Both figures
refer to events during "the last year". These figures provide no empirical
ground for arguing that violence is a normal experience in parent-child
relationships, even common in husband-wife relationships in contempo-
rary Sweden, although one has to account for underreporting even in inter-
view studies. However, it is important to bear in mind when comparing the
interview data with police data, that the figures from the interview study
cover a wider range of behavior with regard to seriousness of violence than
the police-reported figures, which are likely to overrepresent the more
serious cases.
All in all, it seems reasonable that violence not reported to the police is
generally less serious and persistent and that the nonreported family vio-
lence is less concentrated to households with different kinds of social prob-
lems. It seems plausible that the level of friction between the adult family
members is higher in households with social problems and therefore that
the violence in such families generally can be expected to be more severe
and persistent. Moreover, judging from the reading of the statements in
the police investigations, it may also be that the tolerance for the use of
violence in settling disputes is higher in families whose members abuse
alcohol and drugs and/or are involved in habitual criminality.
When the concern is violence within the family, it should be remembered
that some of its forms are still legal in some countries and that it was not
too far back in Swedish history that the last legal form of violence in the
family was criminalized (i.e., parents' right to physically punish their chil-
dren was abolished). This probably means that some forms of family vio-
lence (i.e., hitting children) are still regarded as socially acceptable by
some people. In an interview study by the pool institute SIFO in 1981,26%
of the respondents agreed that it was sometimes necessary to hit a child.
However this figure is much lower than the one obtained in a similar study
Urban Violence 65
made in Sweden in 1965 by SIFO, when 53% of the respondents agreed on

that point.
Violence Between Acquaintances in Apartments

A special kind of violence in private is that which occurs between acquain-
tances who lack family relationships. The great part of this kind of violence
takes place in apartments or their proximity, often during heavy-drinking
parties. Most of these cases occur in the home of the victim (see Table 4.8).
In cases of assaults, the victim and offender are predominantly close ac-
quaintances, whereas in cases of robberies, the degree of acquaintance is
generally less. In cases of molestation, most victims and offenders are just
acquainted by appearance (see Table 4.9). The few cases of rapes predomi-
nantly involve close acquaintances.
TABLE 4.8. Crimes of violence between acquaintances in apartments by type of

crimea and place of occurrence (Stockholm, 1982). Percent.
Robbery
assault assault persons Rape c Molestation All violence
Place of occurrence (n = 48) (n = 530) (n = 45) (n = 16) (n = 384) (n = 1,026)
Apartmentlproximityd 100 99 100 100 100 99
Home of both 4 14 0 3 9
Offender's home 7 10 0 3 8
Victim's home 68 57 77 94 71
Other's home 21 18 23 0 11
aThree cases of violence towards a public official not shown separately.

bHomicide and aggravated assault.
cNo percent shown for rape due to the low number of cases.
dProximity = staircase, cellar, or house lot.

crimea and victim-offender relationship (Stockholm, 1982). Percent.
Robbery
Victim-offender assault assault person Rape Molestation All violence
relationship (n = 48) (n = 530) (n = 45) (n = 16) (n = 384) (N= 1,026)
Nonfamily
Relatives 7 8 0 0 2 5
Close acquaintances 89 71 54 91 24 54
Acquainted by
appearanceb 4 21 46 9 74 40
bFor molestation, most cases (84%) in the category "acquainted by appearance" refer to
cases between neighbors.

crimea and victim and offender characteristics (Stockholm, 1982). Percent.
Victim and Robbery
offender Serious Petty against
characteristics assault assault person Rape" Molestation All violence
Sex
Both males 86 49 77 0 33 47
Male against female 14 39 15 (100) 42 38
Female against male 0 6 8 0 11 7
Both females 0 7 0 0 14 8
Offender's age
19 and below 0 2 0 (3) 2 2
20-29 18 27 17 (19) 20 24
30-39 50 37 67 (64) 31 38
40 and above 32 34 16 (14) 47 36
Victim's age
19and below 0 8 0 (19) 4 6
20-29 21 16 0 (47) 21 18
30-39 36 36 54 (22) 16 29
40 and above 43 40 46 (12) 59 47
Nationality
Both Swedes 71 68 75 (31) 68 68
Only offender foreigner 7 13 8 (23) 11 12
Only victim foreigner 4 4 0 (11) 15 8
Both foreigners 18 13 17 (35) 6 12
Neither 17 33 0 (43) 79 47
Offender only 13 24 50 (36) 20 24
Victim only 9 7 0 (11) 0 4
Both 61 35 50 (11) 1 25
Extent of prevo criminality
Offender
None 24 45 0 (52) 79 54
Recidivist 8 26 10 (24) 11 19
Persistent 68 29 90 (24) 10 28
Victim
None 31 65 50 (77) 96 74
Recidivist 19 23 17 (19) 4 15
Persistent 50 12 33 (3) 0 11
Previous violence
Offender
% with assaultb 48 34 90 (24) 14 30
% with robbery 28 2 20 (3) 0 4
% with molest. 36 19 50 (17) 8 17
Victim
% with assaultb 28 15 9 (3) 3 10
% with robbery 4 0 0 (0) 0 0
% with molest. 12 7 9 (3) 1 5

blnciuding (few, if any), cases of homicide and rape.
Urban Violence 67
Around one half of the cases of violence between acquaintances in apart-

ments are intermale fights, but a rather high proportion in this group of
violent crimes involves males being violent against females. The involved
persons are generally in their 30s or 40s, the offenders tending to be a bit
younger than the victims. Just as for the family violence, cases between two
persons of foreign nationality are highly overrepresented, given what can
be expected from their proportion of the population.
Just as in all of the different social contexts discussed in the present
study, the majority of the offenders in cases of violence between acquain-
tances in apartments have a previous criminal record. Unlike the other dis-
cussed contexts, the victims are also to a high degree previously recorded
for criminality-69% for serious assaults, 35% for petty assaults and 50%
for robberies (see Table 4.10). If one excludes cases with female victims,
the overwhelming majority of both offenders and victims have a previous
record.
Judgin,g from the reading of the statements in the police investigations,
the arguments that often precede assaults in this context concern liquor,
money, women, physical strength, cheating at cards, and so forth. The
robbery crimes are often part of an assault; for instance, a fight may end up
with one of the parties stealing the other's liquor or money.
The great majority of the offenders in these cases are unemployed, but
that is to be expected because many are heavy drug abusers and are greatly
involved in criminal activity. Many of the female victims in this group of
crimes appear to be linked to drug abuse and criminal milieus (i.e., they
themselves are drug abusers, mix with drug abusers/criminals, or have chil-
dren who abuse drugs and are heavily engaged in criminality).
All in all, violence in apartments between nonfamily acquaintances
seems closely related to a friction-producing way of living among socially
marginalized people (i.e., addicts and criminals). Generally speaking, vio-
lence between acquaintances other than the socially marginalized is very
uncommon, and most of it (two thirds) takes place in apartments or their
proximity (see again Table 4.3).
Violence in Streets, Squares, and Other Public Places and

in Places of Public Entertainment
That violence and public entertainment go together is not a new phe-
nomenon. For instance, Aschaffenburgh (1911) reports from a study in
Germany in the first years of this century that "two thirds of all fights occur
in or outside an inn." (p. 77, my translation). A large number of more
recent studies from Sweden (e.g., Lenke, 1974, 1978; Persson, 1977; Wik-
strom, 1980), North America (e.g., Bullock, 1955; Wolfgang, 1958; Pitt-
man & Handy, 1964; Porkny, 1965; Curtis, 1974, pp. 143-145; Dunn,
1976), and Great Britain (e.g., McClintock, 1963, p. 40; Downes, 1958, p.
145) show that much of the violence in public is linked to public entertain-
ment activities. The experience from the present study shows that most of
the violence in public not occurring in places of public entertainment or
their entrance areas occurs while people are on their way to or from public
entertainment activities or in areas with many places of public entertain-
ment. The spatial and temporal pattern of assault in public is also fully
consistent with its relation to public entertainment activities-that is, most
occurs in areas with many public establishments and in the late evening or
at night. Finally, the reading of the various statements in the police inves-
tigation confirmed that much of the violence in public is related in one way
or another to public entertainment activities.
Several British victim surveys show that the risk of violence is closely
related to participation in public entertainment activities. Sparks, Genn,
and Dodd (1977, p. 105) report that of those interviewed who were never
out in the evenings, 2.3% had been subjected to violence, whereas the
corresponding figure for those out every evening was 22.2%. Similar
results have been reported in newer British study by Gotffredson (1984,
p.lO).
For the reasons mentioned above, it was decided to discuss violence in
places of public entertainment jointly with violence in other public places.
First, I shall give some general comments on violence in public and there-
after discuss somewhat more in detail assaults, robberies, and rapes in
public.
About one fifth of all violence in public occurs in places of public enter-
tainment, and about one fourth occurs on public transport. The violence
on public transport predominantly takes place in the underground and its
stations. Less than one half occurs in streets, squares, and parks (see Table
4.11). Regarding different types of violent behaviors and comparing assaul-
tive crimes with rapes and robberies, a major difference is that the latter
are strongly concentrated in streets, squares, and parks (around 80%),
whereas only around one third of the assaultive crimes (considered jointly)
occur in streets, squares, and parks.
Most violence in public occurs between strangers (see Table 4.12).
Moreover, most violence between strangers occurs in public in the course
of public entertainment, a fact that also means that strangers rather seldom
get involved in violence outside public entertainment (see again Table 4.3).
A high proportion of the violence in public involves someone on duty or
in the course of work, as either victim or offender. Of all reported cases of
violence in public, as much as 27% involved someone during work, in 55%
of these cases as victim and in 45% as offender. However, one must allow
for the fact that the reportability of those victimized while working may
be higher than for those victimized as private persons. The five groups
with the highest number victimized during work was, in order of rank,
doormenlwatchguards (predominantly doormen), police officers, shop em-
ployees, public transport employees, and restaurant personnel (excluding
doormen). This finding is in line with what has been reported from the
TABLE 4.11. Crimes of violence in public places by type of crime and place of occurrence (Stockholm, 1982). Percent.
Serious Petty Violence toward Robbery

assault! assault public official against person Rape Molestation All violence
Place of occurrence (n = 83) (n = 1,975) (n = 639) (n = 676) (n = 38) (n = 447) (N= 3,858)
Street, square, park 65 38 26 77 84 46 43

Public transport 16 24 46 19 4 26 26
Central station 0 3 9 0 3 4
Underground and
its stations b 10 14 33 16 4 11 16
Other public
transportC 6 7 4 2 0 12 6
Place of public
entertainment 18 34 17 1 8 15 22
Inside restaurant/
bar, etc. 4 18 5 0 7 11 11
Entrance area to
restaurantlbar, etc. 12 11 8 0 7
Other public
entertainmentd 2 5 4 0 4 4
Shops and places ...,C
0-
af servicea 0 4 10 4 4 13 8 I"
i:l
"Homicide and aggravated assault. ~

0
bExcluding the central station, which is a combined railway and underground station. (D
i:l
cTrain, bus, or taxi. (")
0
d Amusement parks, cinemas, theaters, sports arenas, and temporary places of public entertainment.
e Department stores, gasoline stations, and so forth.
0-
'D
cl
f'-
;J
o
t;/)
o
!:l.
a
()
::l
...oo
TABLE 4.12. Crimes of violence in public places by type of crime and victim-offender relationship (Stockholm, 1982). Percent. ~
'J>
Serious Petty Violence toward Robbery a

Victim-offender assault! assault public official against person Rape Molestation All violence
c
relationship (n = 83) (n = 1,975) (n = 639) (n = 676) (n = 38) (n = 447) (N= 3,858)
a-

()
Close acquaintances 6 7 0 2 4 8 5 ::1.
Acquainted by 3
o
appearance 0 5 5 3 3 9 5
Casual acquaintances 8 1 0 3 1 0 1
Strangers 86 87 95 92 92 83 89
Urban Violence 71
Swedish census bureau's victim surveys (SCB, 1981). The five groups with
the highest number of individuals offending in the course of their work
was, in order of rank, doormenlwatchguards, restaurant personnel, public
transport employees, police officers, and shop employees. These figures
illustrate that much of the violence in public is linked to social control
situations. Comparing assaultive crimes (serious and petty assaults and vio-
lence toward a public official) with robberies and rapes, as might be ex-
pected, almost all cases involving a person on duty or at work belonged to
the group of assaultive crimes, meaning that the proportion of the assaul-
tive crimes involving someone on duty or at work is significantly higher
than for all violent crimes taken together.
Assaults in Public Places

Assaults in public are predominantly male-to-male fights involving young
males. The great majority of the offenders and a rather high proportion of
the victims (with the exception of the victims in cases of violence toward a
public official) have a previous criminal record. More than one third of the
offenders have a previous record of violent crimes (see Table 4.13).
Situational conflicts and interventions of different kinds are the major
types of circumstances of assaults in public places. Interventions typically
occur when people are refused entrance to establishments or are requested
to leave an establishment or public place (e.g., underground station) due
to misbehavior. Situational conflicts are of a very heterogeneous nature,
but from the reading of the case descriptions and statements in these cases,
some common backgrounds may be pointed to. One background is for
those cases related to male-female relationships. One major activity of
public entertainment is to get in contact with persons of the opposite sex to
establish casual or lasting relationships, efforts that may be disappointing
and frustrating and that may cause rivalry among males (Kuhlhom, 1984,
p. 83). Another background appears to be the importance of defending
one's self-esteem in a public setting when confronted with minor provoca-
tions such as being pushed or being passed in a queue.
Alcohol is a major ingredient in public entertainment, and it may be
hypothesized that intoxication contributes to the fact that often trivial con-
flicts develop into violent actions. Most cases of assault involve an offender
and a victim who are both intoxicated. Although that holds true for
assaults in most contexts, the proportion of cases involving intoxication is
especially high in assaults in public. There are practically no cases of
assault in public between two sober persons. Moreover, if one excludes
those cases when someone is on duty or at work, in the majority of cases
both victim and offender are intoxicated. However, there is a rather great
agreement that intoxication does not directly cause aggression and violence
but rather is an important factor in specific milieus involving specific types
of persons (see, e.g., Taylor & Leonard, 1983, p. 86; Powers & Kutash,
--J
N
f"
....,
::r
(1)
TABLE 4.13. Crimes of violence in public places by type of crime and victim and offender characteristics (Stockholm, 1982). a Percent. t:Il
0
("l
Victim and Robbery E

offender Serious Petty Violence toward against n
0
0
characteristics assault assault public official person Rape Molestation All violence ....
(1)
~
CJ>
Sex
0
....,
Both males 91 80 78 89 0 56 78
Male against female 6 16 9 8 100 38 16 c::
....
0-
Female against male 2 2 8 2 0 3 3 ~
0
Both females 0 3 5 0 0 3 3 n
::1.
Offender's age 3(1)
19 and below 11 14 10 39 24 12 14
20-29 48 39 47 35 24 35 40
30-39 26 25 27 24 28 32 27
40 and above 15 22 16 2 24 21 19
Victim's age
19 and below 15 15 0 8 13 16 11
20-29 44 41 75 29 45 31 43
30-39 27 20 18 22 13 26 21
40 and above 14 24 7 41 29 27 25
Nationality
Both Swedes 50 60 76 67 37 68 66
Only offender foreigner 29 22 22 14 37 10 20
Only victim foreigner 0 10 2 7 5 11 7
Both foreigners 21 8 0 12 21 11 7
Neither 18 24 32 14 35 56 28
Offender only 27 34 63 43 50 32 42
Victim only 14 17 1 12 0 5 11
Both 41 25 3 31 15 7 19
Offender
None 28 42 32 34 35 58 40
Recidivist 32 33 33 25 45 15 30
Persistent 40 25 34 41 20 26 30
Victim
None 46 62 95 55 93 88 69
Recidivist 28 27 4 27 3 8 21
Persistent 26 11 1 17 4 4 9
Previous violence
Offender
% with assault b 52 32 34 31 40 29 33
% with robbery 12 5 5 11 5 7 6
% with molestation 32 14 20 32 15 20 19
Victim
% with assault b 37 18 2 11 6 5 13
% with robbery 9 1 0 3 0 2 1
% with molestation 14 9 8 3 6 c:::
....
0-
Il>
-See notes to Table 4.8. ::I
b Including few, if any, cases of homicide and rape.
~
0
(b
::I
("l
(1l
-..l
W
1978, p. 326). As already noted above, a high proportion of the cases in-
volve socially marginalized persons, and some research indicates that peo-
ple who become aggressive after drinking alcohol are especially found
among individuals with social problems, which is often related to low self-
esteem (e.g., Boyatzis, 1975, p. 1205; Deardorff, Melges, Hout, & Sava-
ger, 1975, pp. 1193-1194).
In cases of assault in the public by youth, it is not uncommon that the
violence is preceded by molestation (e.g., forcefully "begging" for
cigarettes). Sudden attacks are comparatively rare, but when they do occur
most of the offenders are youth (Wikstrom, 1980).
Most of the assaults in public occur between people with different back-
grounds. For instance, around one half of the assaults occur between one
individual with a previous record and one who lacks such record, and
almost one third of the cases are between a Swede and a person of foreign
nationality (see again Table 4.13).
In connection with this, it might be mentioned that a fairly recent Swed-
ish study of criminals in prison showed that, while free, the individuals
were likely to be frequent participants in public entertainment (Aker-
strom, 1983). Moreover, Swedish study of the relationship between leisure
activities and criminality among youth in Stockholm shows that the most
criminal of the youths tend to engage more in commercial spare-time
activities and spend more time in the inner-city areas than other youth
(Sarnecki, 1983).
Against the background of what has been discussed, there is much that
points to the fact that a major reason for the comparatively high rate of
assaults in the course of public entertainment is that, when a great number
of strangers with different backgrounds are brought together in a small
area and most of them are intoxicated, there is a high rate of friction that
sometimes develops in to violent actions. Moreover, public entertainment
is also likely to produce a high number of social control situations, which at
times may develop into violence.
As a final comment concerning assaults in public places, it may be men-
tioned that although most of this violence is related to public entertain-
ment, there is a great difference between crimes occurring in the day and
those occurring at night. Assaults in public during the day are rather infre-
quent, but when they occur they are mostly socially marginalized persons'
internal confrontations or their confrontations with different kinds of
authorities, shop employees, and "conventional" people.
Robberies in Public Places

Compared to assault in public places, robbery in public places may be
assumed to be generally a more planned kind of crime than assault,
although one should perhaps not overemphasize the degree of planning
involved in the normal case of street robbery.
Urban Violence 75
Judging from the case descriptions and statements in the police inves-
tigations of these cases, as a rule, the most planned robberies are those in
which the offender, or offenders, decide to rob someone and wait for a
suitable target to show up, or move about to find a good place and target to
rob. In other, less planned cases, there appears more to be a situational
inducement to rob, that is, a good opportunity suddenly arises, such as
when an older alcohol abuser passes a group of youth sitting on a park
bench. A third type of robbery appears to have no preplanning at all.
Rather, a fight may end with the winner taking a wallet or other valuables
from his antagonist after knocking him down. It is not uncommon that a
case that first appears as a robbery in the police report may be redefined as
an assault and a theft when it appears in court (Andersson, 1984, p. 213).
In contrast to assault, robbery is by definition a crime of gain, although a
question mark may very well be put as to whether the theft really is the
main reason for the crime. Pratt (1980) states, in a London study of
mugging,6 that "the actual financial gain from mugging is normally so small
that it must be seen as totally incidental to the main object of the opera-
tion, which, I would suggest, must therefore be to demonstrate toughness
and masculinity" (pp. 164-165). Pratt also claims that a street robbery
(i.e., a mugging) is "not so much a criminal activity as an attempt to estab-
lish a social identity, and in this sense I would argue that mugging bears
close resemblance to the mods/rockers/hippies/skinheads and other similar
phenomena" (p. 62). In this connection, it may be of interest to mention
that one third of the offenders below the age of 25 in street robberies in
Stockholm were noted in the investigations as belonging to different kinds
of youth groups, such as skinheads or rockers. Moreover, in the majority
of the street robbery cases, the value of the stolen goods was less than 500
SEK (approximately 45 or $75).
However, the reasons for committing a street robbery may differ among
different age groups. In a U.S. interview study of 113 robbers from Califor-
nia, Feeney (1986, p. 56) reports that although the majority of the adult
robbers (64%) stated gain as major motive for the robbery, that was so
only for a minor part of the young robbers (35%).
Pratt's (1980) discussion of London muggings appears mainly to be ap-
plicable to the street robberies committed by youth. A large part of the
street robberies in Stockholm are committed by youth; 4 out of 10 offen-
ders are below the age of 20, and more than one half are below the age of
25. Almost one third of the street robberies are committed by groups of
youth. There are good reasons to believe that the actual proportion of
youth and youth groups in street robberies is higher than what one finds
in a study of reported crimes. (For a discussion, see Wikstrom, 1987b,
Sections 4.2.3 and 4.2.4.)
6. Pratt (1980, p. 38) defines mugging as robberies in public places between stran-
gers.
Even if the offender's profit in street robberies is normally small, it

would of course be wrong to ignore the gain motive totally. Among street
robbers, especially the somewhat older ones, there is a rather large group
of known drug addicts. Of all street robbers, 28% were known as in-
travenous drug abusers. So, by and large, there are two main groups of
street robbers in Stockholm: youth/youth groups and drug addicts. In this
connection, it can be mentioned that Conklin (1972, p. 60) has argued that
a contextual description of robberies, such as McClintock's or the one em-
ployed in the present study (see again Table 4.3), is less valuable than a
typology of robbery offenders because the latter says more about the social
circumstances of the crime.
Rapes in Public Places
Judging from the case descriptions and statements in the police investi-
gations, most rapes in public appear to involve some kind of planning,
although many times it appears to be a minimum of planning. This finding
is, by and large, consistent with that of Amir's (1971, pp. 141-143)
Philadelphia study of rape, in which he found that most rapes involved
some kind of planning.
Most of the rapes in public are attempts (73%) and some of these have
more of the character of a sexual molestation than a rape attempt. These
findings are in close correspondence with previous Swedish studies of rape
(see Persson, 1981, pp. 63-64). In most cases (82%), the duration of the
event is less than 5 minutes from the point in time when the victim and
offender meet until it is over. This also means that most rapes in public are
sudden attacks. The generally short time span of the act is related to the
fact mentioned earlier that most rapes in public are attempts.
One half of the rapes in public occur in streets and squares, one third
occur in parks, and the remaining are spread out among various places.
Cases in streets, squares, and parks almost exclusively involve strangers,
whereas cases in places of public entertainment, shops, or other places of
service mostly involve parties who are acquaintances (e.g., workmates).
Compared to assaults and robberies in public, the offenders in rape cases
are less concentrated to certain age groups, unlike their victims, who show
a concentration to the 20s. A very high proportion of the cases involve a
foreign offender. In fact, the great majority of the offenders are foreigners.
Also, the proportion of cases occurring between two foreigners is high in
regard to what can be expected given their proportion of the population.
The offenders are to a high degree previously recorded for crime, and a
very high proportion are previously recorded for violence. However, the
victims of rape in public are generally unrecorded (see again Table 4.13).
The reason for the fact that sometimes in the tables of victim and offender
characteristics, the proportion of cases in which both victim and offender
Urban Violence 77
are previously recorded are higher than the number of cases where the
victim is previously recorded is that the victims to a higher degree are pre-
viously recorded in cases with a known offender than in cases where no
offender has been apprehended. In this connection it may be mentioned
that the actual number of studied cases of rape is twice as high as the
numbers given in the tables due to the weighting to I-year figures (i.e., all
cases of rape during 2 years were included-see Appendix A).
Violence in Other Circumstances

The remaining group of violent crimes-those not occurring in any of
the previous discussed contexts-is, as may be expected, rather hetero-
geneous. Therefore, it is difficult to give a more general picture of the
circumstances of these cases. Other crimes are predominantly crimes be-
tween strangers, although almost one fourth of the assaultive crimes, one
fifth of the robberies, and almost one third of the rapes in this group occur
between people with some acquaintance (see Table 4.14).
A rather large proportion of the cases of other crimes occur in apart-
ments or their proximity (see Table 4.15). By definition, because cases
involving family members and nonfamily acquaintances occurring in apart-
ments or their proximity already have been singled out and discussed,
these are cases between casual acquaintances and strangers occurring in
apartments, cellars, staircases, or house lots. In many respects, the assaults
and robberies in this group share many characteristics with those previous-
ly discussed between acquaintances in apartments. Two common crime cir-
cumstances are those in which the violence occurs in relation to conflicts
emerging during a heavy drinking session in which the participants were
casually acquainted or strangers to each other7 , and those in which the
violence occurs when police arrive on the scene due to complaints from
neighbors. Although some of the rapes also seemed to fit into this general
picture, most of them were of another nature. The main group consisted of
cases in which the victim and offender had previously met at some other
place (often in the course of public entertainment) and then went to the
victim's or the offender's apartment, where the crime took place. Most of
these rapes were completed. But there were also a smaller group of sudden
rape attacks occurring in apartments or their proximity.
Of the assaultive crimes, a rather high proportion occurred at public
institutions, and most of these may be described as emerging out of social
control situations. Moreover, a rather high proportion, especially of vio-
7. Although in this group of crimes it was sometimes difficult to establish the de-
gree of relationship with any greater certainty. It is likely that the proportion of
strangers in this group of crimes is overestimated.
-J
00
f'-
;l
(t>
CIl
o
(')
.:
g
::s
8"
TABLE 4.14. Crimes of violence in other circumstances by type of crime and victim-offender relationship (Stockholm, 1982). ~
o
....,
% Violence % Robbery C
% Serious % Petty toward against ....
0-
po
Victim-offender assault assault public official person % Rape % Molestation % All violence ::s
relationship (n = 56) (n = 485) (n = 219) (n = 206) (n = 74) (n = 288) (N=1,328) n
~.
Close acquaintances 3 12 0 3 6
3
(t>
5
Acquainted by appearance 6 5 8 0 11 7
Casual acquaintances 21 8 0 17 30 2 9
Strangers 70 75 92 80 68 82 78
TABLE 4.15. Crimes of violence in other circumstances by type of crime and place of occurrence (Stockholm, 1982).
% Violence % Robbery
% Serious % Petty toward against
Place assault a assault public official persons % Rape % Molestation % All violence
of occurrence (n = 56) (n = 485) (n = 219) (n = 206) (n = 74) (n = 288) (N= 1,328)
Apartment/proximity b 60 39 13 62 59 57 44
Home of both 6 3 1 0 0 0 1
Offender's home 6 6 5 0 19 5 6
Victim's home 33 18 0 42 30 47 26
Other's home 15 12 7 20 10 5 11
Wood or greater park area C 0 3 0 5 14 0 3
Public institution 27 27 37 4 3 4 19
School/school yard 0 6 0 2 2 1 3
Hospital/medical care centre 21 7 4 2 0 1 5
Other medical institution 0 0 1 0 0 1 0
Police station 0 9 29 0 0 0 8
Other public institution 6 5 3 0 3
Other places 13 31 50 29 24 31 34
Hotel 0 6 0 5 7 4 4
Factory 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
Office 0 0 1 2 1 C
..,
cr"
Other workplace 0 3 0 0 0 1 P>
::I
Harbor or on board ship 3 5 3 3 1 4 4
Inside vehicle 0 9 36 3 12 21 15 $
0
Other places 10 8 10 16 3 8 9 (b
::I
('l
(1l
aHomicide and aggravated assault.
b Proximity = staircase, cellar, or house lot.
-.)
cOutside densely built-up area. Cases in parks within the densely built-up areas appear among the cases in public places context. \Q
~
~
~
I/)
TABLE 4.16. Crimes of violence in other circumstances by type of crime and victim and offender characteristics (Stockholm, 1982).- 0
O.
% Violence % Robbery e:.
Victim and offender % Serious % Petty toward against n
0
-characteristics assault assault public official person % Rape % Molestation % All violence ::s
....
~
><I
....
til
Sex
0
....,
Both males 75 74 65 80 0 53 68
Male against female 12 17 8 19 100 31 20 C
...,
cr"
Female against male 9 4 19 2 0 4 7 po
::s
Both females 3 5 7 0 0 12 5
n
::I.
Offender's age 3
~
19 and below 0 14 9 23 6 6 11
20-29 41 40 45 50 38 35 41
30-39 48 33 38 23 35 21 32
40 and above 11 13 8 4 21 38 16
Victim's age
19 and below 0 11 0 7 19 7 8
20-29 18 31 83 14 52 30 37
30-39 24 26 10 20 21 30 23
40 and above 58 32 7 59 8 33 32
Nationality
Both Swedes 38 63 75 68 39 64 64
Only offender foreigner 42 10 25 23 32 21 20
Only victim foreigner 4 10 0 0 12 13 7
Both foreigners 15 16 0 9 17 2 9
Neither 30 30 27 16 22 62 34
Offender only 30 30 71 58 58 33 46
Victim only 9 25 2 10 9 2 10
Both 30 15 0 16 11 2 9
Offender
None 32 55 27 25 32 65 44
Recidivist 32 20 37 20 36 20 26
Persistent 36 25 36 55 32 14 30
Victim
None 59 53 98 69 85 94 74
Recidivist 15 32 2 12 12 4 16
Persistent 26 15 0 19 3 3 10
Previous violence
Offender
% with assaultb 50 24 44 50 43 12 32
% with robbery 7 4 4 35 11 0 7
Victim
% with assaultb 19 20 0 15 1 2 11
% with robbery 11 1 0 2 0 0 1
C
...
cr
aSee notes to Table 4.8. ~
blnc1uding few, if any, cases of homicide and rape. =

~
~
=
R
00
......
lence toward a public official, took place inside vehicles, normally during
transport of a suspect after a police intervention.
Urban Vandalism
Unlike assaultive crimes, robberies, and rapes, vandalism is not a crime
against the person. Moreover, it is different from serious property crime
and robbery because it is normally not a crime of gain, although, as dis-
cussed in the previous section on urban violence, the gain motive appears
not always to be the main reason for the crime in robberies against the per-
son. Vandalism is a crime of destruction of property. Some authors have
used the term vandalism to cover all kinds of property destruction, both
legal and illegal (e.g., Roos, 1986, pp. 25-26). It may, however, be helpful
to restrict the word vandalism to illegal destruction of property, because
normally the social circumstances of legal and illegal destruction of proper-
ty are likely to be very different. The present study is concerned only with
illegal destruction of property, and the term vandalism will be used in that
sense.
Acts of vandalism cover a wide range of behaviors, for instance,
scratching the paint off cars with a key while passing by, covering walls or
underground train wagons with one's "tags," lighting fire in a cellar, and
damaging street lights. Also, the background to acts of vandalism varies
significantly. Some acts of vandalism may foremost be regarded as a con-
sequence or a part of committing another crime. The committing of a bur-
glary often requires some damage of property. In the course of an assault,
property may more or less accidentally get damaged, or an assault may be
combined with the destruction of the antagonist's property. Vandalism in
private often occurs in conjunction with other types of crimes.
As to the pure vandalism cases, the greatest part take place in public
places. Predominantly, this kind of vandalism can be described as
"weekend vandalism," a concept used by Roos (1986). Roos describes a
typical case in the following way:
This type of vandalism often consists of youth, but also older persons, on a
weekend evening or night, moving through the city on their way to areas of public
entertainment after having been at a private party, and then, for instance, kicking
against parked cars, throwing sausages and mashed potatoes in the face of a kiosk
employee so her glasses break, kicking in doors to dance halls to which they are
refused entrance, etc. (p. 119, my translation).
Acts of vandalism are, as a rule, much easier to commit without being

detected than are either assaults, rapes, or robberies. In the latter cases,
there is always at least one person (the victim) who is likely to be aware
that a crime has been committed and who therefore has the option to re-
port it. In some cases of minor vandalism, if nobody has witnessed the act,
Urban Vandalism 83
TABLE 4.17. Reported acts of vandalism in two studies of self-reported delinquen-

cy; percentage admitting to ever have committed the acts in question.
% Schoolchildren % Boys in the
9-14 years, 1959 ninth grade, 1968
Type of vandalism (Stockholm)" (Orebro)b
Smashing of lamps or windows 48 61

Damaging park benches or telephone kiosks 12 28
Damaging vehicles 6 6
Careless use of fire 27 50
Source: Faktisk Brottslighet Bland Skolbarn (p. 132) by K. Elmhorn, Sou 1969:1, Vad Var Det
Vi Sa! (p. 91) by B. Olofson, 1971 Utbilonincsforlago, Stockholm. Used by permission.
"The study included 950 schoolchildren in Stockholm.
bThe study included 519 schoolchildren (boys only) in Orebro (a medium-sized Swedish city).
it may be difficult to decide whether it is a result of an intentional act of

vandalism or of normal wear.
Minor acts of vandalism are, judging from the findings of Swedish self-
report studies of crime and delinquency, a rather common crime in youth
(Elmhorn, 1969; Olofsson, 1971). The majority of boys admit to having
participated at least once in some form of vandalism. However, only a
minority admit to having committed more serious acts of vandalism (see
Table 4.17).
There are good reasons to believe that the majority of cases of minor
vandalism never get reported to the police. Therefore, a study of police-
reported crimes of vandalism is likely to be predominantly a study of more
serious cases of vandalism.
Swedish victim surveys (e.g., Persson, 1977; SCB, 1981) show that the
most important factors influencing the victim's decision to report a crime
against property, in order of rank, are insurance coverage, and the eco-
nomic value of the stolen/damaged property. In the analysis of victim sur-
veys vandalism and crimes of theft have not been separated, but it seems
safe to assume that these two types of crimes follow the same pattern as
regards the factors of significance for reporting to the police.
It is important to note that the victim surveys only say something about
factors affecting the decisions of private persons, not companies, municipa-
lities, and so forth, as regards reporting acts of vandalism. There is, for
instance, some evidence (see Wikstrom, 1987b, p. 62) that in the public
sector, institutions (e.g., schools) with a persistent high level of vandalism
may refrain from reporting acts of vandalism to the police, because they do
not feel they have time to do so (in light of the fact that nothing much is
likely to come out of the reporting), and in some cases even because they
want to avoid a bad reputation by figuring with a high level of reported
vandalism.
Points of Departure for a Contextual Classification

of Vandalism
In making a contextual description of vandalism, as compared to violence,
we do not have very many previous efforts to build upon. In a fairly recent-
ly published article, Cohen (1984) writes, "criminologists had virtually
ignored vandalism as a research subject, and despite its often cited pre-
valence, it seldom figured in typologies or causal theories of crime and
delinquency" (p. 52).
Discussions about the phenomenology of vandalism have often focused
on classifications of offender motives. (For an overview, see, e.g., van
Vliet, 1984, pp. 18-19). For instance, Cohen (1984) has proposed, as he
states himself, a commonsense typology of vandalism based on offender
motives:
(a) acquisitive: damage in order to acquire money or property (or in the course of
. such acts of theft) ;
(b) tactical: the damage is a conscious tactic, a means to achieve some other end
such as publicity for a political cause;
(c) vindictive: damage in order to obtain revenge, to settle some real or imagined
grievance;
(d) play: damage in the course of a game or play in which such motivations as
curiosity, fun or competition are dominant;
(e) malicious: in which the elements of anger, malice, or aggression are not as
target-specific as in revenge vandalism, but are nevertheless directed (to par-
ticular categories of property) and responsive (as solutions to particular sets of
biographical and structural problems). (p. 57)
Cohen's (1984) typology is difficult to use as point of departure for a
classification because the types are not mutually exclusive nor exhaustive.
A special problem with this typology appears also to be the explanations
that are partly built into it, and this is perhaps best illustrated by the defini-
tion of the fifth class, (e). Finally, the typology is very difficult to apply to
the kind of data used in the present study.
It will be suggested here that there are three aspects of vandalism that
may contain some of the essentials of the variation in the social circum-
stances of the crime:
The differentiation between vandalism in the course of another crime and
pure vandalism.
The place where the act of vandalism took place (the private-public
dimension).
The object and form of vandalism (e.g., graffiti, destruction of windows,
etc.).
Of these three aspects, only the two first will be possible to fully consider in
this study, because no data about the form of vandalism was collected, and
only very crude data on the kind of object vandalized.
Urban Vandalism 85
The Social Contexts of Vandalism:

The Basic Classification
The classification employed in this study has five main classes. The first is a
class of all cases of vandalism occurring in apartments or their proximity
(i.e., staircase, cellar, attic, or house lot). The second is a class of all van-
dalism cases in streets and squares. This class has been subdivided accord-
ing to the main type of object vandalized: cars, buildings, and other. The
third class is all cases of vandalism occurring on public transport, with two
subcategories: in the underground/railway or its stations (the underground
dominates heavily), and on other public transport. The fourth main class
includes those cases occurring inside public buildings, including places of
public entertainment, subdivided into four categories, according to the
main type of public locale. Finally, there is a small remaining class of all
cases not fitting in under any of the other classes. Whereas the first class
may be r~garded as vandalism in private, the others may be regarded as
vandalism occurring in public or in semipublic settings.
The Distribution of Crimes of Vandalism by

Social Context of Crime
Of the police-reported cases of vandalism, those occurring in streets and

squares dominate. More than one third of the cases involved vandalism
directed against buildings, and almost one fourth involved vandalism
directed toward vehicles (see Table 4.18). Of all of the cases of vandalism,
15% were committed in conjunction with another type of crime. The most
common is vandalism in the course of a burglary, followed by vandalism in
the course of an assault. A rather large proportion of the acts of vandalism
indoors occur in the course of committing another type of crime-more
than one third of the cases in private (apartments or their proximity), and
one fourth of the cases in public locales. The former occurred mostly
together with assaults, the latter with burglaries. Of all acts of vandalism,
6% have been cases in which someone has set fire to property, and a large
part of the fires (44%) were set in cellars, staircases, or attics.
Below, I shall discuss, somewhat in detail, the three major contexts of
vandalism: vandalism in private apartments ortheir proximity, vandalism
in public places, and vandalism in public locales. Vandalism in streets and
squares and vandalism on public transport will not be discussed separately,
but jointly as vandalism in public places, because the overall circumstances
of these two groups of crimes, when analyzed separately, appeared to have
much in common as regards the social circumstances of the crimes. The
point of departure for the discussion is selected offender characteristics by
major context of crime (see Table 4.18a).
TABLE 4.18. The social contexts of vandalism (Stockholm, 1982).

% % in conjunction with
Social context (N = 6, 160; missing 100) other type of crime
In apartments/proximity 15 35
In apartment 4
In staircase, attic, cellar, or house lot 11
In streets and squares 64 11
Against cars 24
Against buildings 35
Other 5
In public transport 11 1
Underground, railway (on board
or in station) 9
Other public transport" 2
Public locales 7 25
Public entertainment 1
School, sports arena, church, etc. 3
Shop or service station 2
Workplaces (other than above)
Other places 3 19
Total 100
"Bus and taxi.
Vandalism in Private
It is unusual that youths are involved in acts of vandalism in private, and
when they are, it is normally in damages made in cellars or staircases. The
offenders in vandalism in private are to a very high degree previously re-
corded for crime, and a rather large proportion-more than one tenth-
are known to be intravenous drug abusers. About one half of the offenders
are unemployed. This picture does not change very much whether one is
considering all cases or only cases of pure vandalism (see again Table
4.18).
The social circumstances of vandalism in private often resemble those
described earlier for assault and robberies in private. It is not uncommon
that these acts of vandalism occur during heavy drinking parties in connec-
tion with a fight or when some of the participants get a "delirium." Other
circumstances of vandalism in this context have to do with the parties' pre-
vious relationships; for instance, a former husband may be refused en-
trance to his former wife's apartment, and the damages emerge during the
husband's more or less successful attempts to enter the apartment, or, as it
looks, the damages may result from the husband's more aggressive ways of
showing dissatisfaction (destroying property) at not being let in.
Urban Vandalism 87
TABLE 4.18a. Selected offender characteristics by social context of vandalism. All

cases and cases of pure vandalism separately. Percent (Stockholm, 1982).
All vandalism Pure vandalism onlya
Public Public Public Public

Offender characteristics Private places locales Private places locales
Offender's age
19 and below 4 27 16 9 30 22
20-29 42 33 36 45 33 44
30-39 36 28 16 27 26 22
40 and above 18 12 32 19 11 12
Offender's sex
Male 86 91 93 83 92 91
Female 14 9 7 17 8 9
Offender's nationality
Swedish 78 80 72 90 84 81
Foreigner 22 20 28 10 16 19
Offender extent of
previous criminality
None 19 46 40 14 45 38
Recidivist 34 30 32 33 29 38
Persistent 46 24 28 53 26 24
Previous vandalism 45 25 32 57 23 29
Offender known
intravenous drug abuser 14 4 19 14 4 18
Offender unemployed 46 28 44 53 33 36
Offender in youth group 2 19 4 4 21 5
aExcluding cases of vandalism in connection with other crime.
Vandalism in Public Places

The proportion of youth offenders is quite high in cases of vandalism in
streets, squares, and on public transport. It is likely that the proportion of
youth offenders reported in Table 4.18a for these cases is an underestima-
tion. Cases in which a suspect is missing are generally those having taken
place in public, and witnesses have estimated these nonapprehended
offenders to be much younger than known offenders are (see Wikstrom,
1987b, p. 65). Acts of vandalism in public places are to a fairly high degree
committed by youth groups-around one fifth-and, for the same reason
as for youths in general, the proportion of crimes by youth groups in public
is likely to be underestimated.
Compared to vandalism in private, the offenders in cases of vandalism in
public are to a lesser degree previously recorded for crime or known as
intravenous drug abusers. Moreover , the proportion of these offenders
who are unemployed is significantly less. Partly, this difference may be

accounted for by the generally lower age of those who commit vandalism in
public. 8
The most common type of acts of vandalism in public are those that have
been referred to as "weekend vandalism" by Roos (see above), and that
occur in the course of participation in public entertainment, or on the way
to or from such activities. All in all, it appears that a great part of the
vandalism in public takes place in what may be labeled socially unstable
public mileus, that is, milieus that are characterized by the presence of a
large number of intoxicated people, often youths who are in groups and
who are out to amuse themselves.
Vandalism in Public Locales

Acts of vandalism that occurs in public locales are to a higher degree com-
mitted by youths than are those that occur in private, although the rate is
not as high as that for vandalism in public. The majority of offenders are
previously recorded for crime, and a rather high proportion of them are
known intravenous drug abusers.
The social circumstances of the crimes in this group are rather hetero-
geneous, and involve public-entertainment-related, drug- and a1cohol-
abuse-related, and other types of vandalism. The youths are mostly in-
volved in the public-entertainment-related cases, whereas the older offen-
ders are often involved in a1cohol- and drug-abuse-related cases (e.g.,
smashing things in a shop when being caught shoplifting, or in the office of
a social worker when refused money). In this group, those cases occurring
together with another crime are almost exclusively damages resulting from
burglaries or attempted burglaries.
Urban Serious Theft

The great part of what has been defined as traditional crimes are crimes of
theft (see again Chap. 1). In this study only a selection of, generally speak-
ing, more serious crimes of theft have been included (i.e., burglaries and
thefts of and from cars). For these kinds of crimes, the dark figures are
likely to be very low. As mentioned in the previous section, insurance
coverage (which is very high in Sweden) and the economic value of the
stolen property have been shown to be the two most important factors that
influence the reporting of property crimes to the police. Moreover, in con-
trast to shoplifting, for example, almost all acts of burglary, and theft of
and from cars, will be detected.
8. School pupils are counted as employed.

Urban Serious Theft 89
The two major reasons for committing thefts pointed to in the literature
are gain, and thrill and excitement. Gain is an obvious reason for commit-
ting crimes of theft, although for some types of crimes of theft (e.g., sho-
plifting), gain may not always be the major reason for the crime-thrill and
excitement may be just as important. However, of the more serious types
of crimes of theft included in this study, it is likely that gain, in most cases,
is an important reason for committing the crime. In an interview study with
150 Swedish inmates, focusing on thieves, Akerstrom (1983) sums up her
findings, as regards the reason for living a criminal life-style, in the follow-
ing manner:
At least in a limited time perspective, crime can be lucrative. Another rather evi-
dent facet of criminality is that it can be exciting, adventurous and filled with thrills.
Since criminals can be described as action-seekers, this is obviously a rewarding
factor. A third characteristic of a criminal lifestyle is that it is secret, which in itself
gives a certain amount of fascination. Finally, independence is discussed since this
so often was stated as important by the interviewees and thus given a value of its
own. (p. 221)
Some research findings suggest that the main motive for theft may differ
among age groups; that is, motives have more to do with thrill and excite-
ment at younger ages, and more with gain at older ages. For instance,
Belson (1975, pp. 145-170), in a study of 13- to 16-year-old London boys,
reports support for the idea that the seeking of fun and excitement plays a
significant role in juvenile theft. Belson states that "'fun and excitment
seeking' appears to be an important contributing factor operating within a
complex of other factors" (p. 169). Farrington (1986, pp. 231-232) reports
findings from several studies indicating that as subjects grow older, the
dominant reason for committing crimes of theft appears to change from
thrill to economic gain. Interviewing a sample of delinquents in adoles-
cence and early adulthood from Montreal, Canada, LeBlanc and Frechette
(1989, Chap. 2) show that although both "hedonistic" and "utilitarian"
motives for committing crimes of theft are common at all ages, the impor-
tance of gain increases with age, whereas the importance of thrill and
excitement decreases.
A special aspect of theft is that of theft as a means of financing an abuse
of drugs. As was presented in Chapter 3, a high proportion of the offenders
in crimes of serious theft are likely to be drug abusers, especially those
involved in residential burglaries and thefts of and from cars, and much
more so than the offenders in violent crimes and vandalism, with the excep-
tion of the robberies, which also had a rather high proportion offenders
likely to be drug abusers. All in all, it appears that drug abusers are more
represented in serious crimes of gain than in crimes of vandalism and vio-
lence, but also that there may be significant variation among types of
crimes of gain in the proportion of drug abusers involved.
The question of whether drug abuse causes a person to be a thief or
whether a drug abuse follows upon the involvement in crime (for instance,
as a consequence of exposure to certain milieus and life-styles) has been
intensely debated. Regardless of the answer to that question, it is likely
that drug abuse accelerates the motivation to theft, due to the high costs of
financing drug addiction. Theft and drug-dealing appear to be the main
sources of finance, at least for male abusers. (For discussions, see Knutsson
& Kuhlhorn, 1979, pp. 16-20; Torstensson, 1987, pp. 146-148).
Contextual Aspects of Crimes of Theft

Although a contextual analysis has its greatest value when analyzing crimes
of violence, there are some contextual aspects worth mentioning as regards
property crimes. It will be suggested here that crimes of theft may be di-
vided within the private-public dimension as to the degree of violation of
privacy. This may be empirically grasped by a division of property crimes
with regard to whether the owner of the stolen property was a private
person or an entity (i.e., company, municipality, etc.), and whether or not
the theft took place in the home.
In crimes of theft, the perpetrator and the victim are normally strangers
to each other, which is a relevant part of the context when comparing theft
to other types of crime but makes no major ground for division among
different kinds of crimes of theft. Instead, one may focus on the private-
public dimension of ownership of the property stolen. The other aspect of
the private-public dimension is the place of occurrence of the theft, divid-
ing between the home and other places of occurrence. Combining these
two aspects of the private-public dimension of crimes of theft, the crimes
most violating privacy are those in which a private person's property is
stolen in a home, and the ones least violating privacy are those in which a
public entity property is stolen outside the home, as illustrated in the table
below, in which a basic classification of the public-private dimension of
crimes of theft is presented, and the different cells of the table have been
ranked from 1 to 4 by their hypothesized degree of violation of privacy:
TABLE 4.18b. Ownership category of property

stolen.
Private person Public entity
Place of theft
Home 1 3
Other place 2 4
Of the included crimes, residential burglaries are likely to be the ones

most violating private space because they are directed toward a private
person's property and are an intrusion of another's home. Walsh (1980), in

a study of residential burglaries in Exeter, England, states:
To understand the impact of a burglary on a modern family one must know some-
thing about the significance of the house and home and what these things mean to
the inhabitants. The house, garden and property are personal territory. The home
is not public. It is not a place to which outsiders and strangers are usually invited.
(p. 11)
Thefts of and from cars are likely to come second because cars usually
belong to private persons (although quite a few cars out in the streets be-
longs to companies, etc.), and are usually parked outside the home site (an
exception being, for instance, when a car is stolen from a house with a
built-in garage). The nonresidential burglaries are, in general, likely to be
the crime least violating privacy. After this general introduction to the con-
texts of crimes of theft, I shall discuss somewhat more in detail burglaries
and thefts of and from cars.
Burglaries
The burglaries have been divided according to the major category of place
burglarized (see Table 4.19). Because the official crime statistics show
burglaries according to place burglarized, there was an opportunity to com-
pare the distribution from the sample of crimes included in the Stockholm
TABLE 4.19. The distribution of burglaries by major category of place burglarized;

weighted data from the Stockholm crime survey, and corresponding data from of-
ficial crime statistics (Stockholm, 1982).a Columne percent.
Stockholm crime survey Official crime statistics
Place burglarized (N=20,616) (N= 20,576)
Residence/proximity 51 52
Apartment 26 25
Cellar/attic 25 27
Public locale 22 19
School, sport, etc. 5 5
Public entertainment 4 3
Shop, service station 13 11
Semipublic locales, etc. 20 23
Office/factory 10 10
Building site/garage 5 5
Kiosk/vending machine 5 8
Other places 7 6
a Excluding a smaller number of burglaries of safes because no place of occurrence for these
cases is given in the official crime statistics.
1982 Crime Survey (which has been weighted to I-year figures) and the
official statistics including all crimes. The comparison shows a very high
degree of correspondence. About one fourth of the burglaries occur in
apartments, about one fourth occur in cellars or attics, about one fifth
occur in public locales, and about one fifth occur in semipublic locales (in-
cluding building sites and vending machines). The division between public
and semipublic locales is made on the grounds that the former are normally
open to the public, whereas the latter are generally only open to those who
work in the place or have an errand to the place.
Most of the residential burglaries were directed toward fiats in multistory
houses (75%), but if this figure is compared with the proportion of all
residences in Stockholm that are fiats in multistory houses (89%), this
finding indicates a somewhat lesser risk of burglarization for apartments in
multistory houses than for single-family houses.
In about two thirds of the residential burglaries (68%), the entry was
made through a door, and in the remaining one third (32%) the entry was
made through a window. Comparing burglaries in multistory houses and
single-family houses, the way of entering in the former is normally through
the door (84%), whereas entry through a window dominates (68%) in the
latter case.
Of the nonresidential burglaries, the way of entrance in nearly two thirds
(63%) was through a door, and in nearly one third (30%) through a win-
dow. In the remaining cases, the offender entered by the rough or through
a wall, and in the smaller number of burglaries of vending machines, the
way of entrance was, of course, irrelevant.
Comparing the offender characteristics by major type of place burgla-
rized (see Table 4.20) shows some interesting relationships of the offen-
der's age and pevious criminal involvement to the degree of privacy of the
place burglarized: 9
e The more private the place burglarized is, the older the offender tends to
be.
e The more private the place burglarized is, the more previously recorded
for crime, and the more previously recorded for crimes of theft, the
offender tends to be.
All in all, it looks like it takes a more experienced offender to burglarize
a private rather than a nonprivate space. Generally, the average gain is
also higher in burglaries of private rather than nonprivate spaces (see
Table 4.21), although the variablity among the cases is great. Table 4.20
also tells us that there is seldom big economic values that are lost in a single
burglary. However, there are a small number of cases with high gain (i.e.
over 40,000 SEKJ6,500 U.S. Dollars; normally these belong to the nonre-
9. However, the difference between public and semipublic locales is minor.

TABLE 4.20. Offender characteristics by major type of place burglarized (Stock-

holm, 1982). Percent.
Public Semipublic
Offender characteristic Residence Cellar/attic locale" locale b Other places
Sex
Male 93 91 97 96 92
Female 7 9 3 4 8
Age
19 and below 2 7 27 29 15
20-29 58 50 43 43 39
30-39 27 33 20 23 36
40 and above 13 10 10 5 10
Nationality
Foreigners 9 12 21 12 15
None 6 17 25 32 31
Recidivist 14 21 27 28 18
Persistent 80 62 48 40 51
Previous theft
% with previous theft 89 73 67 63 60
-School, sport place, locale of public entertainment, shop, locale of service.
bOffice, factory, building site, garage, kiosk, vending machine.
TABLE 4.21. Value of stolen cash and goods in residential and nonresidential burg-
laries. Columne percent (Stockholm, 1982).
Residential Nonresidential
Value (SEK) Cash Goods Cash Goods
0 72 30 87 29
1-500 13 5 7 13
501-2,500 10 15 4 38
2,501-5,000 3 20 10
5,001 and above 2 30 10
Note. 100 SEK is currently about 10 or $ 15.
sidential burglaries. From the point of view of the offender, the value of
the stolen goods is often much less because the "sales value" of stolen
goods is normally much below its actual value (Knutsson, 1980, p. 357).
Thefts of and from Cars

Thefts of and from cars are rather common. In Stockholm in 1982, around
4,200 cases of car theft, or attempted car theft, and about 17,300 cases of
TABLE 4.22. Car thefts by retainment and damages

to the car (Stockholm, 1982).
%
Retainmentldamages (N = 3, 910; missing 285)
Not retained 5
Retained, no damages 17
Retained, minor damages 32
Retained, big damages 12
Attempts 34
theft from cars were reported to the police. However, in cases of attempts,
it may be difficult to correctly classify the cases as either an attempted car
theft or an attempted theft from a car without any intention to steal the car
itself.
McCaghy, GIordano, and Henson (1977, pp. 378-380) have suggested
the following typology for auto theft:
1. Joyriding.
2. Short-term transportation.
3. Long-term transportation.
4. Profit.
5. Commission of another crime.
Classes 1, 2, and 5 refer to cases in which the offender did not intend to
keep the car, whereas Classes 3 and 4 refer to cases in which the offender
either intended to keep the car for himself or to sell it. The findings from
the study of auto theft in Toledo, Ohio, by McCaghy et al. (1977, p. 381)
showed that most (around 60%) of the car thefts were for joyriding or
short-term transportation. In LeBlanc and Frechette's (1989, Chap. 2)
study, of a sample delinquents from Montreal during adolescence and early
adulthood, it is reported that the motives stated for motor vehicle theft at
all studied ages are predominantly hedonistic, although there was a very
slight decrease in hedonistic motives as subjects grow older. No informa-
tion about the offender's motives behind stealing the car was collected for
the present study, although it was found that only a minor proportion of
the cars were lost (see Table 4.22)-most had been found in time for the
coding of the crime files. The coding was made, on average, about 1 year
after the time of crime commission. However, most cars were found in a
rather short time span after the crime commission.
The overwhelming majority of cars stolen (or attempted to be stolen)
were parked in public spaces, in particular on the street (see Table 4.23).
Moreover, the cars owned by private persons residing in Stockholm were
predominantly (66%) parked within 500 meters from the owner's residence
at the time they were stolen or an attempt to steal the car was made.
Also, in cases of thefts from parked cars, the most common place on the
TABLE 4.23. Place of crime commission: thefts of and thefts from cars. Columne
percent (Stockholm, 1982).
Place of crime Thefts of cars Thefts from cars
commission (n = 4,065; missing 130) (n = 16,797; missing 495)
Private parking space 6 2

One-car garage 0 0
Multicar garage a 0
House lot outdoors 2
Company parking
lot within fences 1 1
Company garage 2 0
Public parking space 81 75
Special parking lot outdoors 3 1
Parking garage 1 2
Parked on street 77 72
Unspecified! in private garage,
or public parking garage 13 23
aNormally, multicar garages owned by multifamily housing landlord or tenants' association.
TABLE 4.24. Items stolen in cases of thefts from cars (Stockholm, 1982).
Number
Item stolen (n = 14,718; missing 2,574) %
Nothing stolen 1,452

Car items stolen 12,177 71
Car radio/stereo 7,689 45
Attached object a 2,640 15
Tires 1,155 7
PetroVpetrol can 693 4
Other items stolen 4,920 28
Toolsb 2,079 12
Clothes 1,254 7
Cash 729 4
Photographic equipment 627 4
Keys 198 1
Bags/suitcases 33 o
aLe., driver's rearview mirror, speedometers, etc.
bIn some cases, when the tools stolen are special tools for the car, they may equally well have
been classified as car items.
Note. Number of stolen items exceeds number of cases, because many items may have been
stolen. All items up to five were counted. In cases of more than five items, the five most
valuable were counted.
TABLE 4.25. Offender characteristics in car thefts and thefts from cars (Stockholm,
1982). Percent.
Offender characteristic Thefts of cars Thefts from cars
Sex
Male 95 95
Female 5 5
Age
19 and below 20 12
20-29 44 44
30-39 29 37
40 and above 7 7
Nationality
% foreigners 14 13
None 18 33
Recidivist 19 24
Persistent 63 43
Previous theft
% with previous theft 69 62
street (see again Table 4.23), and most (62%) of the thefts from cars own-
ed by private persons residing in Stockholm occurred within 500 meters of
the owner's residence.
Most cars are likely to be parked on the street, and as long one does not
have information about the distribution of the frequency of where cars are
parked by type of parking place, the results shown in Table 4.23 cannot be
used to say anything about the relative risk of thefts of and from cars by
place of car parking.
The most frequently stolen objects in thefts from cars were car radios or
car stereos (see Table 4.24). In one half (52%) of all thefts from cars,
including those with nothing stolen, a car radio or stereo was stolen.
However, of all objects stolen, car radios and stereos total 45%. The
second most frequent stolen objects were parts attached to the car (e.g.,
instruments); the third, tools of different kinds. All in all, most things
stolen from cars were car items. In only 2% of the cases was the value of
the stolen goods above 5,000 SEKl800 U.S. Dollars.
As previously mentioned, in most thefts of cars the car was retained.
However, in around one third (38%) of these cases something had been
stolen from the car. Again, car radios and steroes were the most frequent
objects stolen, followed by parts attached to the car and tools.
The offender characteristics for car thefts as compared with thefts from
cars are very much the same, although the offenders in car thefts tend to be
a bit younger and more previously recorded for crime (see Table 4.25).
Conclusion 97
Conclusion
In Chapter 3, it was, among other things, shown that traditional crimes

occurring in urban areas (especially the more serious ones) are likely to be
predominantly committed by a rather small group of persistent and versa-
tile offenders, who often have started early with crime. In this chapter, the
social contexts of urban crime were studied. One major finding to emerge
from this study is that there appears to be a rather close link between
violence and vandalism, especially in private, and a friction-producing way
of living among groups of socially marginalized people (alcohol abusers,
drug addicts, and habitual criminals).
On basis of the findings in this chapter, one may, at the risk of over-
simplifying, reduce the social contexts of violence and vandalism to three
major kinds:
1. Violence within the family.
2. Violence and vandalism in apartments (nonfamily).
3. Violence and vandalism in public.
Much of the violence and vandalism in private, especially the nonfamily
but also to a rather high degree the more serious family violence, appears
to be related to frictions among the socially marginalized themselves or
with people linked to them (e.g., parents, wives etc.).
The police-reported family violence cases normally have a long prehis-
tory before getting reported to the police, and generally the violence is
related to the parties' interpersonal relationships. The majority of the
family violence cases occur in apartments. Many of the offenders have
alcohol problems, and conflicts often concern drinking and jealousy. In
cases of immigrant families, conflicts about the women's position in the
family do not appear to be uncommon. It is, however, likely that in many
cases the nonreported, generally less serious family violence may show a
different and less problem-oriented picture than that reported to the
police.
In contrast, nonfamily cases of violence and vandalism in apartments are
more often of a situational nature. It is not uncommon for these cases to
emerge in the course of heavy drinking sessions. Although most types of
violence involve a high proportion of socially marginalized persons (drug
addicts, alcohol abusers, and habitual criminals), the violence occurring
among nonfamily members in apartments appears to be extremely linked
to a friction-producing way of living among the socially marginalized. A
significant part was also related to social control situations. For the rape
cases in apartments there was, however, a significant group of cases involv-
ing casual acquaintances or strangers who were of a different nature.
Violence and vandalism in public appear to be somewhat less highly
linked to a socially marginalized life-style than violence and vandalism in
private. Much of the socially marginalized persons' violence in public,

seems to result from friction either with authorities of different kinds who
may intervene (e.g., police officers) or refuse them support they feel enti-
tled to (e.g., social workers), or with conventional people whom they may
come across when they are out and about, often in the course of public
entertainment.
Assaultive crimes and vandalism in public are generally of an expressive
and situational nature. As a rule, assaultive crimes have no long prehistory
and seem mostly to develop from a sudden argument or a social control
situation. A rather large part of these crimes involve someone on duty or in
the course of work. Robbery and rape in public appear to a higher degree
to be instrumental and planned, although one should not exaggerate the
normal degree of planning. Even if gain or sexual satisfaction may seem to
be obvious motives in robbery or rape, it has been questioned whether the
sexual aspect is really always the main thing in rapes, and the view has been
proposed that many street robberies, especially among the young, have
more to do with the expression of masculinity and toughness than gain.
The value of stolen goods in street robberies is generally low, although it
should be pointed out that a significant number of the robbers are drug
addicts for whom gain may be the major motive. Of the rapes occurring in
public, most are attempts.
Most of the violence and vandalism in public appears to take place in the
course of public entertainment. It will be suggested here that a major
reason for the concentration of violence and vandalism in public within the
social context of public entertainment is that this is the public milieu that is
the most socially unstable. It is characterized by the mixing of a lot of
people who are strangers to each other and have different social back-
grounds, and who are often intoxicated and out to amuse themselves.
Therefore, public entertainment may be hypothesized to be a milieu that
creates a comparatively high rate of friction among the participants that
sometimes may evolve into violent actions and vandalism.
Gain and thrill and excitement are the major reasons for committing
theft pointed to in the literature. It is likely that gain may be a more impor-
tant motive for the generally more serious types of thefts included in the
present study than for thefts in general. A very high proportion of the
offenders are also previously recorded for crime, and most (6 to 7 out of
every 10) have a previous record of theft. Approximately one third to one
half of the offenders, depending on the type of theft, were known to be
drug abusers (see again Chap. 3). However, the offenders gain in single
crimes of theft cannot be considered to be very high. Some evidence
pointed to the fact that the more private the place was where the theft
occurred, the more experienced (measured by previous criminality and
age) the offender was.
The dark figures and clearance rates for crimes of violence and vandal-
ism are likely to vary in a systematic way with the private-public dimension
Conclusion 99
of the crime, more so for less serious than serious criminality. Generally,
crimes in private are likely to have a high dark figure and a relatively high
clearance rate, whereas crimes in public are likely to have a lesser dark
figure and a much lesser clearance rate. However, for crimes of theft of a
more serious nature, the dark figure is likely to be low and the clearance
rate very low, regardless of whether the theft is directed toward the private
or the public. As for crime prevention, suitable and effective measures are
likely to vary with the public-private dimension of crime. The recent em-
phasis on the value of situational crime prevention is one expression of
the importance that has been put on the social contexts of crime for find-
ing suitable and effective crime prevention measures (see, e.g., Clarke &
Mayhew, 1980), although situational crime prevention has predominantly
been concerned with crime in public.
The private and public sides of people's lives are often very different.
Expressions such as "behind closed doors" or "would never do that in
public" indicate the importance put on the division between private and
public in everyday life. It is therefore no great surprise that the social con-
texts of crime, and victim and offender characteristics, show significant dif-
ferences between the private and public, although, in this chapter I have
only been able to touch upon parts of the many relevant factors that are
likely to vary with the social contexts of the crime.
It will be suggested here that the private-public dimension of crime is
important for the understanding and prevention of crime and that a divi-
sion of traditional crime, building upon this dimension, is likely to turn out
to be a much more fruitful point of departure for analysis than a division of
crimes by legal definitions, for example, in the study of criminal careers or
ecological and environmental aspects on crime. Unfortunately, it was not
possible to employ this approach in the analysis of urban criminal careers
presented in Chapter 3. However, in the analysis of area crime patterns in
Chapter 8, a division of the crimes by their social contexts, focusing on the
private-public dimension, will be an important point of departure.
5
The Urban Victim
In the analysis of the social contexts of crime in Chapter 4, characteristics

of the victim and the victim-offender relationship were included as impor-
tant aspects of the social context of the crime. In this chapter, the focus will
be on the victim. Building on the findings from the contextual analysis and
some further analyses, victimization will be discussed in more depth. The
data used will be taken predominantly from the Stockholm 1982 Crime
Survey (see Appendix A).
The Victimological Appoach

The victim experience is far from random. The ecological patterning of
crime and the differential life-styles of persons have been prominent fac-
tors pointed to in explanations of differential risks of personal victimiza-
tion. It has, for instance, been shown that the place where people live and
the way they live their lives strongly influence their risk of victimization
(Persson, 1977; SCB, 1981; Sparks et aI., 1977; Gottfredson, 1984).
Situational and victimological approaches to the study of crime are in
part only different aspects of the same thing. What makes a person or
object an attractive target for potential offenders creates at the same time a
risk of victimization for that person or object. Situational crime prevention
(see, e.g., Clarke & Mayhew, 1980) may in this context simply be viewed
as a set of measures taken to affect situational conditions so that victimiza-
tion does not occur.
Cohen and Felson (1979) stress the importance of the convergence of
motivated offenders and suitable targets in the absence of what are called
capable guardians for the occurrence of direct-contact predatory crimes'!
What causes this convergence, making an opportunity for crime, is a ques-
1. Direct-contact predatory crimes are crimes in which someone takes or damages

the person or property of another (Cohen & Felson, 1979, p. 589).
100
The Victimological Approach 101
tion that belongs to the social ecology of crime (see Chapter 8). Modern
crime ecology focuses on what brings offenders and targets together in a
crime situation (Brantingham & Brantingham, 1981, p. 8).
Against this background, it is hardly surprising that Steinmetz (1981)
finds Cohen and Felson's (1979) routine activity approach (discussed in
Chap. 2), which is essentially situational in nature, a useful point of depar-
ture for the creation of a model of personal victimization and prevention of
personal crimes.
Steinmetz (1981) uses concepts similar to those of Cohen and Felson
(1979)-potential offenders and potential victims-but instead of speaking
of capable guardians, he prefers the wider concept of barriers between the
victim and the offender. Capable guardians (i.e., formal and informal sur-
veillance by people) may in this context be regarded as one among many
different types of social barriers. Steinmetz distinguishes between social
and technical barriers and barriers through environmental design.
Using the language of victimology, Steinmetz (1981) differentiates
among three main factors influencing the risk of victimization: attractive-
ness, proximity, and exposure. Attractiveness largely refers to the value
for the potential offender of committing a crime against a specific person or
object. The proximity factor is split up into social and geographic proxim-
ity. The first relates to the degree of contact a person has with potential
offenders as a result of his or her life-style. The second has mainly to do
with residential segregation and the issue of crime and distance in that the
risk for victimization is assumed to be greater for those living in or close to
areas with many potential offenders. The greatest risk for personal victim-
ization, according to the proximity factor, is for persons who live in cer-
tain areas and move about in urban space in such way that they come into
frequent contact with potential offenders. The exposure factor is defined
by Steinmetz as "the extent to which an offender is given an opportunity to
commit an offence when he or she comes into contact with an attractive
target" (p. 65).
Hindelang, Gottfredson, and Garofalo (1978), in their theory of person-
al criminal victimization, point to the importance of life-styles: "Different
life-styles imply different probabilities that individuals will be in particular
places, at particular times, under particular circumstances, interacting with
particular kinds of people" (p. 251).
Life-style influences how often an individual is confronted with risk
situations. That is mainly assumed to be a result of how much of his or her
time a person spends in public places, especially at night. Life-style also
influences which individuals are perceived as good targets by a potential
offender. According to Hindelang et al. (1978), this has to do with judg-
ments on the behalf of the potential offender regarding the willingness of
the potential victim to report a victimization and the amount of resistance
he or she is likely to be capable of mobilizing. The similarities between the
life-style approach of Hindelang et al. and the routine activity approach of
102 5. The Urban Victim
Cohen and Felson (1979) have been pointed out many times (e.g., Garo-
falo, 1987, p. 27).
In discussing victimization, it appears important to distinguish between
cases in which the victim is a private person or not (e.g., company, etc.).
In this chapter, only crimes against private persons and their property will
be treated. This means that nonresidential burglaries, vandalism of nonpri-
vate property, and thefts of and from cars owned by companies etc. will be
excluded from the discussion. This is not to say that there are no important
factors that influence variations in victimization of company etc. property,
but just to say that the present study largely lacks relevant data to explore
this issue.
As for personal victimization, crimes may be divided into those that
actually involve the victim in the crime event (assault, robbery, and rape)
and those that normally do not (theft of and from cars and residential bur-
glaries). In the former case, life-style may be assumed to be important in
determining the degree to which individuals come into direct physical con-
tact with potential offenders (i.e., risk meetings), and in the latter case,
life-style influences to what degree the individual's property is exposed to
potential offenders (i.e., left unguarded).
Crimes of Violence
In Chapter 2, it was shown that the overall risk of victimization for violence
appears to be linked to the degree of urbanization of the area of residence.
However, it is also clear (see Chapter 8) that there are significant differ-
ences in the risk of victimization among parts of urban areas. Thus, the
victimization risk appears to be dependent on both the degree of urbaniza-
tion of an area and what parts of the urban area the individual is living in
and frequently visiting. The latter is likely to be related to life-style.
The victim-offender distinction is not always clear in crimes of violence.
Fattah (1989) states:
Who will end up being victim and who will be legally qualified as the offender
depends quite often on chance factors rather than deliberate action, planning or
intent. Thus victim/offender roles are not necessarily antagonistic but are frequent-
ly complementary and interchangeable. This is particulary true of brawls, quarrels,
disputes and altercations (p. 47).
In an attempt to test the similarity/dissimilarity of victim-offender char-

acteristics, Kuhlhorn (1990) compared the correspondence of the distribu-
tion of nine variables for victims' respective offenders convicted for crimi-
nal violence: previous criminality, number of sentences, previous violence,
alcohol abuse, social welfare allowance, drug abuse, sex, income, and age.
Kuhlhorn finds that not only the offenders but also the victims have a de-
viant distribution on these nine characteristics compared to the normal
population but that the victims do not have as deviant a distribution as the
The Victimoiogicai Approach 103
offenders. Kuhlhorn interprets his findings in the following way: "Life-

styles create segments in society where interactions and conflicts are
frequent-assymmetry in social deviance in critical interactive situations
facilitates violence from the direction of the most socially deviant" (p. 56).
To this author's view, an explantion that victims are more deviant than
the normal population but less deviant than offenders may lie in the fact
that there are basically two types of situations in which violence occurs;
encounters between socially deviant persons and socially deviant encoun-
ters with ordinary people and people at work. In the first category of cases,
there is obviously a direct link through similar life-styles (life-styles that
may be assumed to have aggressive behavior as a significant ingredient),
whereas the victim and offender in the second category are more indirectly
linked by life-style. As already stated in Chapter 4, much violence occurs in
the course of public entertainment, and socially deviant persons have a
high participation in public entertainment, moreover, a rather high propor-
tion of violent crimes in public occur between one individual with a pre-
vious record and one who lacks such record (Wikstrom, 1985, pp. 268-
269), and between a person at work (e.g., doormen) and one not at work.
In the latter category, the differential social position between the victim
and offender, as suggested by Kuhlhorn (1990), may playa significant
situational role. In violence in private, as discussed in Chapter 4, there
appears to be a more direct link between the social positions of the victim
and the offender and the risk to be victimized. This holds true in particular
for nonfamily violence in private, although quite a large proportion of the
more serious family violence may also fit into this description.
All in all, it is likely that violence in private occurs to a high degree
between people of similar social positions and life-styles, whereas violence
in public is likely to occur to a higher degree between people of different
social positions. In other words, violence in private is likely to occur pre-
dominantly between similar people, and violence in public is to a high de-
gree likely to occur between socially dissimilar people.
Looking at the victim-offender similarity/dissimilarity with regard to sex,
age, nationality (ethnicity), and previous record in different social contexts
of crimes of violence reveals the following.
Sex
Excluding the crime of rape, in which for natural reasons there is a strong
asymmetry between the sex of the victim and offender, the findings show
overall that except for violel1ce within the family, the victim and offender
are predominantly of the same sex (see Table 5.1). The significant excep-
tions are for minor assaults and molestations between nonfamily acquain-
tances, in which the total of cases occurring between two persons of a dif-
ferent sex comes close to half, or just above half, of all cases. For violence
occurring outside the private, the intersex cases have the highest propor-
TABLE 5.1. Percentage of crimes by same-sex victim and offender (Stockholm,

1982).
Petty assault and Robbery
Serious violence against against
Social context assault public official Rape" person Molestation
Within the family

% same sex 12 6 0 6
Phi -76 -38 -85
Significance *. .* .*
Nonfamily acquaintances
in residences
% same sex 86 56 0 77 47
Phia
Significance n.s. n.s n.s
Public places, including
public entertainment
% same sex 91 83 0 89 59
Phi 25 20
Significance n.s. *. n.s.
Other circumstances
% same sex 78 75 0 80 65
Phi 20 35
Significance n.s. n.s. **
Note. Significance tested by chi-square test. Phi only shown in case of relationships significant
at the 5% level or better.
* Significant at 5% level.
** Significant at 1% level.
aNo female offender and no male victim in group.
tion in crimes of molestation, which often involve no physical violence (see

Chap. 4). The findings presented here should be related to the fact that
there are very few interfemale cases of violence and the fact that females
are most likely to be victimized in private by a male offender, whereas
males are mostly victimized in public by strangers (see Chap. 4). Thus, for
both males and females, it is likely that their victimization risk is dependent
on what categories of males they associate with (i.e., on their associations
with socially deviant persons), and more specifically for males to what ex-
tent their life-style means that they are participating in certain types of risk
activities (e.g., public entertainment).
Age
Generally, victims (with the exception of rape victims) are older than the
offenders and not as strongly concentrated to certain (younger) ages-
compare the age distribution in Table 5.2 with the offender age distribution
presented in Chapter 3. In crimes within the family, the victim-offender
TABLE 5.2. The age distribution of victims in different legal categories of crime,a
per 10,000 in respective age group (Stockholm, 1982). b
violence toward against the
Age Serious assault" public official person Raped Molestation
0-9 0.0 2.6 0.0 0.4 2.1

10-14 0.0 29.7 6.7 1.6 15.4
15-19 4.7 110.7 17.6 13.8 19.7
20-24 10.3 197.8 19.3 16.4 36.4
25-29 7.4 147.7 22.8 12.0 29.9
30-34 7.0 122.3 26.0 8.0 35.2
35-39 7.9 108.2 17.0 4.4 29.8
40-44 7.9 125.3 21.3 5.2 34.1
45-49 6.8 62.6 25.0 2.8 25.6
50-54 5.0 59.1 26.0 1.8 18.5
55-59 5.0 34.2 10.9 1.0 15.0
60 and above 2.0 12.1 8.5 0.5 11.3
-Only victims residing in Stockholm included.

bPeak age(s) in bold type.
"Including homicide.
dDenominator only including females in age group because all victims are females.
age correlations are strong, which is also true for nonfamily violence in
residences, with a slight exception for molestations between nonfamily ac-
quaintances (see Table 5.3). Thus, in crimes of violence in private, the
victim and the offender tend generally to be of the same age. In cases
occurring in public, the age differences between victim and offender tend
to be greater and are especially high in cases of robbery. In general, it can
also be claimed that the victim-offender age difference tends to be greater
in instrumental as compared to expressive crimes of violence. In cases of
robbery, the offender tends to be significantly younger than the victim,
whereas in rape cases (except those occurring in public) the victim tends to
be significantly younger than the offender.
Nationality
The victim and the offender tend to be of the same ethnic background (i.e.,
nationality-as dichotomized into Swedes and other nationalities). This is
of course to be expected because the population is predominantly of Swed-
ish origin. It is noteworthy, however, that the proportion of cases involving
people of same ethnicity in general is significantly lower for the rape cases.
As to the ethnic status correlations, it could generally be claimed that the
number of cases involving people with different ethnic backgrounds is high-
er in crimes of violence occurring in public than in crimes of violence in
private (see Table 5.4).
TABLE 5.3. Victim-offender age differences, mean and median age differences, and
zero-order correlation (Stockholm, 1982).
assault public official Rape person Molestation
Within the family

% age difference:
0-2 years 24 24 29 38
3-6 years 40 34 32 31
7-14 years 16 23 29 23
15 or more years 20 19 10 18
Mean 3.8 -0.7 -4.7 -0.2
Median 3.0 -2.0 -3.0 -1.0
Correlation 66b 50b 53b 58b
Nonfamity acquaintances
in residences
% age difference:
0-2 years 32 22 23 42 21
3-6 years 21 31 16 17 15
7-14 years 32 25 42 17 19
15 or more years 15 22 19 24 45
Mean 2.3 0.7 -4.5 8.7 0.5
Median 1.0 0.0 -5.0 1.5 0.0
Correlation 50b 48 b 45 b 22a
% age difference:
0-2 years 13 22 9 14 12
3-6 years 37 24 10 20 26
7-14 years 22 27 33 32 23
15 or more years 28 27 48 34 39
Mean 4.9 -0.8 6.3 12.8 0.5
Median 1.5 -1.0 0.0 10.0 1.0
Correlation n.s. 18a n.s. n.s. n.s
Other circumstances
% age difference:
0-2 years 4 22 20 4 6
3-6 years 22 20 23 9 16
7-14 years 33 34 28 23 40
15 or more years 41 24 29 64 38
Mean 10.8 1.7 -3.8 20.6 -0.1
Median 10.0 0.0 -3.0 10.0 1.5
Correlation n.s. n.s. n.s. n.s. n.s
Note. Age differences calculated as victim age minus offender age. Thus, negative values of
mean and median mean that victim tends to be younger than offender (e.g., a median of-2
means that the victim on the average is 2 years younger than the offender). Correlation coef-
ficients multiplied with 100.
aSignificant at 5% level.
b Significant at 1% level.
TABLE 5.4. Victim nationality, percentage of victims with foreign citizenship, and
Phi-coefficientlvictim-offender dichotomized (Swede-foreigner) nationality (Stock-
holm, 1982).
Social context assault public official Rape person Molestation
Within the family

% same ethnicity 96 84 79 66
Phi 87 61 51
Significant ** ** n.s
in residences
% same ethnicity 89 81 66 92 74
Phi 70 42 77 20
Significant ** ** n.S. ** **

public ente~tainment
Phi 33 11 23 31
Significant ** ** n.s. ** **
Other circumstances
Phi 31 38
Significant n.S. ** n.S. ** n.s.
Note. Phi coefficients multiplied by 100.

Significant at 5% level.
n.s. = Not significant.
Previous Criminal Record

Nonfamily crimes of violence in private are predominantly crimes between
two previously recorded individuals-that is, crimes between two socially
marginalized persons (see Table 5.5). In cases of family violence, the simi-
larity in recordings is less but depends on the high proportion of female
victims (who less often are recorded). Thus, victims in private are either
socially deviant males who are beaten up, robbed and so on by other social-
ly deviant males, or females associated with socially deviant males who get
beaten up, raped, and so on by the males (see Chap. 4). This holds true in
particular for the more serious cases of violence, whereas less serious vio-
lence is likely to show a less problem-oriented social picture. In public
places-in particular as regards minor assaults, molestations, and
robberies-violence occurs predominantly in encounters between socially
marginalized people and others. This may be interpreted as that the mixing
of people of different social backgrounds in the course of public entertain-
TABLE 5.5. Victim-offender previous recordings (Stockholm, 1982).

Social context assault public official Rape person Molestation
Within the family

% same record b 59 47 54 68
ra 41
Significance n.s. n.s. n.s
in residences
% same recordb 78 68 54 50 80
r" 50 48 45 22
Significance ** '*
Public places including
% same record b 59 42 50 46 63
ra . 50 54
Significance * n.s. n.s. n.s.
Other circumstances
% same recordb 60 40 33 32 64
r" -55
Significance n.s. n.s. n.s. n.s.
Note. Zero-order correlation coefficients multiplied by 100.

n.s. = Not significant.
"Zero-order correlation between number of years with a previous criminal record.
bPercentage of cases in which either both victim and offender had a previous criminal record
or both victim and offender lacked a previous criminal record.
ment (where most outdoor violence takes place) is an important back-

ground to the occurrence of crime and, thus, that participation in that kind
of milieu is an important victimization risk factor, especially for non-
socially deviant individuals who are seldom victimized elsewhere (see
Chap. 4).
Looking at the victim's rate of previous recordings for crime in different
social contexts and at the sex and age of the victim shows that in all social
contexts and at all ages, male victims are more previously recorded than
females but also that (excluding the youngest age group) the younger the
victim is, the higher the proportion is of previously recorded victims, re-
gardless of whether the victim is male or female. Moreover, the victim's
previous recordings for crime are generally higher for crimes taking place
in private, compared to crimes in public (see Table 5.6). However, the
latter finding is modified if those victimized during work are excluded (see
Table 5.7). A rather high proportion of the victims of violence in public
TABLE 5.6. Percentage of victims previously recorded by social context of crime

and by sex and age of victim, all kinds of violence (Stockholm, 1982).
Nonfamily
acquaintances Other
Family in apartments Public places circumstances
Victim age M F M F M F M F
19 and below 100a Oa 50a 2 23 7 14 2

20-39 50 28 55 23 39 20 34 17
40-64 23 16 24 9 31 10 34 9
65 and above 0 0 0 Oa 0 Oa 17 0
aNumber observations below 25.
TABLE 5.7. Percentage of victims previously recorded by social context of crime

and by sex and age of victim ,a all kinds of violence (Stockholm, 1982).
Public places Other circumstances
Victim age M F M F
19 and below 25 7 16 2
20-39 51 30 56 22
40-64 35 14 41 11
65 and above 0 Ob 17 0
aExcluding those victimized at work.

b Number of observations below 25.
and in other circumstances are victimized during work (see Chap. 4).
When interpreting the figures presented in Tables 5.6 and 5.7, it should be
kept in mind that the highest victimization rates for violence are to be
found in the age group of 20 to 39 (see again Table 5.2).
Crimes Against Property

In contrast to crimes of violence, the similarity in life-style (both in a broad
and in a narrow sense) of victims and potential offenders may be hypothe-
sized to be of less importance for the victimization risk for property crimes.
For instance, in cases of theft of and from cars and residential burglaries,
the offender normally has little knowledge about or contact with the
victim.
Thus, victims' personal characteristics can be assumed to play a lesser
direct role for the victimization risk in crimes against property than in
crimes of violence, in which patterns in meetings and interactions are cru-
cial risk factors. However, place of residence is likely to be important for
victimization risk in property crimes. This claim is substantiated for the
property crimes considered in the present study by the fact that most thefts
of and from a private person's car occur when the car is parked nearby the
person's residence (see Chap. 4) and by the obvious link to the victim's
area of residence for the crime of residential burglary.
Just as for crimes of violence, the present study shows that the risk of
victimization for property crimes is strongly related to degree of urbaniza-
tion of area of residence (see Chap. 2). However, as for crimes of violence,
the risk of victimization for property crimes appears to fluctuate strongly
depending on the victim's area of residence in larger urban areas (see
Chap. 8). There is no significant association between victimization rates for
violent crimes and property crimes at the city-area level. Thus, the victi-
mization rate for property crimes shows a pattern different from that for
violent crimes. Moreover, in contrast to crimes of violence, there are some
marked differences in victimization risk by area of residence among diffe-
rent types of property crimes (see further Chap. 8).
Conclusion
At the risk of oversimplification, one may say that the prime overall risk
for violent victimizations is strongly dependent upon what kind of people
one associates with and what places (activities) one frequently visits. The
prime overall risk for victimization of the types of property crime included
in this study appears to be largely dependent upon area of residence.
However, this is not to say that individual behavior is unimportant for
property crime victimization risks, only that area of residence appears to
be a major risk factor and that we lack data to put light on the importance
of individual behavior.
6
Stockholm: Its Crime and
Urban Structure
In this chapter, as background to and point of departure for the ecological

and environmental analyses presented in Chapters 7 and 8, Stockholm and
its different areas are presented, and the urban structure of the research
area is analyzed. Special emphasis is given to the area distribution of hous-
ing, population composition, and routine activities because these are fac-
tors thought to influence the area patterns of crime and victimization. In
addition, basic data about crime rates and crime trends for the city of
Stockholm will be shown.
The major issues in this chapter will be treated in the following order:
the definition of the research area and its relation to the Greater Stock-
holm area, basic data on crime rates and crime trends in the city of Stock-
holm, the basic units of analysis for the ecological and environmental
studies, the inner- and outer-city areas, housing in Stockholm, a factor
analysis of the urban structure of Stockholm, and the grouping of wards
into major types of urban environments.
The Research Area

Stockholm is the capital of Sweden, and Sweden's biggest city. The city of
Stockholm had about 650,000 inhabitants in 1982, with just above one third
(35%) of its population living in the inner-city area. The Greater Stock-
holm area (the conurbation) had at the same time about 1.4 million inhabi-
tants. In the post war period (1950-1985), the population of the city of
Stockholm decreased by about 100,000 inhabitants, while the population of
the areas of Greater Stockholm outside the city of Stockholm increased
over the same period by about 500,000 inhabitants (see Table 6.1). The
whole of the Greater Stockholm area increased over the period in question
by about 400,000 inhabitants.
For natural reasons, when a city grows, the most land available for build-
ing new residences is in the fringe areas; therefore, the areas outside the
city of Stockholm have expanded the most. The decrease in population
111
112 6. Stockholm: Its Crime and Urban Structure
TABLE 6.1. Population in the Greater Stockholm area and, separately, for the city
of Stockholm and Greater Stockholm area ouside the city, 1950-1985.
Area 1950 1960 1970 1980 1985
Greater Stockholm 1,002,895 1,163,207 1,349,173 1,386,980 1,435,474

City of Stockholm 745,936 808,022 744,911 647,214 659,030
Inner city 427,019 345 ,591 271,683 225,940 236,283
Outer city 318,917 462,431 473,228 421,274 422,747
Greater Stockholm 256,959 355,185 604,262 739,766 776,444
(excluding the city)
Source: Stor-Stockholms bebyggelsehistoria (p. 614) by I. Johansson, 1987, Gidlungs f6rlag.
within the city of Stockholm is partly related to the conversion of building

space into offices, which has decreased the number of residences, especial-
ly In the inner city. It has also been an inner-city policy to convert small
fiats into larger fiats by combining small fiats, which probably also has had
some effect on the decrease of residences. The inner city lost nearly
200,000 inhabitants from 1950 to 1985, while the outer-city area gained
about 100,000 inhabitants over the same period.
The studied area is limited to the city of Stockholm, which means that
caD
Inner-city
[ill Post-war sleep. words
~ Post-wor ABC words
III Post -wor Jarvo cHy
Single femily houses ..
D other ou ter city
* 5 I :i or more.
Not i nc1.
MAp 6.1. Key map of the research area showing the location of the CBD , the inner
city, major post war residential developments, and single-family housing wards.
Crime Rates and Crime Trends in the City of Stockholm 113
the present study covers the inner-city area and those suburbs belonging to
the city of Stockholm (see Map 6.1). In general, one can say that these are
the suburbs surrounding the inner city; the more distant suburbs are not
included in the study. Hereafter, Stockholm will be used to mean the city
of Stockholm, and the conurbation will be referred to as the Greater Stock-
holm area.
The somewhat arbitrary administrative boundaries between the research
area and the rest of the Greater Stockholm area might cause some prob-
lems in an ecological study because the included suburban areas do not
have any distinct natural border with the neighboring, not-included sub-
urban areas. It is, however, not believed that this fact will distort the gener-
al analysis of the relationship between various types of urban environments
and different aspects of victimization and crime, even though for special
kinds of analysis, the problem of the somewhat arbitrary borders might be
of greater importance-for instance, in the analysis of crime and distance
(Chap. 8)..
Crime Rates and Crime Trends in the City of Stockholm

Table 6.2 shows the total number of crimes reported to the police in
Stockholm for selected years between 1951 and 1985. Separately are also
shown figures for the crimes included in the Stockholm 1982 Crime Survey
(with exception of molestation and violence toward a public official).
The total number of crimes reported to the police in Stockholm has in-
creased 3.6 times over the period 1951 to 1985. For some specific crimes
(e.g., robbery), the increase has been much higher (i.e., 16.5 times). The
figures in Table 6.2 are shown both in numbers of crimes and per 10,000
inhabitants. The increase in crime is bigger when calculated per 10,000
inhabitants because the population has decreased over the period (see
again Table 6.1). But it should be pointed out that quite a number of the
crimes committed in Stockholm involve offenders and victims who reside
outside Stockholm (see Chap. 8), which means that comparing changes in
the number of crimes may give a more accurate picture of the development
than crime rates calculated per inhabitants.
Comparing the development of the major groups of crimes included in
the Stockholm 1982 Crime Survey (i.e., crimes against the person, vandal-
ism and serious property crimes) in the city of Stockholm with that in other
parts of the Greater Stockholm area, the counties of the other two Swedish
big cities (Goteborg and Malmo) and the rest of Sweden (i.e., medium-
sized and small cities and rural areas) for the period 1968 to 1987 shows
that the rate of crime is highest in Stockholm and that the increase in crime
has been highest in Stockholm, more so for crimes against the person and
vandalism than for serious property crimes (see Table 6.3). For crimes
against the person and vandalism, it was found (by inspection of scatter-
TABLE 6.2. Total crimes against the penal code and selected types of crimes; num-
ber and per 10,000 inhabitants; 1951, 1960, 1970, 1980, and 1985 (City of Stock-
holm).
Crime 1951" 1960 1970 1980 1985
Total crimes against

the penal code
Number 44,124 56,799 119,083 124,385 158,887
Per 10,000 591.5 702.9 1,598.6 1,921.8 2,410.9
Homicide b
Number 5 14 17 19 16
Per 10,000 0.07 0.17 0.23 0.29 0.24
Assaultc
Number 1,553 2,065 3,262 4,330 5,465
Per 10,000 20.8 25.6 43.8 66.9 82.9
Robbery
Number 70 162 614 1,261 1,152
Per 10,000 1.6 2.0 8.2 19.5 17.5
Rape
Number 64 90 140 168 166
Per 10,000 0.9 1.1 1.0 2.6 2.5
Vandalism
Number 736 1,603 3,928 5,953 7,520
Per 10,000 9.9 19.8 52.7 92.0 114.1
Burglary
Number n.a. 11,809 22,896 21,253 23,565
Per 10,000 n.a. 146.1 307.4 328.4 357.6
Thefts of cars
Number 3,581 7,933 8,526 5,152 9,068
Per 10,000 48.0 98.2 114.5 79.6 137.6
Thefts from cars
Number n.a. n.a. 17,773 23,247 28,288
Per 10,000 n.a. n.a. 238.6 359.2 429.2
aNo data for Stockholm city available for 1950.

bCompleted homicides and assaults causing death.
cSerious and petty assault including attempted homicide.
n.a. = Separate figures for this crime category not available.
grams and calculation of R2 values) that the increase could be described as

monotone, whereas for serious property crimes the rates were highly
fluctuating for some areas. Therefore, change was described as mean rates
for the studied period divided by 3 for serious property crimes, whereas the
change for crimes against the person and vandalism was described as yearly
linear increase per 10,000 inhabitants and change per 10,000 inhabitants
from 1968 to 1987 (i.e., the 1968 crime rate subtracted from 1987 crime
rate).
The Basic Units of Analysis 115
TABLE 6.3. Regression coefficients and R2, 1968-1987; crime rates and increase
1968 to 1987 for crimes against the person and vandalism; mean crime rates 1968-
1973, 1974-1980, 1981-1987 for serious property crimes; all figures per 10,000 resi-
dents.
Greater Stockholm The counties Other Sweden
City of area (excluding of Goteborg (non-big-city
Stockholm city of Stockholm) and Malmo areas)
Crimes against the persona

Regression coefficient b 5.89 4.01 3.29 1.78
R2 .96 .97 .93 .91
Crime rate
1968 85 32 51 33
1987 180 98 110 69
Increase 95 66 59 36
Vandalism
R2 .92 .96 .96 .94
Crime rate
1968 46 37 35 35
1987 144 110 110 86
Increase 98 73 75 51
Serious property crimes c
Mean crime rates
1968-1973 635 321 319 166
1974-1980 741 466 431 219
1981-1987 853 509 502 244
Increased 218 188 183 78
aHomicide, serious and petty assault, violence against a public official, molestation, robbery,
rape.
bYearly linear increase per 10,000 inhabitants.
cBurglaries and thefts of and from cars.
dMean value 1981-1987 compared to mean value 1968-1973.
The Basic Units of Analysis

When using areas of a city as units of research, we have a variable in the
division of the areas. Many different divisions are possible, and different
divisions may yield different results. Normally, the option of choosing area
divisions for practical or economic reasons is restricted to predefined areas
if one wishes to study the relationship of criminality to housing, popula-
tion, and other characteristics, although other techniques have been sug-
gested and used, for example, the isometric map (Mowrer, 1938; Hoiberg
& Cloyd, 1971; Curtis, 1974).
When the scenes of crime-offenders' and victims' homes (where
applicable)-have been referred to areas, the division is that of areas for
which population and other statistics are possible to obtain. However,
there are several levels of aggregation in such statistics, so a choice had to
be made.
According to Baldwin and Bottoms (1976), "The aim of urban analysis

ought to be to provide categorizations of areas which are homogeneous"
(p. 103). Areas may be homogeneous in some respects and heterogeneous
in others, so there is no simple way to attain such a goal. Moreover, certain
aspects of heterogeneity of an area (e.g., ethnic heterogeneity) may be an
interesting feature of the mileu to relate to criminality.
The basic unit of analysis used in the ecological and environmental stu-
dies of crime in Stockholm is the ward. The ward was chosen because
Stockholm's wards often have a history (see, e.g., the section below on
major postwar residential developments) and because one type of housing
often dominates a ward. There are also, in general, "natural" demarca-
tions between wards such as major roads, water, and parks. However, as a
rule, there are not very clear demarcations between inner-city wards.
The ward was regarded as generally not too small a unit, so that the
crime rates would be highly dependent on random variations. The ward
unit was also regarded as normally not being so big as to have very hetero-
geneous characteristics of, for example, housing and population.
Although the ward level appears to be the best choice among the aggre-
gate levels available, it is far from perfect. For instance, the plotting of the
exact locations of the offenders' homes showed that for a few wards these
were highly concentrated to parts of the ward.
The question of whether the area division used corresponds to neighbor-
hoods is crucial in attempts to study the influence of neighborhood charac-
teristics (e.g., compositional effects) on crime and victimization. Schwirian
(1983) defines a neighborhood as "a population residing in an identifiable
section of a city whose members are organized into a general interaction
network of formal and informal ties and express their common identifica-
tion with the area in public symbols" (p. 84). Research on urban neighbor-
hoods has, however, shown that the concept of neighborhood is not easily
defined and involves quite big difficulties when applied empirically (e.g.,
Hunter, 1979; Olson, 1982; Schwirian, 1983).
The ward division of Stockholm, at least as far as the outer city is con-
cerned, may be viewed as a crude approximation of a neighborhood divi-
sion; a ward is generally a residential area that has a name used by its
residents; a history of its own, a physical identity due to distinguishable
borders, physical layout, and housing; and often a social mix of residents
related to the type of housing in the area. Popenoe (1977) remarks, with
regard to the postwar residential developments in Stockholm, "The neigh-
borhood concept was quite important in the minds of most Swedish plan-
ners of the time" (p. 37).
The Inner- and Outer-City Areas

In the ward division of Stockholm, the inner city is divided into 35 wards
and the outer city into 95 wards. Of the outer-city wards, 7 were excluded
The Inner- and Outer-City Areas 117
from the crime analysis, either because of an extremely low residential

population (5 wards, including the Bromma airport, each have a residential
population well below 100) or because of the presence of a larger social
institution. In one of the latter cases, the ward is almost totally dominated
by a large mental hospital, and in the other, a large institution for treat-
ment of severe alcoholics was located in the ward at the time of the study.
The exclusion of the 7 outer-city wards left 123 wards to be included in the
study. The mean residential population of the included wards was 5,198,
with a range from 296 to 16,754 inhabitants. Two of the included wards had
below 500 inhabitants-these were the two Central Business District
(CBD) wards. Thus, the population-based crime figures for these wards
might be a bit shaky and should be interpreted with care. Therefore, in
some of the analyses in the following chapters, one or both of the CBD
wards were excluded.
The relationship between the distribution of routine activities and crime
has been central in recent criminological research (e.g., Maxfield, 1987).
Ecological aspects are central in the so-called routine activity approach,
which stresses the importance of how routine activities affect the conver-
gence in time and space of motivated offenders and suitable targets. Ac-
cording to Cohen and Felson (1979), "Routine activities would include
formalized work, as well as the provision of standard food, shelter, sex-
ual outlet, leisure, social interaction, learning and child rearing" (p. 593).
Cohen and Felson go on to say that "routine activities may occur (1) at
home, (2) in jobs away from home, and (3) in other activities away from
home." The study of the distribution of residential areas, work areas, com-
mercial centers, public entertainment areas, and so forth gives some clues
about the distribution of routine activities in the urban area. Knowledge of
the normal temporal variations (over the week and day) of different activi-
ties adds information about the temporal variations of routine activities in
different parts of the urban area.
The Inner City

The inner city is-by its "city architecture" and characteristic mixture of
residences, offices, commercial establishments, and so forth-clearly dis-
tinguishable from the outer city, the major exceptions being the area sur-
rounding the University of Stockholm located in the far north part of the
inner city, and a bigger park/woodland in the east part of the inner city.
Generally, the inner city of Stockholm also has physical borders (mostly
water) because it is mainly built on islands.
About 300,000 people work in the inner city, compared to about 150,000
in the outer city. The ratio of people working in the area to the residential
population of the inner city is 1.3, as compared to 0.4 for the outer city.
Moreover, the workplaces are more concentrated to specific wards in the
outer city than in the inner city (see Map 6.2). In contrast to many British
and U.S. cities, there are no residential slums or run-down residential
11m Commerc181 centre"

M8nuf8cturing ....
Commerce end
mllnuf8cturi ng.
incl.
+ sao or more IJorkinQ in shops,department stores etc

1000 or more IJorking in manufacturing.
MAP 6.2. Wards with greater industrial areas and commercial centers.
areas in the inner city or elsewhere in Stockholm. Popenoe (1977) com-

ments that "it is generally agreed that Stockholm has one of the most
livable inner-city environments among the world's major cities" (p. 39).
The Central Business District (CBD)

Stockholm's CBD is a very small area of the city (see again Map 6.1), and
its residential population numbers less than 1,000. The CBD is character-
ized by a lot of office buildings and a number of big department stores. It
is of course the major shopping area of the city. It also has a lot of theaters,
cinemas, restaurants, and other places of public entertainment. The gov-
ernmental and ministerial buildings are concentrated in this area. About
67,000 people work in the CBD. The main public transport junction is
located in the CBD; all underground lines pass through the Central Sta-
tion, which is also the main railway station. This means that there is a very
large number of travelers who pass the CBD or change lines or means of
transportation there. Within the CBD, there are several well-known meet-
ing points for disruptive youths and drug addicts who hang around in the
city. The main street prostitution area is located within the CBD. All in all,
one might say that the CBD in the daytime is a main office area and the
The Inner- and Outer-City Areas 119
Resteunmts ,pubs etc per

hectere;
0 .31 -
. 0.21 - 0 .30
0 . ' , - 0 .20
[ ] 0 .0' - O. , 0
D 0 .00
inc\.
i ncl.
MAp 6.3. Licensed establishments (restaurants, pubs, etc.) per hectare.
major shopping area, and at night it is the central part of the major public
entertainment district, which, however, spreads into nearby parts of the
inner city (see Map 6.3). During both daytime and nighttime , the great
majority of people in the area are nonresidents.
The Outer City

In a somewhat simplified way, the outer city of Stockholm can be described
as three rings (see again Map 6.1): First, and closest to the inner city, are
areas with older multistory houses (many built in the 1930s and 1940s),
with some pockets of new residential areas; second are areas dominated by
single-family houses; and third are areas with larger postwar multistory
residential developments.
Most of the wards with large industrial areas are located near the inner
city (see again Map 6.2). Large local commercial centers are in most cases
located in post war residential developments (see below, and compare
Maps 6.1 and 6.2), some of which also include industrial parts.
Major Postwar Residential Developments

The major postwar residential developments in the city of Stockholm
(Johansson, 1987, pp. 539-554,587-604) can be divided into three groups:
(1) sleeping suburbs, mainly built in the 1950s; (2) ABC suburbs, built in
the 1950s and 1960s; and (3) the Jarva city, built in the late 1960s and early
1970s (see again Map 6.1). These developments were closely linked to the
development of the Stockholm underground, which was begun in 1945 and
largely completed in the mid-1970s.
The major difference between the sleeping suburbs and the ABC sub-
urbs is that the latter were planned not only to be residential areas, built
around tube stations, but also to include a substantial number of work-
places and a large cultural and commercial center. ABC stands for work,
residence, and center (compare Maps 6.1 and 6.2). The Jarva city is the
most recent major residential development within the boundaries of the
city of Stockholm. It includes the most densely built and densely populated
residential areas outside the inner city (Johansson, 1987, p. 596). One
salient characteristic of the population of Jarva city is that it includes two
wards with, for Swedish conditions, comparatively very high proportions of
immigrants (40-50%).
Housing in Stockholm
A rather small proportion of the inhabitants of Stockholm live in single-
family houses: around 10% in the whole city and around 20% in the sub-
urban areas. Most residents live in rented flats, mostly rented from private
landlords, but a substantial proportion of the rented flats are also owned by
nonprofit organizations (see Table 6.4).
Because the overwhelming majority of the one- and two-family houses
TABLE 6.4. Housing in the city of Stockholm; number and percentage of resi-
dences by type of housing (1980).
Type of housing Number %
Owner-occupied
House a 38,797 10.6
Tenant-owned flat (condominium) 63,438 17.3
Rented
Private landlordb 160,437 43.8
Nonprofit organization c 98,972 27.0
State, municipalityd 4,748 1.3
Total 366,392 100.0
Missing 797
aOne- or two-family houses owned by private person (37,652) or tenant owners' association
(1,145).
bMultistory houses owned by private person or company (including 327 residences in one- or
two-family houses).
crncIuding 877 residences in one- or two-family houses.
dIncIuding 252 residences in one- or two-family houses.
Source: Statistisk firsbok fOr Stockholm 1983/84, USK Table 68 (p. 121).
The Factorial Social Ecology of Stockholm 121
DomineUng type of
tenure (51 ~ or more)
o Single fomily houses

Tenonts owners flots
Prl~ote londlord
Non-profit housing
IZ:J Mi xed tenure
Not Incl.
MAP 6.4. Dominating type of tenure (51 % or more) in the wards of Stockholm,
1980.
are owner-occupied, there is a great overlap between one- and two-family

houses and owner-occupancy. Among the multistory houses, however,
most flats are not owner-occupied. Only around one fifth of the flats in
multistory houses are owned by tenants' associations.
In the inner city, nearly all wards are dominated by flats rented from
private landlords (see Map 6.4). The second most frequent type of tenure
shows a pattern for the inner city that simplified, may be described as
tenants' -association-owned flats being more common in the northern part
of the inner city (the areas beside and above the CBD) and nonprofit hous-
ing being in the southern part of the inner-city (the areas below the CBD).
Perhaps the most striking feature of the tenure in the outer-city wards is
that the postwar residential developments (discussed above) to a large ex-
tent are owned by nonprofit organizations (compare Maps 6.1 and 6.4). Of
the wards containing the major postwar residential developments, 18 out
of 29 are dominated by nonprofit housing. Of the remaining 11 wards,
many have a significant part of their flats in nonprofit housing: 3 have
almost 50%, 4 between 30 and 40%, and 2 between 20 and 30%.
The Factorial Social Ecology of Stockholm

Factorial social ecology is a well-established technique of research into the
dimensions of urban structure. As Janson (1980) reports, "Studies of urban
spatial structure in modern Western society appear to have established

fairly well the dominance of three classes of dimensions" (p. 447). These
dimensions are social rank, familism, and ethnicity (see also Schwirian,
1974, pp. 8-10; Timms, 1971, p. 85). More recently there has also been an
increasing interest in the residential differentiation of so-called social prob-
lem households (e.g., Wallden, 1985, pp. 191-192). The choice of variables
for the factor analysis, guided by the result of previous studies of the fac-
torial social ecology of cities (see, e.g., Janson, 1971), is presented in
Appendix C.
The strategy of factor analysis used for the present study is what may be
called the Varimax-Promax strategy. After a first interpretation of
Varimax-rotated factors, I shall proceed with an oblique rotation (Promax)
to see whether the assumption of orthogonality holds and eventually to see
what the interfactor correlations are. Gorsuch (1974, p. 212), in a compari-
son of different techniques of rotation, recommended the combined use of
Varimax and Promax rotations. If there are apparently significant intercor-
relations between factors in the Prom ax solution, this solution will be the
choice. Otherwise, the Varimax solution is chosen. According to Gorsuch,
the Varimax-Promax strategy should be used in cases of clear simple struc-
ture.
Although only 123 wards will be included in the crime analyses in the
following chapters, 125 wards were included in the factor analysis. The two
wards excluded from the crime analysis because of the presence of a larger
social institution (see above) were included in the urban structure factor
analysis.
The result of the factor analysis is shown in Table 6.5. Five factors were
extracted, using the conventional criteria of inclusion of factors with an
eigenvalue above 1. Together they explained 80% of the variance. One of
the included variables (vacant fiats) had a low communality, but a rerun of
the factor analysis without that variable did not change the result in any
significant way. Only the first four factors were interpreted. Factor scores
were computed for the first four factors and plotted on maps.
Familism
The first, and strongest, factor was interpreted as Familism, with high posi-
tive loadings on the variables of household size, households with children!
youth, persons aged 0-14 years, fiats in one- and two-family houses, large
residences, distance from city center, and mean income-and with high
negative loadings on the variables of small residences, persons aged 60 or
more years, overcrowded fiats, children with single working parents, the
percentage of females of those aged 15 years and older, and old residences.
An alternative labeling of this factor may be Familism/Space, because
obviously some of the high loading variables are of relevance for space.
The plotting of the factor scores in five classes is shown in Map 6.5. Most
TABLE 6.5. Factor loadings and communalities. Varimax rotated factors, Stock-
holm, 1980 (N = 125).
Variable II III IV V h2
Mean income 57 -47 56 0 4 88

Income heterogeneity 29 -32 75 2 -21 81
% aged 0-14 89 15 -1 -20 -6 87
% aged 60 and above -80 -42 -4 2 10 85
% females of those aged
15 years or older -63 -26 11 -11 46 72
% foreign nationality 6 77 8 5 -15 63
Household size, mean 96 0 -1 -16 -5 96
% fiats in one- or
two-family houses 76 -47 -7 -14 -28 92
% fiats in nonprofit
housing -2 69 -29 -9 32 68
% small residences -92 11 0 14 4 91
% large residences 75 -42 30 -8 -11 86
% old residences -48 -54 19 9 -45 80
% households with
children/youth 94 16 -4 -15 2 93
% children with single
working parents -69 48 5 10 29 82
% vacant fiats -24 19 52 0 0 37
% workplaces -26 3 31 82 0 83
Manufacturing workplaces -12 -6 -15 89 9 85
Workplaces in commerce -20 23 54 41 -29 64
Distance from city center 68 21 -40 -25 21 78
% overcrowded fiats -72 32 -4 -3 -19 66
% blue-collar workers -6 47 -74 0 -4 80
% on public welfare
assistance 0 92 -11 0 7 86
% females gainfully
employed -14 10 -12 10 84 76
Contribution % 37 21 10 6 6
Note. Coefficients have been multiplied by 100; loadings 40 and higher in bold type.
inner-city wards show negative scores for this factor, whereas the highest
positive scores for this factor are to be found among parts of the postwar
multistory residential developments and single-family house areas. One
may hypothesize that mainly less better-off families with children are
housed in the newer multistory residences (often nonprofit public hous-
ing), and that the better-off families with children are mainly housed in
single-family house areas. In general, Familism is highest in the outskirts of
the outer city.
FAMILISM .
Fllctor scores;
1.91 - 2.88
09
.3 - 1.90
-0 .05 - 0.92
[ ] - 1.03 - -0 .06
D -2 .0 I - -1.04
i ncl.
; nc1.
MAp 6.5. Plot of scores for Factor I-Familism.
Problem Residential Areas

The second factor was interpreted as Problem Residential Areas, with high
positive loadings on the variables of public welfare assistance, immigrants
(foreign citizens), nonprofit housing, children of single working parents,
and blue-collar workers-and high negative loadings on the variables of
old residences, mean income, fiats in one- and two-family houses, large
residences, and people aged 60 and older. An alternative and less value-
ridden labeling of this factor would be Postwar Public Housing, because
those wards with the highest positive factor scores overlap greatly but not
totally with the postwar residential developments, especially those wards
within these developments that are dominated by nonprofit housing (com-
pare Maps 6.4 and 6.6).
In the inner-city area, there are three wards with higher positive scores
on the Problem Residential Area factor: one of the two CBD wards and (in
the far north) the two wards including the university area with a lot of
student residences. The high scoring for the university-area wards is likely
to be at least partly explained by the fact that, at the time, a fairly high
proportion of political refugees were located in the student residences;
also, a rather great number of foreign students reside in this area, giving
the wards a high proportion foreign residents. The conditions in these two
PROBLEM AREAS
Factor scores ;
2.97 - 4. 14

1.79 - 2.96
0.61 - 1.78
[] -0 .57 - 0.60
D -1.75- -0.58
i ncl.
Not incl .
MAP 6.6. Plot of scores for Factor II-Problem Residential Areas.
problem areas are not of the same kind as the ones producing high scores
on this factor in the outer city. In this connection, it should also be pointed
out that the high-scoring CBD ward belongs to the group of wards with the
smallest residential population, which may make the figures for this area a
bit shaky.
When speaking about problem residential areas, it should be pointed out
that what may be considered a problem residential area is relative and that
many of the high-scoring areas in Stockholm probably not would qualify
for the label "problem area" in an international perspective. There are no
slum areas in Stockholm as there are in many big U.S. cities. Moreover, it
is also questionable whether Stockholm's problem residential areas are
comparable (on the level of social problems) to inner-city run-down areas
and so-called difficult council estates in large British cities (see Baldwin &
Bottoms, 1976).
Social Rank
The third factor was interpreted as Social Rank, with high positive loadings
on the variables of income heterogeneity, mean income, workplaces in
commerce, and vacant flats-and high negative loadings on the variables
of blue-collar workers and distance from city center.
SOCIAL RANK .
Fector scores ;

3.06 - 4.37
1.74 - 3.05
0.42- 1.73
ITJ -0.90 - 0.4 1
D -2 .22 - -0.91
inel.
inel.
MAp 6.7. Plot of scores for Factor III-Social Rank.
Looking at the plotting of the scores for the Social Rank factor (see Map
6.7), it is obvious that there are two areas of high social rank in Stockholm:
the northern part of the inner city, especially the CBD and the areas close
to the CBD, and the single-family house area close to the inner city in the
west of the outer city. This result corresponds very well with a Stockholm
resident's everyday view of the most prestigious areas to reside in.
Workplace Areas
The fourth and final interpreted factor was labeled Workplaces because it
had high positive loadings on the variables of percentage of workplaces,
manufacturing workplaces, and workplaces in commerce. It is a factor that
picks out those wards having a high frequency of workplaces (see Map 6.8,
and compare Map 6.2).
The Oblique Solution

An oblique solution (Promax) was also carried out. This resulted in the
same factor structures as in the orthogonal solution, but Factor III was
more clearly a Social Rank factor in the oblique solution, the loadings on
Grouping Wards to Major Types of Urban Environments 127
WORK PLACES
Fector scores ;
2.85 - 4.00

1.69 - 2.84
0 .53 - 1.68
lTI -0.63 - 0 .52
0 -1.79 - - 0 .64
i ncl.
Not i ncl.
mean income (64) and blue-collar workers (-84) being higher (compare
Table 6.3).
None of the interfactor correlations was above .31. Familism was nega-
tively related to Workplace (- .31), Problem Residential Areas negatively
related to Social Rank ( - .28), whereas Social Rank was negatively related
to the noninterpreted Factor V ( - .26) . The decision was taken to stick to
the orthogonal solution in light of the generally low or modest intercorrela-
tions and the more complex interpretation that results when using corre-
lated factors . The purpose of the analysis presented in this chapter is purely
descriptive , and for that purpose the Varimax solution was judged to give
an adequate picture of the Stockholm urban structure.
Grouping Wards to Major Types of Urban Environments

As mentioned earlier, the basic unit of analysis in the ecological and en-
vironmental studies of crime in Stockholm is the ward. For some research
topics, however, the ward unit was found to be too small, and the wards
were therefore grouped into a smaller number of larger aggregates of types
of urban environments.
CBD (I)
Inner high ronl< (2)
.Otherlnner(3)
Outer hi gh rllnl< (4)
III Outer problem (5)
D Other outer (6)
Not i nc1.
MAP 6.9. Location of major types of urban environments.
TABLE 6.6. Selected characteristics of wards grouped together (Stockholm, 1980).

Inner city Outer city
High social High social Problem

Characteristics CBD rank Other rank residential Other
Residential population 775 49,172 177,155 17,832 145,073 251,766

Daytime population" 66,905 54,878 178,658 2,641 19,135 130,D20
Ratio day time/
residential population 86.3 1.1 1.0 0.1 0.1 0.5
Land area (hectare) 128 995 2,412 1,407 4,464 9,356
% Nonprofit housing 7.6 6.2 14.1 2.7 61.1 23.6
Mean income (SEK) 61 ,000 72,000 53 ,000 78,000 51,000 55,000
% Households with
children/youth 5.7 13.8 9.3 33.4 34.7 23.4
% Blue-collar workers 9.8 4.8 10.1 3.9 18.8 16.1
% Foreigners 11.5 4.6 6.8 2.7 15.7 5.2
% On social welfare
assistance 5.4 1.2 2.9 0.5 9.0 2.5
"Number of people working in area.

Grouping Wards to Major Types of Urban Environments 129
When grouping the 123 wards included in the crime study into major
types of urban environments, three principles of grouping were chosen:
1. Separate inner- and outer-city groups of wards.
2. Try as far as possible to have geographically coherent groups of wards.
3. Use the factor scores for the Problem Residental Area and Social Rank
factors as the main criteria for grouping within the inner-city area re-
spective to the outer-city area.
This grouping resulted in six major types of urban environments, which
consist of 15 subgroups when the criteria of geographical coherence is up-
held. The six major types are as follows:
Inner City
1. The central business district (CBD).
2. Inner-city high social rank areas.
3. Other inner-city areas.
Outer City
4. Outer-city high social rank areas.
5. Outer-city high problem residential areas.
6. Other outer-city areas.
The locations of the different types of major urban environments are
shown in Map 6.9. Selected characteristics of the major urban environ-
ments are shown in Table 6.6.
7
Housing, Population Composition,
and Offending
The offender distribution in urban populations is highly skewed, and the

offender rate varies significantly among different ages and social groups
(see Chap. 3). Moreover, it is also well established that there is a significant
residential segregation of different age and social groups in urban areas,
apparently more so in some than in other countries (see, e.g., Theodorson,
1961; Timms, 1971; Schwirian, 1974; and Chap. 6). Therefore, one is
to expect that the offender rate should vary among different residential
areas of a city-perhaps more so in more segregated cities than in others-
and covary with the age and social group patterns of residential segregation
within the city. At one extreme, one can view all of the residential area
variation in offender rates as caused by the age and social group segrega-
tion in the city. But of course, it is also possible to view it from the other
extreme-that all social group variation in offending is due to the effects of
differential patterns of residence for different social groups-although
there are no scholars, to this author's knowledge, who have claimed this to
be the case. Not even Shaw and McKay (1969), who strongly claimed the
great importance of area context of residence for male youth offending
rates, argued that the offending rates for different social groups would be
the same if controlling for area of residence-see, for instance, their de-
bate with Jonassen (Shaw & McKay, 1949; Jonassen, 1949).
All in all, there are two main reasons why area of residence and offend-
ing may be related:
1. Area of residence and offending may be related because more crime-

prone social groups are segregated to certain types of areas.
2. Area of residence may also in itself influence criminal motivation
through the impact of area contextual characteristics on social life and
social control in an area, where this influence may be divided into (a)
short-term situational influences on criminal motivation, and (b) long-
term influences on the development of personality and modes of living
affecting the individual's propensity to commit crime.
130
Housing, Population Composition, and Offending 131
Contextual effects may be defined as "macro processes that are presumed

to have an impact on the individual actor over and above the effects of any
individual-level variables that may be operating" (Blalock, 1984, p. 354).
The question as to what degree individual social characteristics, and so-
ciallife and control in area of residence, respectively, influence individuals'
propensity to commit crime is still a key issue in criminology, and there are
not many studies (including the present one) that have had access to data
that would make it possible to fully deal with this issue. One major difficul-
ty lies in not being able to separate and weight the relative importance of
individual social characteristics and area contextual influences, especially
in light of the fact that they are likely to interact and that their relative
influences may change over the individual's life span. For instance, Bloom
(1964) argues that "variations in the environment have greatest quantita-
tive effect on a characteristic at its most rapid period of change and least
effect on the characteristic during the least rapid period of change" (p. vii).
For children and youths, the relationship between area of residence and
offending is likely, at least partly, to reflect residential segregation patterns
(i.e., families with, for whatever reason, more crime-prone children tend
to be segregated in certain types of areas). In addition to possible short-
term situational influences on offending, area of residence in childhood and
youth may also have a long-term influence on offending behavior through
its impact on the socialization process by area-related differences in social
life and social control, for example, in fostering a delinquent way of life
that might persist into adulthood. Timms (1971) has stressed the neighbor-
hood's great importance in the socialization process:
For much of the first ten or eleven years of life much of the individual's activity is
confined to an area within a relatively small radius of his home. In this area he
obtains most of his extra-familial social relationships, notably in play-groups. It is
more likely than not that his school will be in close proximity and most of his school
peers will be neighbours." (pp. 31-32)
For adults, the possibility of any major socialization influence on offend-

ing behavior from area of residence appears less likely for at least two
reasons: (a) The neighborhood's impact on personality and ways of living is
probably much less in adulthood than in childhood and youth, and (b) most
adult offenders started their criminal involvement at young ages-there
are few individuals who start a criminal career in adulthood, at least as far
as regards traditional criminality (see Chap. 3). So, it appears that the
major kinds of contextual effects to be considered for the group of adult
offenders are possible short-term situational area influences on offending.
All in all, for children and youths, the area offender rate variations may
reflect segregation patterns and long- and short-term area contextual in-
fluences, whereas for adults, the offender rate variations may reflect seg-
regation patterns and short-term situational area contextual influences.
132 7. Housing, Population Composition, and Offending
TABLE 7.1. Juvenile court male offenders per

100 persons aged 10-163 in Chicago, 1900-
1965; cumulative participation rates.
Seriesb Range Median
1900-1906 0.6-29.8 4.9

1917-1923 0.8-19.4 4.3
1927-1933 0.5-18.9 2.5
1934-1940 0.4-22.3 3.5
1945-1951 0.3-16.9 3.8
1954-1957 2.1-25.9 6.5
1958-1961 1.8-34.5 6.8
1962-1965 1.7-30.0 6.5
a For some of the later series a slightly different age

interval was used.
bNote the differing year intervals: From the 1954-
1957 series, the intervals are 4 years, in contrast to
the previous series, which are 7-year intervals.
From the 1934-1940 series, the area division used is
a division into communities. Before, it was a divi-
sion of Chicago into square-mile areas. The latter
are more numerous.
Source: Juvenile Delinquency in Urban Areas (pp.
53, 60, 63, 65, 334, 336, 339, and 341). By C.R.
Shaw and H. McKay, 1969, Chicago: The Universi-
ty of Chicago Press. Used by permission.
The Offender Residential Distribution

One of the key findings in Shaw and McKay's (1969) pioneering work on
male youth offender rates in Chicago and some other major U.S. cities-
the Chicago study covering more than the first half of this century-was
the great area variations in youth offender rates and their skew distribution
(see Table 7.1), that is, a small number of areas had very high youth offen-
der rates whereas most areas had low or moderate rates (pp. 70-72).
Moreover, Shaw and McKay found that these offender rate differences
among areas showed stability over time: "The most persistent finding in
this examination of rates of delinquents among areas in Chicago has been
the absence of significant changes in the production of delinquents in most
city areas relative to other city areas" (p. 374).1 This finding led to perhaps
one of Shaw and McKay's most central questions: "Why do relatively large
numbers of boys from the inner urban areas appear in court with such
1. The claim that the relative area distribution of delinquency rates in Chicago is
stable over time has recently been challenged by Bursik (1986b) in a reanalysis of
the Shaw & McKay data for the period 1930-1970.
The Offender Residential Distribution 133
striking regularity, year after year, regardless of changing population struc-

ture and ups and downs of the business cycle?" (p. 140).
The finding that the offender rate, not only for juveniles, varies signif-
icantly among areas of a city and appears to be highly skewed, has been
replicated in many Anglo-American studies. (For an overview, see Brant-
ingham & Brantingham, 1984 pp. 297-331). For instance, Baldwin and
Bottoms (1976, pp. 75-76) show that of 217 studied enumeration districts
in Sheffield, England, in 1966, 32% of the districts had a zero rate of adult
male offenders, and 28% had a zero rate of young male offenders; in con-
trast, 17% of the districts had an adult male offender rate of 40 or more per
1,000 aged 10 or older, and 18% had a young male offender rate of 24 or
more per 1,000 aged 10 to 19. 2
Although ecological studies of crime have not been too prevalent in
Sweden to date, the few previously conducted have reported significant
variations in juvenile offender rates among areas of cities (e.g., Centralfor-
bundet for Socialt Arbete, 1941; Janson, 1953; Carlsson, 1972). However,
Carlsson, comparing his study with the Shaw and McKay findings, states
that it was not possible to find area youth offender rate differences in
Stockholm of the same magnitude as in Chicago. Although comparisons of
offender rate variations among cities, and more so among cities in different
countries, are complicated for many reasons; for instance, there are differ-
ences in sizes of area units studied, offender categories included, types of
data used, dark figures and clearance, and so forth. Needless to say, what is
really needed to answer questions like this are cross-national studies direct-
ly designed for making comparisons. Such studies are indeed rare.
Some Preliminary Methodological Points

Before presenting the offender rate distributions in Stockholm, some pre-
liminary methodological points should be mentioned. First, it should be
recalled that only traditional crimes are included in this study (i.e., crimes
against the person, vandalism, and theft) and, moreover, that among the
property crimes only a selection of the more serious property crimes is
included (i.e., burglaries and thefts of and from cars). (Note that robbery is
counted as a violent crime in this study.) Thus, there is a bias toward the
more serious of the traditional crimes because most types of minor thefts
are not included. Moreover, because many of the minor property crimes
not included have comparably high proportions of juvenile offenders, there
is a lower proportion of juvenile offenders in the study than what would
have been the case had the full range of property crimes been included.
2. The offender sample in Baldwin & Bottoms's (1976, p. 66) study was a sample of
all offenders convicted or cautioned in 4 different months in 1966. It is unclear to
this author whether the rate figures presented for Sheffield areas are weighted to
I-year figures or only represent the rate for the 4 months included.
Second, the fact should be brought out that the presented rates are not
pure participation rates because the same offender might appear several
times. As discussed in Chapter 3, the aggregate offender rate, for instance,
for a ward, can be viewed as produced by the residents' participation in and
their individual frequency of crime. For cases in which the offender series
for violence and vandalism is shown separately, the offender rates are very
close to the participation rates, because most offenders are only included
for one crime of these kinds. The offender rates for serious property crimes
is to a somewhat higher degree influenced by individual frequency, because
there are a number of offenders included who appear in the study with
several crimes of this kind. However, by and large, given the short period
of observation, the rates presented are close to pure participation rates,
because the bulk of offenders are included only for one crime. As for rates
for single wards, especially for the smaller of the wards, the offender rate
might be significantly affected by, for instance, cases of serial clearance.
This fact will be commented upon when applicable in the analysis carried
out below. Some results presented below indicate that areas with high par-
ticipation rates also have high individual frequencies of crime among offen-
ders and that areas with low participation rates have lower individual
frequencies of crime.
Third, the basic offender rates will be given per 1,000 residents aged 10
or older. There are, of course, several possibilities in choosing a denomina-
tor for the calculation of offender rates. For instance, one can always argue
that because rather few offenders are in older age groups (in this study 5%
of the total offenders are 50 years or older, and 2% are 60 years or older),
one should not only restrict among the youngest ages to be included in the
denominator, but also among the oldest ones. However, because the pro-
portion of victims in crimes involving older persons is much higher than
the corresponding proportion of offenders (see Chap. 5), and because I pre-
ferred to have comparable rates of offending and victimization, I decided
not to leave out the older ages from the denominator when calculating
the offender rate. To some extent this problem is dealt with anyway be-
cause age-standardized rates will also be calculated and included in the
analysis.
Fourth, it has rightly been pointed out that when studying the residential
distribution of offenders in a city, with crimes committed in the city as
sampling frame, one leaves out those offenders who live outside the city
but commit crimes in the city and those offenders who live in the city but
commit crimes outside the city (Baldwin & Bottoms, 1976, p. 72). Only the
latter can be considered to be a real problem in the study of the offender
rate variation in the urban area, and only insofar as these offenders are
distributed differently from those who commit crimss within the urban
area. This problem will be further discussed in Chapter 8.
Finally, the problem of possible bias in studies using officially recorded
crimes, due to area differential dark figures and clearance, was brought out
early in the discussion of the Shaw and McKay (1969) findings. Mostly, it
The Offender Rate Distributions 135
seems to have been assumed that the offender rate differences noted in
studies of recorded crimes overestimate the area differences. (For a gener-
al discussion on class bias in official data, including some area aspects, see
Braithwaith, 1979 pp. 32-46) However, there are few empirical studies
showing this to be the case. On the contrary, the few conducted generally
do not support this view. For instance, Bottoms and Wiles (1986), summar-
izing the efforts in the Sheffield project to explore this possible bias, state
that:
The results suggest that a good deal of confidence can be placed on the assumption
that within a city the residents of small areas that have high official (police re-
corded) offender rates usually do .actually commit more offenses than do the resi-
dents of areas with low police-recorded offender rates. (p. 107)
The same view was also held by Shaw & McKay (1969, p. 45) based on
their extensive study of Chicago male juvenile offenders.
The Offender Rate Distributions

In the study of the offender rate distribution, six different offender rates
have been calculated for the wards of Stockholm. Besides the total offen-
der rate for all included crimes, offender rates have also been calculated for
subgroups of offenders defined by age (youths), by previous criminal in-
volvement (chronic offenders), and by major type of crime committed (vio-
lence, vandalism, or serious property crime). The definition of the series is
as follows:
All offenders of included crimes per 1,000 residents aged 10 or older.
Chronic offenders per 1,000 residents aged 10 or older, where a chronic
offender is defined as one who has a previous criminal record of at least
one crime in at least 4 different years previous to the year studied.
Youth offenders per 1,000 residents aged 10 to 19, where a youth offen-
der is defined as one who is below the age of 20.
o Violent offenders per 1,000 residents aged 10 or older, where a violent
offender is defined as one who has committed homicide, assault, violence

to a public official, rape, robbery, or molestation.
Vandalism offenders per 1,000 residents aged 10 or older.
Serious property offenders per 1,000 residents aged 10 or older, where a
serious property offender is defined as one who has committed burglary
(residential or nonresidential) or a theft from or of a car.
Two of the presented series may be significantly affected by chance
variation and may therefore give somewhat unreliable estimates due to low
numbers in the denominator used to calculate the rate (youth offenders),
or due to a rather low number of offenders in a subgroup (youth and van-
dalism offenders), the lattt:!r especially in view of the weighting procedure
applied (see Appendix A). Of the 123 wards included, 42 had a residential
TABLE 7.2. Offender rates per 1,000 residents aged 10 or more (except youth offen-
ders, which shows rate per 1,000 residents aged 10-19) (Stockholm, 1982).
Range Median %
excluding excluding wards with Extreme
Series extremes extremes zero rate Skewness values
Total offenders 0-35.7 10.7 12.2 0.38 51.7/63.4

Chronic offenders 0-22.3 2.8 26.8 1.43 51.6
Youth offenders 0-131.8 5.8 47.2 2.14 193.2
Violent offenders 0-13.4 4.1 17.9 0.42
Vandalism offenders 0-19.9 0.0 52.8 3.42 43.1
Serious property offenders 0-25.6 3.9 31.7 0.80 60.1
"Excluding extreme values; measured as 3(mean - median)/standard deviation.
population of persons aged 10 to 19 below 200 (mean = 441, median =

329). Therefore, the youth offender and vandalism offender rate distribu-
tions should be interpreted with special care.
The range and median (excluding extremes) of the offender rate dis-
tributions for the six different series defined above are presented in Table
7.2. It should be recalled that all data are weighted to I-year figures (see
Appendix A). The offender rates show significant variation, and all series
are positively skewed. The degree of skewness is clearly related to the
series proportion of areas with a zero offender rate.
Extreme Values
The extreme values were picked out for special inspection to see whether
these were produced by, for instance, serial clearance or other similar fac-
tors. As extreme values were defined those that were clearly out of line
with the others when plotting the ward rates. For instance, considering the
plot of rates for total offenders ordered by size (see Fig. 7.1), one can
clearly see that there is a rather continuous increase up to around 35 offen-
ders per 1,000 residents aged 10 or older, when suddenly the rate makes a
significant jump for the last two wards with the highest frequencies. It was
found that all extreme values but one-that for the youth offenders (see
again Table 7.2)-belonged to the same two wards: one inner-city CBD
ward and one outer-city ward. In the latter case, it was found that the
offender rate for this ward was highly affected by a serial clearance case of
a serious property offenders, and therefore the offender rate for this par-
ticular ward might be misleadingly high. For no other ward, including the
CBD ward with extreme values for some of the offender rates, was it possi-
ble to detect any case of single offenders that significantly affected the
offender rate. The extreme offender rates noted for the CBD ward might,
due to its small population size, be affected by chance variations. The ex-
treme value for youth offenders might also be affected by chance variations
because it was localized to a ward with a small youth population (88 resi-
70
60
so
40
30
20
10
0
0 so. 100 ,
FIGURE7.1. Plot of ward offender rates for total offenders, in order by size of rate
(N= 123).
dents aged 10 to 19). It was decided to exclude the extreme values from the
further analyses of the offender distributions.
The Degree of Concentration

Having established the expected skewed area distribution of the offenders,
the next step is to measure the degree of offender residential concentration
in the urban area. This step is especially relevant in light of the emphasis
that has been given in research and theory to the existence of so-called
delinquency areas. The concept is in itself a bit ambiguous, as pointed out
by Morris (1953, p. 20), because what it normally refers to is areas with
high rates of delinquents' residences, not acts of delinquency, areas that
are not necessarily overlapping. It is sometimes a bit unclear in the litera-
ture what is meant by "delinquency area" (high offender rate area)-
whether it refers to some qualitative difference in offending between this
and other areas, or whether it refers to areas with the highest offender rates
compared to other areas of the city. Shaw (1931) describes a delinquency
area as an area where "delinquency has become a more or less permanent
aspect of the social activity of the boys living in this neighborhood. It is
apparently, part of the culture and tradition which is transmsitted through
the medium of social contact" (p. 18).
The problem of definition looks a bit similar to what can be found in the
discussions in criminal career research regarding how a chronic (frequent)
offender should be defined (see Chap. 3). Where, and on what criteria,
should we draw the line between delinquency areas and others? Should it
be an absolute or relative criteria? For instance, in the first case, one may
find that some cities do not have areas that qualify to be called delinquency
areas, which in itself may be an interesting finding.
TABLE 7.3. Segregation indexes and Gini coefficients for different offender dis-
tributions (Stockholm, 1982).
Segregation Gini
Series indexes) coefficient" N
Total offenders 27.5 35.1 (35.8) 121
Chronic offenders 39.2 51.5 (51.8) 122

Youth offenders 43.2 57.2 (57.6) 122
Violent offenders 25.1 33.7 123

Vandalism offenders 41.7 57.1 (57.8) 122
Serious property offenders 37.8 49.1 (50.4) 122
'Figures within brackets show Gini coefficients when extreme values were included. As can
be seen, the effect is marginal.
Two measures of offender concentration were considered: the segrega-

tion index(s), and the Gini coefficient. The segregation index( s) for the
offender distribution can be interpreted as showing, in this case, how large
a proportion of the offenders would have to move from their ward of resi-
dence to give an equal area distribution of the offenders as the area dis-
tribution for the nonoffenders. The segregation index is a measure based
on summation of all wards-in this case, finding the difference between the
proportion of the city's offenders living in the ward and the proportion of
the city's population living in the ward, and then dividing the result by the
proportion of nonoffenders in the whole city (see, e.g., Duncan & Duncan,
1955a, p. 211; 1955b, p. 494). The result from the computation ofthe seg-
regation indexes are shown in Table 7.3. According to this index, 27.5% of
all offenders would have to move to another ward to make their distribu-
tion equal to that of the nonoffenders. Considering the sub series of offen-
der categories, chronic offenders are somewhat less segregated than youth
offenders, and violent offenders are less segregated than vandalism and
serious property offenders.
The Gini coefficient (presented in Ch. 3) will be 0 in this case if the
offenders are as equally distributed in the wards as in the population as a
whole, and 100 if all offenders are living in one of the wards. The results
from the computation of the Gini coefficients are presented in Table 7.3.
The results show, as expected, that the pattern is the same as for the seg-
regation indexes but that the value of the Gini coefficients are higher. 3 A
problem that is common to both of these measures is that different distribu-
tions of offenders on the wards can yield similar coefficients. A way to deal
3. The Gini coefficient is a measure similar to the segregation index (see Duncan &
Duncan, 1955a, p. 211). The minimum value of the Gini coefficient is the value of
the segregation index(s), and its maximum value is 2s - S2. The correlation be-
tween the two measures is high.
100
90
....0)
III
"tJ
c: 70
....
....0
0)
...c:
0)
"....
0)
50
c.
0)
>
.;;
40
.!!!
;j
E
;j
u 20
10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
Cumulative per cent population
FIGURE 7.2. Lorenz curve for total offenders (Stockholm, 1982).
100
90
~ 80
0)
0
c:
......
0) 70
0
~
c:
60
0)
" 50
~
Q)
>
;::; 40
~
:I
E 30
:I
:.J
20
10
10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
FIGURE 7.3. Lorenz curves for chronic and youth offenders, respectively (Stock-
holm, 1982).
100
Vandalism
90
80
...'"
Q)
-c 70
c:
....
....0
Q)
...c: 60
Q)
... 50
(.)
Q)
c.
Q) 40
>
.;::;
.!!!
:J
E
:J
U
10
10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
FIGURE 7.4. Lorenz curves for violent, vandalism, and serious property offenders,
respectively (Stockholm, 1982).
with that problem is to look at the so called Lorenz curve, which adds the
information of what kind of distribution lies behind the coefficient.
The Lorenz curves for the six different offender distributions are shown
graphically in Figures 7.2, 7.3, and 7.4. As in Chapter 3, when describing
the offender concentration in a cohort, the normal way of presenting the
Lorenz curve has been mirrored, following the praxis employed by Fox and
Tracy (1988).
In comparison to having individuals as units of analysis (as in Chap. 3),
having unequally sized wards as units makes the interpretation of the
Lorenz curve (and Gini coefficient) less straightforward. Moreover, other
ward divisions may yield more or less different distributions and coef-
ficients, a fact that makes intercity comparisons of the degree of offender
concentration somewhat complicated. It appears that area offender con-
centration comparisons (using segregation indexes, Gini coefficients, or
similar measures) are most straightforward when comparing different
offender distributions in the same city or changes in a single city over time,
assuming, in the latter case, that the ward division is the same and that
changes in the population distribution have not been too large.
All in all, the result of the study of offender area concentration shows
quite a high degree of concentration. This is further illustrated in Table
7.4, in which the percentage of offenders by quartiles of the population
ordered by rank of ward offender rate is shown. It might be worth noting,
TABLE 7.4. Percentage of offenders by quartiles of population in order of rank by

offender rate of ward; number of wards within brackets (Stockholm, 1982).a
Upper Second Third Lower
Offender series quartile quartile quartile quartile Total
Total offenders 46 (22) 30 (31) 17 (28) 7 (40) 100 (121)
Chronic offenders 59 (29) 27 (24) 12 (24) 2 (45) 100 (122)

Youth offenders 62 (26) 28 (18) 10 (25) 0 (53) 100 (122)
Violent offenders 44 (24) 30 (28) 18 (26) 8 (45) 100 (123)

Vandalism offenders 59 (27) 31 (21) 10 (24) 0 (50) 100 (122)
Serious property offenders 56 (29) 30 (24) 12 (23) 2 (46) 100 (122)
aFor example, for total offenders, the first category, upper quartile, may be read as that the 22
wards with the highest offender rates in the city have 25% of the population but 46% of the
offenders.
with due caution as regards all the difficulties of intercity comparisons, that
the offender area distribution in Stockholm 1982, by quartiles of popula-
tion, is remarkably similar to that found by Shaw and McKay (1969) for
male juvenile offenders in Chicago in the early part of this century. Shaw
and McKay (p. 71) found, for instance, for their 1927-1933 series, that
54.3% of the delinquents belonged to the upper quartile, 23.9% to the
second quartile, 14.6% to the third quartile, and 7.2% to the lower quartile
of the population when areas were ranked by rate of delinquents. How-
ever, the fact that the pattern of the area concentration appears to be simi-
lar, should not be confused with similarity in rates of offending, which
is a totally different matter.
The Relationships Among Different Types of

Offender Distributions
Having established that the series for total offenders and for subcategories
of offenders shows a concentration in a small number of wards, the next
question to be raised is whether, and to what degree, different categories of
offenders are concentrated to the same areas. Looking at the range, mean,
and median of the offender rates for the series for subcategories of offen-
ders, by quartiles of the area total offender rate (see Table 7.5), shows that
the mean and median rate of offenders for all subcategories of offenders
shows a pattern consistent with that for the total offender rates. However,
it is also clear that within each quartile of the area total offender rate, the
series for subcategories of offenders shows significant variability.
The offender rates for the subseries of chronic, violent, and serious prop-
erty offenders are all highly correlated with the total offender rate. How-
ever, the offender rates for the sub series of youth and vandalism offen-
TABLE 7.5. Range, mean, and median ward offender rates for subcategories of
offenders by quartiles of ward total offender rates; zero-order correlations between
total offender rate and offender rates for series of subcategories of offenders
(Stockholm, 1982).
Serious
Total offender Chronic Youth Violent Vandalism property
ward rate offenders offenders offenders offenders offenders
Upper quartile
Range 1.5-22.3 0.0-111.8 0.0-13.4 0.0-13.3 0.0-25.6
Mean 9.8 31.1 8.3 2.8 15.3
Median 9.5 18.6 8.5 2.2 15.3
N 30 30 30 30 30
Second quartile
Range 0.0-19.9 0.0-131.7 0.0-12.2 0.0-19.9 0.0-17.1
Mean 5.2 22.2 5.8 1.9 8.3
Median 4.2 11.2 3.3 1.3 5.8
N 31 30 31 31 31
Third quartile
Range 0.0-7.0 0.0-123.5 0.0-10.4 0.0-6.7 0.0-9.0
Mean 1.8 14.8 4.1 1.7 2.3
Median 1.3 6.4 3.5 1.2 1.7
N 30 30 30 30 30
Lower quartile
Range 0.0-4.1 0.0-27.2 0.0-5.0 0.0-2.2 0.0-3.8
Mean 0.5 3.3 1.4 0.1 0.3
Median 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
N 30 30 30 30 30
r (N = 121)a 0.72 0.36 b 0.70 0.36 0.87
aAll zero-order correlations significant at the 1% level.

bN= 120.
Note. Quartiles refers here to quartiles of wards (and not popUlation) by offender rate of
ward.
ders, although significantly correlated with the total offender rate, shows
a much lesser degree of association (see again Table 7.5). This finding
should be interpreted with some care, because the two subseries of offen-
der categories showing the least association with the total offender rate are
those series that may be most affected by chance variation, as discussed
earlier in this chapter. Recalculating the correlation of the youth offender
series with the others, eliminating the 41 areas with fewer than 200 resi-
dents aged 10 to 19 resulted, as expected, in an increase in the magnitude
of the correlation (i.e., r = 0.46, p = 0.000, n = 81).
A comparison of the overlap of the wards in the upper quartiles of,
respectively, the five subseries of offender categories to the wards in the
upper quartile of the total offender rate shows the following percentages
TABLE 7.6. Zero-order correlations between different offender series (Stockholm,

1982).
Vandalism Property Chronic Youth
offenders offenders offenders offenders
Violent offenders 15 36** 39** 19

Vandalism offenders 02 30** 20**
Serious property offenders 67** 32**
Chronic offenders 03
* Significant at 5% level. *. Significant at 1% level.

Note. Number of observations varies between 121 and 123, depending on what series are
correlated. Coefficients multiplied by 100.
of the wards in the highest quartile of the respective series to also belong to
the wards of the highest quartile for the total offender rate:
Chronic offenders, 70%.
Youth offenders, 43%.
Violent offenders, 63%.
Vandalism offenders, 47%.
Serious property offenders, 80%.
The intercorrelations among the subseries of offender categories are
shown in Table 7.6. It is worth noting that the subseries for youth and
chronic offenders shows no significant relationship at all. That also holds
true when recalculating the relationship to exclude the 41 areas with a
small youth population (i.e., r = 0.21, N.S., n = 81). Moreover, comparing
the overlap of the number of wards in the upper quartile of chronic and
youth offender rates shows the number of overlapping wards to be 9 out of
30 (i.e., 30%). In this connection, it is also worth mentioning that the
individual overlap between youth and chronic offenders is minimal-less
than one half of 1% of the chronic offenders are under the age of 20.
The Location of High and Low Offender Rate Areas

The location of the high offender rate areas seems to differ among coun-
tries and to have changed in some countries over the years. Most U.S.
studies report the high offender rate areas to be located near the city center
(e.g. Shaw & McKay, 1969; Lander, 1954; Schmid, 1960b, p. 660); older
British studies of larger cities report the same (e.g., Burt, 1944; Morris,
1958, p. 21; Castle & Gittus, 1961, p. 420; Wallis & Maliphant, 1967). But
it appears that more recently there have been changes in large British cities
due to slum clearance programs and so forth, so that high offender rate
areas are now not only found in deteriorated inner-city areas but also in
what has been called difficult council estates, often located in the outskirts
Offenders per 1.000 inh

10 yeors oncl 01 cler.
33 -
25 - 32
17 - 24
[] 9 - 16
o 0 - 8
inel.
Not inel.
MAp 7.1. Total offender rate per 1,000 residents aged 10 or older (Stockholm,
1982).
Chronic offenders per

1.000 inhob . 10 years
or olcler .
17-
13 - 16
9 - 12
[ill 5- 8
o 0 - 4
incl .
MAP 7.2. Chronic offenders per 1,000 residents aged 10 or older (Stockholm,
1982).
Young offenders (under

ege of 20) per 1.000 int
aged 10-19 yeers .
81 -
. 6 1 - 80
. 4 1 - 60
o 21 - 40
o 0- 20
Not i ncl.
MAP 7.3. Youth offenders per residents aged 10-19 (Stockholm, 1982).
Vlo1 ent offenders

per 1.000 inheb.
10 ye6rs or older.
9-
.7-8
5-5
8'.01
t:.;ij 3 - 4
D 0-2
Not i ne1.
MAP 7.4. Violent offenders per 1,000 resident's aged 10 or older (Stockholm,
1982).
Vendel ism offender

per 1.000 inheb.

10 yeers or 01 der.
8 -

6 - 7
4-5
EJ 2 - 3
0 0- 1
; ncl .
MAp 7.5. Vandalism offenders per 1,000 resident's aged 10 or older (Stockholm,
1982).
of the cities (e.g., Mays, 1963, p. 160; Baldwin, 1975; Baldwin & Bottoms,
1976). Herbert (1978) comments, comparing the high offender rate area
patterns in the United States and Great Britain, "The basic distorting fac-
tor would appear to be the public sector intervention in the British housing
market , which in the process of transferring population groups from city
centre to periphery has also transferred their behaviour patterns" (p. 235).
All in all, there is no universal pattern of the location of high offender
rate areas, and this pattern may also change over longer periods of time.
(See also Herbert , 1972, p. 217, and Harries, 1974, pp. 74-75, for exam-
ples from countries other than those discussed here.)
Turning to Stockholm, 1982 (excluding the extremes from considera-
tion), most of the wards in the two highest classes of the total offender rate
are to be found in the outer-city areas, but some of the wards in the south-
ern part of the inner city also belong to the high offender rate wards (see
Map 7.1). Generally, the same overall pattern holds for the different
subseries of offenders (see Maps 7.2-7.6), although, as has already been
noted, when exploring the relationship between these distributions, the
high offender rate wards of respective series show some differences in
distribution.
Age Structure and Offender Rates 147
Seri ous propert y off end

per 1.000 inMb.
10 Ijellrs or older.
25 -
19 - 24
13- 18
[J 7 - 12
D 0 - 6
incl.
MAp 7.6. Serious property offenders per 1,000 residents aged 10 or older (Stock-
holm, 1982).
Age Structure and Offender Rates

Offending shows a strong variation with age (see Chap. 3). Because the age
structure of the residents may vary significantly among wards, one reason
for the variations in the area offender rates may simply be that they mirror
area age-structure variations. To test this possible explanation of area
variations in offender rates, the age-standardized offender rates were com-
puted for the offender series, except for the youth offender series, which,
of course, may already be thought of as age-standardized.
The calculation of the age-standardized offender rates were made in the
following way (see Korner, Ek, & Berg, 1984, pp. 178-179). First, the
total population of Stockholm was divided into 5-year classes (0-4, 5-9,
10-14, etc.), and for every age class the proportion offenders was
calculated. 4 The resulting p-values were used as the age-class expected
value of offenders (i.e., PI, Pz, P3, etc.). Second, the number of residents
(n) in each of the age classes were calculated for every ward (i.e., nb nz,
4. Only offenders residing in the city were included in calculating the p-values.
Offenders aged 60 and older were referred to as one class.
n3, etc.). Third, the expected number of offenders for a given ward (EO)
was computed as follows:
EO = n1 x PI + n2 X P2 + n3 X P3 + ... nk X Pk
Fourth, to get the expected offender rate (ER) for a ward, the expected
number of offenders (EO) was simply divided by the residential population
aged 10 or older. Finally, the difference between the expected offender
rate (ER) and the observed offender rate (OR)5 was taken, and the result-
ing residual was used as a measure of the age-standardized offender rate
(ASOR):
ASOR=OR-ER
The AS OR will be positive if the ward has a higher observed than expected
offender rate and negative if the ward has a lower observed than expected
offender rate. The ASOR will subsequently be used in some of the analyses
below as a measure of the offender rate when controlling for area age struc-
ture.
The zero-order correlations of the expected offender rates (ER) with the
observed rates (OR) are shown for the different offender series in Table
7.7. The low and, with one exception, nonsignificant correlations between
the expected and observed offender rates show that the offender rate varia-
tions in Stockholm cannot very well be explained by area differences in age
structure. In line with this, the zero-order correlations between the age-
standardized (ASOR) and observed offender rate (OR) series are very
high (i.e., for total offenders, .94, for chronics, .97, for violent offenders,
.97, for vandalism offenders, .99, and for serious property offenders, .96).
As an illustration, the scattergram and regression line for the relationship
between OR and ASOR for total offenders is shown in Figure 7.5. All in
all, it seems safe to conclude that variations in the age structure of the
wards are no major cause of the area offender rate variations.
Housing and Offending

As discussed in Chapter 6, residential areas of the city vary with regard to
their dominating type of residential buildings (e.g., single-family houses or
multistory houses) and type of tenure (e.g., owner-occupied, rented from
public housing, etc.). Type of housing is likely to influence the area popula-
tion composition through tenure and type of residential building allocation
processes. For instance, social groups with low economic resources may be
limited in their choice of residence to the rented sector, and in particular to
flats to be rented from nonprofit organizations. Because the population
5. Per 1,000 residents 10 years or older.

Age Structure and Offender Rates 149
TABLE 7.7. Zero-order correlations of observed and expected offender rates per
1,000 residents aged 10 or older (Stockholm, 1982).
Observed offender rates (OR)
Serious
Expected offender Chronic Violent Vandalism property
rates (ER) Total offender offender offender offenders
Total offenders 0.145

Chronic offenders 0.025
Violent offenders 0.276'
Vandalism offenders 0.036
Serious property offenders 0.009
N 121 122 123 122 122
Note. Only diagonal values shown. Significant at the 5% level.
Age-standardized
total offender rate
20
.,
-2
-25
-30
0 5 j 0 15 20 25 30 35 40
Total offender rate.
FIGURE7.5. Scattergram and regression line for relationship between OR and
ASOR for total offenders.
composition of areas is likely to affect the area offender rate, there is an

indirect relationship between housing and offending.
A great number of Anglo-American studies of the crime patterns in the
city have generally shown strong negative correlations between the area
offender rate and the percentage of owner-occupied dwellings (see, e.g.,
Shaw & McKay, 1969, pp. 149-151; Lander, 1954, pp. 29-35; Bordua,
1958; Chilton, 1964; Wallis & Maliphant, 1967; Baldwin & Bottoms, 1976,
p. 108; Schuerman & Kobrin, 1986). Studies from the Sheffield project in
England (e.g., Baldwin & Bottoms, 1976; Bottoms & Wiles, 1986) have
shown that there are great area-level differences in offender rates by type
of tenure dominating an area. These studies used a classification of type of
tenure of area in four classes: (1) owner-occupied, (2) rented from private
landlord, (3) rented from local authority (public housing), and (4) mixed.
If more than 50% of the households in the area belonged to one of the first
three classes, the area was referred to that class, otherwise as mixed. Bot-
toms and Wiles found no owner-occupied area with a high offender rate,
but in the two other main types of areas they found that "some privately
rented districts had high rates, and some had low rates; some local author-
ity areas had high rates, and some had low rates" (p. 105). Their main
explanation for these differences is the mechanisms of housing allocation;
they state that "the mechanisms of allocation between and within tenure
types must be a critical part of any explanation of offender-rate distribu-
tion" (p. 119). For instance, Bottoms and Xanthos (1981) suggest, from
the Engiish experience, the following possibly important factors influenc-
ing offender rate variations in the public sector of housing: (1) differential
rent levels, (2) local authority allocation systems, (3) residents' self-
selection to area, and (4) area reputation.
It has also been maintained that "the way we design our apartment
buildings and housing complexes has everything to do with the crime pat-
tern of the city" (Jeffery, 1977, p. 193). Physical design characteristics of
buildings and housing estates may have an effect on residential area offend-
ing rates by their influence on social space, privacy, and surveillance
opportunities-all factors that have been assumed to be of relevance for
social life and social control in residential areas (e.g., Newman, 1972;
Baldwin & Bottoms, 1976; Brown & Altman, 1981).
In this section, I shall explore the relationship between housing and
offending. Housing in Stockholm and the distribution of types of housing in
areas were presented in Chapter 6. The housing classification used in the
following analyses was also presented in Chapter 6. Before turning to the
1982 Stockholm data, I shall summarize some findings from a study made
on the individual-level relationship between housing and offending in
childhood and youth in a Greater Stockholm area cohort.
The Individual-Level Relationship Between Housing and

Offending in Childhood and Youth
The individual-level relationship between type of housing for individuals at

age 7 and cumulative participation in crime in childhood (7 -12 years) as
known by the child welfare authorities, and cumulative participation and
frequency in crime in youth (13-19 years) as recorded by the police, was
studied by the author for the Project Metropolitan 1953 birth cohort (see
Wikstrom, 1989a).6 Before presenting some findings from this study, some
Relationship Between Housing and Offending 151
TABLE 7.8. Participation rates by type of housing in childhood and youth for
traditional crimes; the individual-level relationship (Project Metropolitan, 1953
Greater Stockholm cohort).
Total cohort a Males b Femalesc
Housing 7-12 13-19 7-12 13-19 7-12 13-19
Owner-occupied
House 1.4 7.5 2.5, 13.0 0.2 1.7
Flat 0.5 7.6 1.1 13.8 0.0 1.5
Rented
Privately 2.2 9.8 3.3 15.9 1.0 3.3
Nonprofit 3.2 14.0 5.5 23.5 0.8 4.1
Other public housing 2.4 11.6 3.9 19.2 0.7 3.7
Significance
(prob. value) 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.012 0.000
aN= 13,855.
bN=7,083.
cN=6,772.
Note. Highest participation rate in bold type.
remarks are necessary. First, this study is restricted to the relationship be-
tween housing and offending in childhood and youth. As previously dis-
cussed, the relationship between housing and offending may be different
for different age groups. Second, the area studied covers the Greater
Stockholm area and is not confined to the city of Stockholm (see Chap. 6).
Participatio n
Both in youth and in childhood, both totally and separately for the two
sexes, the results show significant differences in participation. 7 Generally,
the highest participation rates were found among those living in the rented
sector of housing, and particularly among those living in flats rented from
nonprofit organizations, that is, public housing (see Table 7.8).
Frequency of Crime
The comparison of frequency of crime by type of housing was only possible
for the youth period (13-19 years) because frequency data were lacking for
6. For the full details and other findings than those presented here, the reader is
referred to the original study. The Project Metropolitan cohort study is presented
in Chapter 3 of the present study.
7. Only results for traditional crimes (i.e., violence, vandalism and theft) will be
shown here, although the full range of crimes was included in the study (see
Wikstrom, 1989).
TABLE 7.9. Frequency in crimea by type of housing in youth (13-19)-traditional

crimes, the individual-level relationship (Project Metropolitan, 1953, Greater
Stockholm cohort).
Housing Total cohort Males Females
Owner-occupied
House 5.2 5.6 1.8
Flat 4.3 4.6 2.0
Rented
Privately 5.7 6.4 1.7
Nonprofit organization 8.3 9.2 2.5
Other public housing 4.9 5.3 2.1
Difference (times)
highest -lowest 1.9 2.0 1.5
-Crimes per offenders.

Note. Highest frequency in bold type.
the childhood period. The result shows that as regards frequency of crime
there are also marked variations according to types of housing, although
less so for females (see Table 7.9). Again, those living in nonprofit housing
have the highest values. All in all, participation in and frequency of crime
tend to covary when compared by type of housing.
Area Offender Rates by Dominating Type of

Housing in Area
The findings from the individual-level study of offending by housing
showed significant differences. Because living in one type of housing gener-
ally means living in an area dominated by that type of housing, the results
say something about area variation in offender rates by type of housing.
However, what is totally ignored in such a study is variations among areas
dominated by the same type of housing. Neighborhoods with a similar type
of housing may vary considerably in, for instance, population mix (i.e.,
ethnic composition) and physical layout (e.g., inner-city and suburban
multifamily housing). As presented above, previous research has also
shown the area offender rate differences among areas dominated by the
same type of housing to be substantial, at least for some types. In this
section, the offender rate variations in Stockholm in 1982 according to the
dominating type of housing will be studied. Areas where no single type of
housing dominates have been referred to as mixed. One group of areas
(dominated by tenants'-association-owned flats) were excluded from this
analysis due to the low number of wards dominated by that type of housing
(N= 3).
Regarding the median offender rate by type of dominating housing,
Relationship Between Housing and Offending 153
TABLE 7.10. Range, mean, and median offender rate by type of housing dominat-
ing area (Stockholm, 1982).
Serious
Dominating Chronic Youth Violent property
housing- Total offenders offenders offenders Vandalism offenders
Owner-occupied
House
Range 0.0-21.0 0.0-7.0 0.0-131.8 0.0-10.4 0.0-5.7 0.0-18.1
Mean 5.6 1.0 19.5 1.8 0.9 2.8
Median 5.5 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
N 29 29 29 29 29 29
Rented
Privately
Range 0.0-28.2 0.0-22.3 0.0-98.0 0.0-12.3 0.0-19.9 0.0-22.3
Mean 12.3 4.1 9.9 4.5 1.9 5.6
Median 10.4 2.4 0.0 3.9 0.0 2.9
N 45 46 47 47 46 46
Non-profit org.
Range 4.1-35.7 0.0-18.9 0.0-123.5 0.0-13.4 0.0-9.5 0.0-25.6
Mean 22.4 7.8 28.2 8.8 2.3 11.1
Median 24.5 7.4 20.6 9.1 1.8 11.7
N 24 24 24 24 24 24
Mixed
Range 2.1-32.6 0.0-20.5 0.0-111.8 2.1-11.4 0.0-5.7 0.0-23.0
Mean 16.0 6.1 21.9 5.7 1.3 9.0
Median 15.9 4.6 8.5 4.7 1.3 8.1
N 20 20 19 20 20 20
_51 % or more of the households in category of housing.

bNo single housing category totals 51 % or more.
Note. Highest median rates in bold type. Three wards dominated by tenants'-association-
owned fiats not included in table.
the findings show the same pattern as that in the individual-level analysis,
namely, that the areas dominated by rented housing have higher offender
rates than those dominated by owner-occupied housing, and that among
the areas dominated by rented housing, those where the majority of hous-
ing is nonprofit have the highest median offender rates (see Table 7.10).
This holds true for total offenders and all subseries of offender categories,
with the minor exceptions that the median offender rates for youth and
vandalism offenders are 0 both in areas dominated by owner-occupied
houses and those dominated by housing rented from private landlords.
Moreover, the findings show, just as for Sheffield, that the offender rates
vary significantly among areas dominated by the same type of housing. As
regards the finding in the Sheffield study-that no owner-occupied area
had a high offender rate-if we define a high offender rate area as one
belonging to the upper quartile of the area offender rates, then there are
1 total offender, 1 chronic offender, 8 youth offenders, 6 vandalism offen-

ders, and 3 serious property offenders, high offender-rate wards among the
29 wards dominated by owner-occupied houses. So there is a fairly big
number of youth and vandalism high offender rate wards in this type of
housing. As might be expected, the areas dominated by nonprofit housing
have the highest number of high offender rate wards per wards in the
group: Of the 24 wards in this group, there are 15 total offenders, 12 chro-
nic offenders, 10 youth offenders, 17 violent offenders, 9 vandalism offen-
ders and 11 serious property offenders high offender rate wards. Of further
interest is that of the high offender rate wards in the group dominated by
privately rented housing, all high offender rate areas for youth (8 wards)
and vandalism offenders (12 wards) are to be found among the inner-city
wards of that group. The reader should recall that almost all wards of the
inner city are dominated by privately rented housing (see Chap. 6).
Zero-Order Correlations
A zero-order correlational analysis, with dominating housing in an area
represented by a set of dichotomous variables, generally shows a negative
association with the offender rate for owner-occupied housing areas and a
positive association for nonprofit housing areas. The subseries for vandal-
ism and youth offenders are exceptions in that vandalism shows no signif-
icant correlation to either owner-occupied housing or nonprofit housing,
and youth shows no significant correlation to owner-occupied housing.
Mixed areas and areas dominated by fiats rented from private landlords
TABLE 7.11. Zero-order correlations between dominating type of housing in area

(dichotomies) and offender rates for total offenders and subcategories of offenders
(Stockholm, 1982).
Serious
Total Chronic Youth Violent Vandalism property
Dominating housing offenders offenders offenders offenders offenders offenders
Owner-occupied -44** -37** 04 -46** -14 -30**

houses ( -48**) (-36**) (-04) ( -51**) (-17) ( -30**)
Rented from -07 -04 -22* -07 07 -10
private landlord ( -05) ( -03) ( -19*) (07) (13) (-13)
Rented from 47*' 34** 19* 51** 13 33**
nonprofit organization (63**) (49**) (27**) (56**) (09) (53**)
Mixed tenure 13 15 07 09 -06 16
Significant at 5% level. ** Significant at 1% level.

Note. N varies between 121 and 123 depending on offender series in correlation. Coefficients
multiplied by 100. Coefficients within brackets are corresponding correlations, computed with
percentage of type of housing in question in area as unit of measure. For obvious reasons, no
such correlations could be computed for mixed areas.
Zero-Order Correlations 155
show no significant relationship to any of the offender rate series, with

exception of a weak negative correlation of the youth offender rate with
areas dominated by privately rented flats (Table 7.11).
Multiple Regression
The analysis presented above shows, generally, that owner-occupied
(negative) and nonprofit housing (positive) are those types most strongly
linked to area offender rate. To explore their joint capability to explain
variations in area offender rates, multiple regression analysis was carried
out, with the percentage of households living in flats rented from nonprofit
organizations and the percentage of households living in owner-occupied
houses as independent variables. 8 The result shows that type of housing
dominating area to a rather high degree (except for the subseries of youth
and vandalism offenders) explains the area variation in offender rates (see
Table 7.1~). However, this finding might just reflect the residential seg-
regation by type of housing for different social groups. I shall return to that
question after having explored, in the next section, the relationship be-
tween population composition and offender rates in the areas of Stock-
holm.
TABLE 7.12. Multiple R2, standardized partial regression coefficients, and probabil-
ity values; housing and offender rates (Stockholm, 1982).
Dependent variable
Serious
Independent Chronic Youth Violent Vandalism property
variables Total offenders offenders offenders offenders offenders
% owner-occupied houses
Standard regular
coefficient -.27 -.21 .07 -.34 -.17 -.12
Probability value 0.00 0.02 N.S. 0.00 N.S. N.S.
% nonprofit housing
Standard regular
coefficient .52 .40 .30 .43 .03 .48
Probability value 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 N.S. 0.00
Multiple RZ x 100 45.6 27.2 7.7 42.3 N.S. 30.0
Note. Number of observations varies between 121 and 123 depending on offender series in-
volved. N.S. = Nonsignificant at the 5% level.
8. Adding the percentage of privately rented fiats to the equation did not at all
improve the variance explained.
Population Composition and Offending

A vast amount of Anglo-American research shows that the area offender
rate generally tends to vary negatively with the socioeconornic status (SES)
of the area. (For an overview, see Braithwaithe, 1979, pp. 29-32 and 50.)
The same holds true for the few Swedish studies conducted (e.g., Janson,
1953; Carlsson, 1972). However, the interpretation of the relationship be-
tween SES and offending varies. For instance, Shaw and McKay (1969,
p. 186) argue that it is not the socioeconomic residential segregation in it-
self that causes the area youth offender rate variations, and in particular
not the existence of areas with extreme juvenile offender rates; instead,
they claim that "low rates of delinquency reflect the existence of a stable
institutional structure. A high incidence of delinquent behavior indicates
the breakdown of the machinery through which the needs of different seg-
ments of the population are met through conventional institutions" (p.
384).
In the following sections I shall first explore the relationship between
area population composition and offender rates in Stockholm in 1982, and,
second, address, without really being able to give any conclusive answer,
the question of whether area social disorganization has any importance for
the area offender rate variations in Stockholm.
Point of Departure for Analysis

The point of departure for the analysis of the relationship between area
population composition and the offender rate is the factor analysis of the
Stockholm urban structure presented in Chapter 6. This analysis showed
that, to a high degree, the area variation in residential population composi-
tion in Stockholm could be explained by three major dimensions: Famil-
ism, Socio-Economic Status [SES], and Public Welfare receiving (Social
Problem households). The question to be raised is how much of the area
offender rate variation these three major dimensions of residential segrega-
tion can explain.
Two alternatives were considered: to use the factor scores of the three
factors as independent variables, or to use the major loading variable of
each factor as independent variables. The latter alternative was chosen
because it facilitates the interpretation of findings, yet has the same advan-
tage as the factor scores as regards minimizing any possible problem of
multicolinearity.9a However, choosing the high-loading variable of each fac-
tor instead of the factor scores means losing some, but not much, explana-
tive power, especially for the SES variable that had a correlation of -0.74
with its factor, whereas the corresponding correlation for the major famil-
9a. The reader is reminded that the oblique solution (Promax) showed the factors to
be only weakly correlated (see Chap. 6).
Population Composition and Offending 157
ism variable was 0.96, and for the major Social Problem household vari-
able .92. 9 The three chosen independent variables are defined as follows:
1. Mean household size (familism).
2. Percentage of households receiving public welfare assistance (social
problems).
3. Percentage of blue-collar workers (SES).
The use of households receiving public welfare as a measure of the pre-
sence of residents with social problems may require some justification. It is
acknowledged that this is a crude measure. The two major categories re-
ceiving public welfare assistance are families with children having monet-
ary problems and socially marginalized persons (e.g., drug addicts and
alcoholics). The assumption made is that the proportion of families receiv-
ing public welfare in an area will reflect the proportion of households with
different kinds of social problems in that area.
The zero-order correlations among the three independent variables
shows that mean household size of area is virtually unrelated to the percent-
age of households that receive public welfare assistance (r = - .05) and to
the percentage of blue-collar workers (r = .01), while the percentage of
blue collar workers and the percentage of those receiving public welfare
assistance, as may be expected, shows a fairly high correlation (r = .54),
although not of the magnitude to cause any serious problems of multi-
colinearity. However, an inspection of the scattergrams of the interrela-
tionship of these variables (Figures 7.6, 7.7, and 7.8) show that it may be
too hasty to say that mean household size is unrelated to the percentage of
those receiving public welfare assistance (see Fig. 7.6).10 There is a group
of wards among those with the lowest level of residents with public welfare
assistance that have the highest scores for familism. The group consists
mainly of outer-city, high-SES, owner-occupied housing areas (see Chap.
6). If wards with less than 3% of the households receiving social welfare
are excluded, there is a strong correlation (r = .80, p = .000, N = 56) be-
tween mean household size and the percentage of those receiving public
welfare assistance. l l So it appears, that this relationship changes with the
area level of residents receiving public welfare assistance-a fact to be
taken into consideration in the analyses to come.
9. All regression analyses, presented below, were also made with factor scores as
independent variables, but the results were nearly identical, although the factor
scores generally explained a few per cent more variation in the multiple regression
analysis.
10. A ploynominal regression analysis of mean household size and per cent receiv-
ing public welfare assistance showed a clearly significant relationship (p = 0.001,
R2 * 100 = 22.9).
11. The relationship between the two variables when only wards with less than 3%
receiving public welfare assistance (N = 67) were included is negative, and nonsig-
nificant at the 5% level.
Mean house-
hold size.
3.75
3.5

-
3.25

3
2.75

--._-
2.5

._-..
2.
2.25

---
1.75
1.5
_ _ a
1.25
0
2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16
Per cent receiving public welfare
FIGURE 7.6. Scattergram of area mean household size and percentage receiving
public welfare assistance (Stockholm, 1982) (N = 123). Several observations (dots)
are hidden.
Mean house-
hold size.
3.75
3.5
3.25

3
2.75

-
2.5

.- -. - -
2.25

2
1.75

1.5
1.25

0 2.5 5 7.5 10 12.5 15 17.5 20 22.5 25 27.5
Per cent blue collar workers
FIGURE 7.7. Scattergram of area mean household size and percentage of blue-collar
workers (Stockholm, 1982) (N = 123). Several observations (dots) are hidden.
Familism, SES, Social Problem Households, and Offending 159
Per cent
receiving
public welfare
16
14

. ,.... ..,
12
10
.. . ..-... /:
8
." .
6

.... "'....,.---- ..
............
4
.~..
2 .:" -!.... , .
q~~~~~~~~~~-r~-T~~~-,~-,~~r-r-,
o 2.5 5 7.5 10 12.5 15 17.5 20 22.5 25 27.5
Per cent blue collar workers
FIGURE 7.8. Scattergram of percentage in area receiving public welfare assistance
and percentage of blue-collar workers (Stockholm 1982) (N = 123). Several
observations (dots) are hidden.
Two kinds of analysis of the relationship between area population com-

position and offending will be presented below: correlational and mUltiple
regression analysis, and cross-table analysis.
Familism, SES, Social Problem Households,

and Offending
The analysis presented in this section has been carried out both with the
original (OR) and the age-standardized offender rates (AS OR) as depen-
dent variables. Analyses (not shown but briefly commented upon below)
were also made separately for the outer- and inner-city wards, and separ-
ately when only including wards with 3% or more, respective less than 3%,
of the residents receiving public welfare assistance. The latter to see
whether that made any significant difference, in light of the above noted
nonlinear character of the relationship between familism and public wel-
fare receiving.
Zero-Order Correlations
The area total offender rate tends to be rather strongly positively corre-
lated to the proportion of blue-collar workers (SES) and the proportion of
TABLE 7.13. Zero-order correlations: familism, SES, and social problems with
offending variables (Stockholm, 1982).
Serious
offenders offenders offenders offenders offenders offenders
Original rate (OR)

Familism -22' -25** 01 -17 -09 -17
lowSES 55*' 41*' 26*' 50** -03 50**
Social probability 60** 36** 16 71 ** 15 39*'
Age-standardized
rate (AS OR)
Familism -36** -24** -27** -39*' -24*'
low SES 52** 39** 51*- 04 47**
Social probability 41** 24*' 61** 10 22**
Note. Coefficients multiplied by 100. No age-standardized offender rate for youths. N = 121-
123 depending on offender series involved.
Significant at 5% level. Significant at 1% level.
households receiving public welfare assistance in the area, whereas the

magnitude of the relationship is lesser, and negative, for mean household
size in the area (see Table 7.13). As for the subseries for different types of
offender categories, the pattern is by and large the same, with exception
for the subseries for youth and vandalism offender rates, which shows low
or no (and in all but one, nonsignificant) correlations with the independent
variables .12
Overall, the pattern of association between independent and dependent
variables is the same when using age-standardized offender rates instead of
the original ones. However, the magnitude of the offender rate correla-
tions with social problem households decreases significantly, but increases
significantly with familism (except for chronic offenders), whereas the cor-
relation to SES is only marginally affected. The decrease in the magnitude
of the correlations of the area offender rates with social problems can be
explained by the fact that there is a fairly high association between the age
structure of an area and the proportion of households receiving public wel-
fare assistance. Areas with a high proportion of residents in the ages with
the highest rates of offenders for the types of crimes included in this study
also tend to have a high proportion of households receiving public welfare
assistance. The zero-order correlation between the proportion of residents
aged 20 to 39 (of all residents aged 10 and older) and the proportion of
12. The reader is again reminded, that the youth and vandalism offender series are
those, of the included series, that may be the most affected by chance variation, and
the results for these two variables should be interpreted with special care.
TABLE 7.14. Multiple R2 and standardized partial regression coefficients; familism,

SES, social problem, and offender rates (Stockholm, 1982).
Serious
offenders offenders offenders offenders offenders offenders
Original rate (OR)

Familism -22** -24*' 01 -17" -11 -16*
low SES 29** 28** 25* 15' -17 40**
Social probability 45** 21* 02 63** 24* 18
Multiple R2 x 100 48.0 25.6 6.8 54.6 N.S. 30.0
Age-standardized
rate (AS OR)
Familism -34** -23** -27** -40** -22**
low SES 40*' 35*- 24** -05 47**
Social probability 19* 06 49** 14 -03
Multiple R2 x 100 41.1 21.1 49.0 17.2 27.0
Note. Coefficients multiplied by 100. No age-standardized offender rate for youths. N = 121-
123 depending on offender series involved.
* Significant at 5% level. ** Significant at 1% level.
households receiving public welfare assistance is .54 (p = 0.000, N = 123).

As regards Social Rank and Familism, both show a non-significant correla-
tion to the proportion of those aged 20 to 39 in an area.
Multiple Regression
The multiple regression of the joint influence of the three independent
variables on the offender rates shows that a fairly high proportion of the
area offender rates can be explained by area population composition varia-
tions. One difference between using the original and the age-standardized
offender variables is that in the latter, compared to the first case, the pro-
portion of variance explained by the model decreases by 4 to 7% depending
on the offender series concerned (see Table 7.14). The exception is the
subseries for vandalism offenders, where the model is nonsignificant when
using the original offender rate but reaches significance when using the
age-standardized offender rate. However, using age-standardized offender
rates not only means a decrease in the variance explained (where this de-
crease can be attributed to the control for the influence of area age struc-
ture) but also a significant change in the pattern of relative importance
of the independent variables (as determined by the standardized partial
regression coefficients). Although the social problems variable has the
strongest impact of the three on the total offender rate, using the original
rate, it has the lowest impact of the three and almost loses its significance,
when using the age-standardized rate. And as mentioned above, this de-
crease has to do with the fairly strong relationship between area age struc-
ture and social problems. Looking at the subseries for chronic and serious
property offenders, the area SES is the most important independent vari-
able regardless of whether the original or the age-standardized offender
rate is used as the dependent variable, but when using the age-standardized
offender rate, the social problems variable loses its significance. For the
subseries of violent offenders, just as for total offenders, the social prob-
lems variable is the most important predictor of the three, but unlike
for total offenders, it is still the most important when using the age-
standardized series. The findings thus suggest that area SES is more impor-
tant than area social problems for the area variations in the rates of chronic
and serious property offenders, whereas area social problems is more im-
portant than area SES for the rate of violent offenders. In all instances,
familism is negatively correlated to offender rates.
Separate Analyses for Inner and Outer City,

High Social Problem Wards, Low-to-Moderate
Social Problem Wards
The same analysis that was made for the total city was also made separately
for the inner city and the outer city. For the outer city, the results were by
and large the same as for the total city, with the difference that the multiple
regression models explained significantly more of the area variation in
offender rates (N = 96-97, depending on offender series involved). For in-
stance, for the series of total offenders, the Multiple R2 * 100 was 58.2 for
the original, and 50.8 for the age-standardized series. For the inner city,
the results were different, and most mUltiple regression models did not
reach statistical significance, but that may be interpreted partly as a result
of the low number of inner-city wards (N = 34-35, depending on offender
series involved), and partly on the generally less variability in population
composition between inner-city wards. With a few exceptions, most inner-
city areas are low in familism and low in social problems, but high in SES
(see Chap. 6).
As regards running the analyses only including wards with 3% or more
of the households receiving public welfare, respective to only including
wards with less then 3% of the households receiving public welfare assist-
ance, the findings (not shown) may be summarized as follows: In wards
with a low level of social problems (N = 66-67, depending on the offender
series involved), there is a strong negative correlation (except for the youth
and vandalism offender series, which both show a nonsignificant rela-
tionship) of familism with the offender series both for the original and the
age-standardized series, whereas in areas with moderate to high social
problems (N = 55-56 depending on the offender series involved) the rela-
tionship of familism to offender rates, in all instance but one, is nonsignif-
icant. The exception is the violent offender series, which shows a strong
positive relationship to familism in the group of moderate to high problem
wards. All in all, the findings show that familism has a strong negative
relation to offender rates in low social problem wards but no relationship to
offender rate (except for a positive relationship for violent offenders) in
moderate to high social problem wards.
Cross- Table Analysis

To further explore and add to the interpretation based on the regression
analysis, cross-tabulations were carried out of the relationships among
familism, SES, social problems, and offender rates, where the independent
variables were dichotomized to focus on the extremes of their distribu-
tions. The variables were dichotomized by rate of variable in the following
manner:
High familism (upper quartile)-medium/low familism (the rest).
Low SES (upper quartile)-mediumlhigh SES (the rest).
High social problems (upper quartile)-medium/low social problems
(the rest).
The results from the cross-tabulation study will be shown only for the total
offender series (for space reasons), although I shall comment upon the
findings for the subseries of offender categories in instances where the
analysis adds to the findings already presented from the regression study.
The cross-table analysis proceeded as follows.
First, the Chi-squares and Phi-coefficients for the different fourfold cross
tables were calculated (not shown). The results showed, as expected, the
same pattern as in the earlier correlational analysis presented above (see
again Table 7.13). Second, the range, mean, and median offender rates for
each cell of combinations of the three independent variables were calcu-
lated (see Table 7.15). The findings show, first, that there is a significant
variability in offender rate for some combinations of the three independent
variables. Second, focusing on the median offender rate, the findings shows
the following:
For all combinations of SES and familism, areas with high social prob-
lems have higher offender rates than those with moderate to low social
problems.
The highest offender rates are found in the low SES areas, especially in
those that are also high in social problems, although this pattern is less
clear when using the age-standardized rates.
In low social problem areas the offender rates are higher in low to moder-
ate than in high familism areas,
The lowest offender rates are found in high SES and low to moderate
social problem areas, especially in those of these areas that also are high
......
~
-....)
:r::
o
c
TABLE 7.15. Range, mean, and median total offender rates for groups of wards combined by familism, SES, and social problem level of '"
area; original and age-standardized rates (Stockholm, 1982). JJ"
Original total offender rates Age-standardized total offender rates
d'
'0
C
;;;l
SES High/medium Low High/medium Low ....
o
::s
Familism High Medium/low High Medium/low High Medium/low High Medium/low n
o
8
Social problems: '0
o
High g1.
....
Range 8.1-29.0 1.8-28.5 20.1-37.7 14.5-31.9 -20.1-5.5 -25.9-11.6 -6.2-9.8 -8.0-12.0 o
::s
Mean 15.9 1404 28.0 23.6 -9.1 -804 0.5 2.2 po
Median 13.2 12.2 26.5 24.2 -10.9 -7.9 -2.7 3.7 ::s
0..
N 4 9 5 13 4 9 5 13
Medium/low
o
~
Range 0.0-21.5 0.0-32.6 (lOA) 4.1-29.6 -26.3-0.5 -24.5-16.0 ( -12.9) -13.0-11.1 ::s
0..
Mean 4.9 11.4 (lOA) 1704 -1604 -7.9 ( -12.9) -1.1 i:i"
-1.6 aQ
Median 4.0 9.7 (lOA) 18.2 -16.5 -lOA ( -12.9)
N 21 56 1 12 21 56 1 12
Note. Highest and lowest median rate in bold type.

in familism, of which most are owner-occupied housing areas in the outer

city, whereas those low to moderate in familism are to a high degree
areas dominated by multistory housing rented from private landlord (the
greater part of the inner city belongs here).
A few comments may be made from the corresponding cross-tabulation
for the subseries of offender categories. Perhaps the most important
finding to report from the analysis of the subseries was that for both the
youth and vandalism offender series, the pattern was fairly similar to that
for the total offender series, with the highest median rates in high social
problem, low SES, and high familism areas (median 35.4 for youth and 2.5
for vandalism offenders), whereas areas with low social problems and high
to moderate SES, regardless of familism, showed the lowest median rates
(in all four cases 0.0).1 3 This is noteworthy, because it indicates that one
should perhaps be careful before one jumps to conclusions, based on the
correlation and regression analysis, and say that the youth and vandalism
offender rates are not strongly related to the major dimensions of residen-
tial segregation in Stockholm, especially in light of the fact that these series
may be highly affected by chance variation due to the comparatively small
number of offenders from which they are calculated.
As for the findings from the regression analysis that (a) area SES seems
to be more important than social problems for the area variation of the
sub series chronic and serious property offenders,14 and (b) social problems
seems to be more important than area SES for the variation in violent
offenders, the results from the cross-tabulations were fully in correspon
dence with the earlier finding.
Most studies of the relationship between area variation in offending and
population composition have been made with correlation or regression
techniques. However, there are a few previous studies that have looked
into this problem by means of cross-table analysis. Of particular interest in
comparison with the findings with from the present study are some studies
from the United States that focused on the relationship between SES,
familism, race, and offending. IS In line with the findings of this study, Polk
(1967) reports, from a study of Portland in 1960, that "delinquency in other
words, tends to be lowest where there is a conjoining of high economic
status and high familism, ... and highest where low economic status and
low familism occurs together" (p. 323). Chilton and Dussich (1974), study-
ing Indianapolis in 1950, report that "the pattern presented ... is general-
13. Offender rates shown refer to the original offender rates.

14. It should be pointed out in this context that most serious property offenders are
chronics, so there is a great overlap between the individuals in these two series.
15. Race is hardly a relevant aspect of crime in Sweden because Sweden has a
marginal black popUlation.
ly, though not entirely, consistent with the results reported by Polk"
(p.77).
Area Social Disorganization

Perhaps the most prominent area contextual effects hypothesis in the study
of the ecology of crime is that of the importance of area social disorganiza-
tion (see, e.g., Shaw & McKay, 1969; Kornhauser, 1978; Bursik, 1988).
Shaw and McKay's line of reasoning as regards area social disorganization
seems to take the following pattern:
1. There is a pressure from conventional institutions (i.e., family, school,
church, etc.) that one should not commit crime.
2. In residential areas with rapid changes in the population mix, the
existing institutions and norms may not match very well with those of
the newcomers, resulting in social instability (disorganization).
3. Even though conventional norms are the most prevalent in these areas,
the norm confusion that exists may lower the social control and facili-
tate the emergence of a tradition in crime (pp. 170-175). Although
Shaw and McKay express some uncertainty about how this tradition
arises in the first place, they believe that it develops "in somewhat the
same way as have all social traditions, that is, as a means of satisfying
certain felt needs within the limits of a particular social and economic
framework" (p. 320).
It is important to bear in mind that the kind of areas that Shaw and
McKay (1969) apparantly had in mind are the most deteriorated areas in
big U.S. cities, areas which have recently been described in the following
manner by Taub, Taylor, and Dunham (1984): "roving youth gangs; unem-
ployed people standing on street corners; vacant buildings, some scarred
by arson; uncollected litter blowing in the wind" (p. 1). This type of re-
sidential area may be found in major U.S. cities, and to some extent, in
major British cities, but not in Swedish major cities.
Kornhauser (1978, pp. 61-82), in her indepth treatment of the social
disorganization perspective in general and Shaw and McKay's (1969) ver-
sion in particular, expresses doubts as to whether the tradition of crime of
their theory really is a necessary element:
Their own case-history data, and other data, do not provide convincing evidence of
the existence of deliquent values, or of the existence of many adolescent gangs
formed for the primary purpose of committing deliquent acts. Deliquent values,
delinquent gangs, and an autonomous delinquency tradition are unnecessary to
explain delinquency in this model. (p. 70)
Nowadays, the social disorganization hypothesis mostly focuses on the

possible effects social disorganization has on offending through its lowering
of social control in area. Kornhauser (1978) has defined a socially disorga-

nized area as "a community that cannot supply a structure through which
common values can be realized and common problems solved" (p. 63).
Area social disorganization is seen as a result of a high population heter-
ogeneity, and a high population mobility in areas dominated by residents
with small social and economic resources (Kornhauser, 1978, p. 73). Also,
the importance of family disruption has been stressed, for instance by
Sampson (1986a, pp. 26-29), who points to the fact that areas with a high
degree of family disruption (i.e., split families) are less able to provide
effective social control.
The importance of social disorganization has mostly been discussed in
reference to youth offending, whereas its relevance as a cause of adult
offending is more theoretically unclear. (See the discussion at the begin-
ning of this chapter about area influences on youth and adult offending.)
Although social disorganization has been a major proposed explanation
to area offender rate variation, perhaps in particular to the exis-
tence of 'areas with extreme youth offender rates, few studies have been
able to really explore the relationship of social disorganization to offend-
ing. Most studies have explored the relationships among factors thought to
cause social disorganization and offending (for a recent discussion of this,
see Bursik, 1988, pp. 530-532), and the present study will be no exception.
The previous findings reported from the Stockholm 1982 Crime Survey
are in line with the social disorganization perspective in that the offender
rates are negatively correlated to area SES. Also, the finding that area
offender rate is negatively correlated to area familism could be taken as
some support for the social disorganization perspective, although the
findings of the relationship of familism to offending were somewhat com-
plex, as presented above. However, these findings may as well be ex-
plained from a perspective of residential segregation of social groups with a
different propensity to offend.
To try to put some light on the possible relevance of the area social
disorganization perspective for the area variations in offender rates in
Stockholm, I shall introduce three variables that measure aspects of the
urban structure that are thought to influence the degree of social disorga-
nization in an area:
1. The percentage of foreigners (population heterogeneity).
2. The percentage residents moving in or out of area (population
mobility).
3. The percentage of single parents with children below the age of 13 out
of all households with children (family disruption).
To use the percentage of foreigners as a measure of area population hetero-
geneity may require some justification. First, it is assumed that the per-
centage of foreigners in an area will reflect the number of foreign nation-
TABLE 7.16. Zero-order correlations between population heterogeneity, popula-

tion mobility, family disruption, familism, low SES, and social problems (Stock-
holm, 1982).
Family Low Social
Mobility disruption Familism SES problems
Heterogeneity 48** 26** 05 21 * 68**

Mobility 51** -45** 07 42**
Family disruption -71 ** 26** 50**
Familism 01 -05
LowSES 54**
Note. N = 113, when correlation involves residential mobility, else N = 123.

* Significant at 5% level.
alities in the area. Second, in Stockholm the maximum percentage of

foreigners in an area is just above 50%; therefore, the maximum value
of this variable is likely to express the maximum ethnic heterogeneity.
The limitation that only ethnic heterogeneity has been considered is
acknowledged.
The population mobility variable was measured as the sum of the num-
ber of residents who had moved in or moved out of an area during the year
divided by the number of residents in the area. This information was unfor-
tunately not available for all areas in the study (N = 116). Moreover, three
areas with available information were excluded because of special condi-
tions causing a high population turnover; two of these areas had a lot of
student fiats, which have a restriction on the number of years a resident can
occupy them, and the third was an area in Stockholm to which all diplo-
mats are assigned.
The zero-order intercorrelations of the three social disorganization vari-
ables and their correlations with the major population composition vari-
ables are shown in Table 7.16. The results reveal that the three social dis-
organization variables all are significantly correlated with each other and
that all three are highly correlated with the social problem variable. An
oblique (Promax) factor analysis, including the three population composi-
tion and the three social disorganization variables and presetting the num-
ber of extracted factors to three, resulted in one Familism, one SES, and
one Social Problem factor that together explained 88% of the variance (see
Table 7.17). All three social disorganization variables, but heterogeneity
and mobility most so, loaded high (i.e., 40 or above) on the social problem
factor, indicating that this factor, as well as being interpreted as a social
problem household factor, may qualify as being interpretated as a Social
Disorganization Factor.
As for the social disorganization variables' correlations to the offender
rates, the findings show for the total offender series significant correlations
TABLE 7.17. Oblique factor analysis (Promax) of major population composition

variables together with additional social disorganization variables (Stockholm,
1982).
Social problems Low
Variable Familism (disorganization) SES h2
Mean household size 93 -03 01 92

% blue-collar workers -13 29 94 90
% with public welfare -21 83 67 90
% foreigners -05 92 33 88
Mobility -64 72 -10 84
% single parents -87 42 34 86
Contribution % 48 25 15
Note. All coefficients multiplied by 100. Loadings 40 and higher in bold type. N = 113. Inter-
factor correlations: Familism and social probability (-0.25), familism and SES (-0.02), social
probability and SES (0.28).
TABLE 7.18. Zero-order correlations of population heterogeneity, population

mobility, and family disruption with area offender rates (Stockholm, 1982).
Family
Heterogeneity Mobility disruption
Original rate (OR)

Total offenders 31** 34** 51*'
Chronic offenders 09 13 38**
Youth offenders 10 00 05
Violent offenders 42** 45** 54**
Vandalism offenders 17 14 13
Serious property offenders 12 13 35**
Age-standardized rate (ASOR)
Total offenders 06 23* 52**
Chronic offenders -07 00 33**
Violent offenders 27** 38** 58*'
Vandalism offenders 04 17 38**
Serious property offenders -08 00 32**
Note. N = 113 when mobility is correlated to offender rates, else N = 121-123, depending on
offender series involved. Coefficients multiplied by 100.
*Significant at the 5% level. **Significant at the 1% level.
for all three measures when using the original rates, whereas when using
the age-standarized rates, the population heterogeneity measure loses its
significance. Of the subseries of offender categories, it is only the violent
offender series that is strongly correlated to all three social disorganization
measures (see Table 7.18).
It is not unproblematic to carry out a multiple regression analysis adding
the three new social disorganization variables to the three old population
composition variables because the three new variables are intercorrelated
and also all correlated to the social problem variable of the old set of vari-
ables. Gordon (1967) has, in his enlightening discussion of the problems of
multiple regression analysis, with particular reference to ecological studies,
pointed out that
As redundant independent variables are succesively introduced into a regression
problem, their common predictive value gets averaged, in a weighted manner, over
all of their regression coefficients. As a result, all of their regression coefficients
decline in absolute value. At the same time, the multiple correlation increases only
a trivial amount with each new variable, reflecting the fact that little new informa-
tion is being added. (p. 934)
And this is exactly what happens when the three social disorganization
variables are added to the earlier model: The Multiple R2 x 100 increases
by a few percent, but the contribution from each of the three disorganiza-
tionyariables is nonsignificant (as determined by their standardized partial
regression coefficient). The corresponding analyses as reported in Table
7.14 above were run adding the three social disorganization variables.
However, when these analyses were conducted induding only the three
social disorganization variables as independent variables, they all reached
significance for most offender series, showing, so to speak, that the social
problem variable picks up much of the disorganization influence on
offending.
This holds true for the total offender series and for all subseries of offen-
TABLE 7.19. Median rates of population heterogeneity, population mobility, and

family disruption by combinations of population composition variables (Stock-
holm, 1982).
SES High/medium Low
Familism High Medium/low High Medium/low
Social problems:
High
% foreigners 10.9 7.3 12.2 6.9
% mobility 2.2 2.1 2.6 2.2
% single parents 24.0 29.8 30.3 30.4
N 4 9 5 13
Mediumllow
% foreigners 3.5 5.4 9.0 5.1
% mobility 1.5 2.2 2.1 2.1
% single parents 7.0 27.4 9.4 24.0
N 21 56 12
Note. Highest and lowest value for each variable in bold type.
Residents moving in or out of residences.
Different Types of Housing 171
der categories, except for that of violent offenders, where residential

mobility and family disruption reached significance when using the original
offender rate, and family disruption reached significance when using the
age-standardized offender rate.
What can be concluded, though, is that areas with high total offender
rates generally tend to be areas with high values on the three social disorga-
nization variables. Moreover, considering the sub series for offender cate-
gories, this also applies to the violent offender series, but not to any of the
others. The fact that high offender rate wards tend to be high in value on
social disorganization variables is further illustrated in Table 7.19, in which
the median rates for the three social disorganization variables are shown
for the same combinations of Familism, SES, and Social Problems as the
offender rate earlier in this chapter (compare Table 7.15 above).
Population Composition and Offending Within

Different Types of Housing
In the previous sections, it has been shown that the offender rate is rather
closely linked both to the type of housing dominating an area and the
population composition of the area. The findings also indicated that area
social disorganization may be of relevance to the area offender rates,
although that is difficult to prove with the kind of analysis employed here.
As might be expected, there is a strong relationship between type of hous-
ing and the different aspects of population composition (see Table 7.20).
TABLE 7.20. Zero-order correlation between housing and population composition

(and disorganization) variables (Stockholm, 1982).a
Low Social Hetero- Family

Familism SES probability geneity Mobility disruption
Owner-occupied 71 ** -27** -48** -27** -50** -83**

house (79**) (-23**) ( -48**) ( -29**) ( -56**) ( -89**)
Rented -63** -35** -13 06 54** 43*'

private ( -69**) (-34**) ( -15) (06) (56") (46**)
Nonprofit 10 50** 69** 31** 03 38**

(-03) (61**) (71**) (28**) 05 (47**)
Mixed b -10 22* -01 -09 -09 02
Note. N = 123, except when mobility is involved (N = 113).

"Housing variables represented both as dichotomies and correlations (within parentheses) as
percent of housing in question in area.
bFor obvious reasons, only correlations with the housing variable represented as a dichotomy
calculated for mixed areas.
TABLE 7.21. Median ward rates of owner-occupied, rented private, and nonprofit
housing (number of areas dominated by type of housing in question in brackets) by
combinations of population composition variables (Stockholm, 1982).
SES High/medium Low
Familism High Mediumllow High Mediumllow
Social problems:
High
Owner-occupied house 18.6 0.1 1.4 2.6
Rented private 10.5 (1) 58.5 (5) 12.3 195 (1)
Nonprofit 38.4 (2) 28.9 (3) 65.0 (5) 66.6 (9)
N 4 10 5 13
Mediumllow
Owner-occupied house 79.2 (20) 0.1 (6) 54.4 (1) 3.6 (2)
Rented private 9.7 68.0 (37) 25.6 29.3 (3)
Nonprofit 0.0 9.2 (2) 4.5 41.7 (3)
N 21 56 1 12
This is further illustrated in Table 7.21, in which it is shown that the high
social problem-low SES areas are heavily dominated by nonprofit housing
areas, regardless of whether they are high or low in familism (14 out of the
24 nonprofit housing areas belong here). Also, the low social problem,
high to moderate SES, and high familism areas are almost exclusively
owner-occupied housing areas (20 of the 29 owner-occupied housing areas
belong here). The low social problem, high to moderate SES areas that are
low to moderate in familism are to a high degree areas dominated by
rented private housing (37 out of 47 rented private housing areas belong
here); moreover, most inner-city areas belong here (29 out of the 35 inner-
city areas).
In this section, I shall explore whether the relationship between area
population composition and offending in Stockholm in 1982 differs among
areas dominated by different types of housing.
Area Population Composition and Offending by

Type of Housing Dominating in Area
In the first major report from the Sheffield study (Baldwin & Bottoms,
1976), it was suggested, on the basis of the findings from a study of the
relationship between the urban structure and area offender rates, that "it is
indeed even possible that we shall have to develop different explanations
for criminal behaviour in different types of tenure area" (p. 120). The au-
thors found that area social class composition was important for the area
adult male offender rate variations within areas dominated by councilor
privately rented housing, but not in owner-occupied areas. 16 Moreover,
An Integrated Model 173
they found that social disorganization (measured as a composite variable of

unmarried, coloured immigrants, Irish immigrants, small flats, and shared
accommodations) was important for offender rate variations in private
housing areas but not for the council districts. Baldwin and Bottoms dis-
cuss several possible reasons as to why the relationships of the studied
variables are different for different types of housing areas. For instance, as
a possible reason why social class is not so important in owner-occupied
areas, they suggest that "becoming an owner-occupier has an important
effect on an individual's behaviour over and above his social class cultural
patterns" (p. 121). They attribute the reason why social disorganization is
not important in council areas to the fact that "council dwellings are built
with families in mind, so that the proportion of dwellings with few rooms or
only one or two inhabitants is likely to be small, while the practise of shar-
ing accommodations is specifically prohibited" (p. 122).
However, the evidence from the Stockholm 1982 Crime Survey suggests
that the .pattern of relationships between population composition and
offending is by and large the same, when considered separately for differ-
ent types of housing, as for all areas together (see Table 7.22, and Fig. 7.9,
7.10, and 7.11). The differences may well be explained by chance varia-
tions due to the rather low number of observations for some type of hous-
ing areas.
To this author's view, a better way to go about this than to try to develop
different explanations of offending for different types of housing areas is to
try to integrate the influence of housing and population composition into a
single model by considering how different types of housing influence area
population composition and how these two directly or indirectly (through
their effects on social life and social control, and by pure social group seg-
regational effects) influence the area offender rateY The patterns for these
influences will necessarily be different in different countries because hous-
ing and mechanisms of allocation to housing differ among countries. I shall
conclude this chapter by presenting a tentative model of that type.
Housing, Population Composition, and Offending:

An Integrated Model
I shall conclude this chapter by summarizing the findings and formulating a
simple, tentative integrated model of the relationships among housing,
population composition, and offender rates in the urban area. This model
will also be empirically tested by means of path analysis.
16. Balwin and Bottom's (1976) analyses focused on the adult male offender rate,
although other offender category series were considered.
17. That is not to say that detailed studies of any differential patterns of causes of
offending in different types of housing is uninteresting; on the contrary.
TABLE 7.22. Zero-order correlations between population composition variables

and offender rate series separately for areas grouped by dominating type of hous-
ing; original (OR) and age standardized rates (ASOR) (Stockholm, 1982).
Chronic Youth Violent Vandalism Serious property
Total offenders offenders offenders offenders offenders
Owner-occupied
house areas
Familism (OR) -22 -23 -27 -25 21 -20
ASOR -45 -32 -40 -14 -33
(low) SES (OR) 58 32 44 51 -07 42
ASOR 52 19 46 -10 39
Soc. Prob. (OR) 47 58 36 46 27 20
ASOR 38 44 41 28 14
N 29 29 29 29 29 29
Rented pivate areas
Familism (OR) -13 -11 10 00 -17 -06
ASOR -28 -13 -11 -33 -13
(low) SES (OR) 31 16 -14 20 -19 37
ASOR 32 17 24 -15 36
Soc. Prob. (OR) 30 06 07 49 -18 20
ASOR 02 -08 32 -29 00
N 45 46 47 47 46 46
Nonprofit areas
Familism (OR) 30 -11 -11 50 28 03
ASOR -13 -28 28 -08 -26
(low) SES (OR) 49 60 -10 19 02 52
ASOR 43 49 13 -13 43
Soc. Prob. (OR) 47 -03 -01 59 40 15
ASOR 02 -26 34 -01 -16
N 24 24 24 24 24 24
Mixed areas
Familism (OR) -35 -35 -18 -23 -13 -33
ASOR -44 -36 -34 -34 -40
(low) SES (OR) 33 26 26 25 22 27
ASOR 28 21 23 29 23
Soc. Prob. (OR) 30 17 23 47 02 19
ASOR 02 -01 23 -24 -02
N 20 20 19 20 20 20
Note. Coefficients multiplied by 100. Three areas dominated by tenants'-association-owned

fiats not included. Roughly, to be significant on the 5% level, the following minimal correla-
tions are required: owner-occupied areas (36), rented private areas (28), nonprofit areas (40),
and mixed areas (44).
ORIGINAL RATES (OR)

Owner-occupied houses Rented Private
22.5 30
20
17.5 25
15
12.5
20

I
. . ... . .
10
7.5
5
2.5 5
O~----~~--~--~~~~
2 2.2 2.4 2.6 2.8 3 3.2 3.4 3.6 O.~~~~--~~~~ __~
1.2 1.4 1.6 1.8 2 2.2 2.4 2.6
Non-Profit Mixed Areas
40 35
35
30
30
25 25
20 20
15 15
10 10
5 5
O~~--~~~~--~~--~
1.4 1.6 1.8 2 2.2 2.4 2.6 2.8 0
1.5 1.6 1.7 1.8 1.9 2 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4
AGE-STANDARDIZED RATES (ASOR)
...
5 10
Or---------~----------- 5
-5 Or--------------------
-5
-10
-10
-15
-15
-20
-20
-25 -25
-302~~2~2~~~~~----~--~ -30,~~~~--~------~--~
. 2.4 2.6 2.8 3 3.2 3.4 3.6 1.2 1.4 1.6 1.8 2 2.2 2.4 2.6
Non-profit Mixed areas

15 20
10
5
15
10
5
0 Or-~~~~~~~~~--
-5 -5
-10
-10
-15
-15 -20~~~--~~--~~~~~
1.4 1.6 1.8 2 2.2 2.4 2.6 2.8
1.5 1.6 1.7 1.8 1.9 2 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4
FIGURE 7.9. Scattergrams and regression lines of mean household size (horizontal)
and total offender rate (vertical) for groups of areas by dominating type of housing;
original and age-standardized offender rates (Stockholm, 1982).
ORIGINAL RATES (OR)

22.5
20
17.5 ..
30
25 .. ....
15
12.5
10
20 .'.
7.5
5
2.5
0 5
-2.50 04
2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 20 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 20 22
Non-Profit Mixed areas

40 35
35 30
30 25
25
20
20
15
.'
15
10 10
5 5
014 22 24 26 04
16 18 20 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 20 22

5
0
-5 0
10
5 .
...
O~--~~----------------
-10 -5
-15
-20
-25
-10
-15
-20
..
-25 .'
-30
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 20 -304 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 20 22
15 20
10 15
5
0
10
5
0
..
-5 -5
-10 -10
-15
-15
14 16 18 20 22 24 26 -204
6 8 10 12 14 16 18 20 22
FIGURE 7.10. Scattergrams and regression lines of percentage of blue-collar work-

ers (horizontal) and total offender rate (vertical) for groups of areas by type of
dominating housing; original and age-standardized rates (Stockholm, 1982).
ORIGINAL RATES (OR)

22.5 30
20
17.5
15
25
20
.. .p.
12.5
10 15
7.5 10
5
2.5 5
o0......~25::-+-'.":-5--='.7'="5-,...'":,'""'.2::!5~1-r:.5:-':1:C.7::5:-2"C":2:O_2::5'='2.5 OHh~--~~~~ __~~__~~
o 2 3 4 5 6 7 B

35
.
40
35 30
30 25
25 20
20 15
15
10
'0
5
2~--~4---6c--rB--~10~~1~2--1~4~~16
5
..
0~-'---2---3--~4~"5--~6---7~~B
..
5 10
O~------J------------- 5
-5 Or-----~----------------
-5
-10r---~~.~.~~~.~:~-------&------
-15 _
-20
-25 -25
-30 0 .25 .5 .75 1.251.51.75 2 2.252.5 -300~~--~2--~3---4---5--~6---7--~B
'5 20
10 15
5
": 10
5 eo
.
O~======~==========
-5 o _~t=======~~======
-10
-10 -15
-152~~4--~6--~B---1~0---1~2---14--~16 -20~~--~-c--c-------__~
o 234 5 6 7 B
FIGURE 7.11. Scattergrams and regression lines for percentage receiving public wel-
fare (horizontal) and total offender rate (vertical) for groups of areas by dominating
type of housing; original and age-standardized rates (Stockholm, 1982).
Summary of Findings
Focusing on the total offender rate in Stockholm in 1982, the major
findings of this chapter may be summarized as follows:
1. The total area offender rate shows significant variability and quite a high
degree of concentration to a smaller number of wards. The high total
offender rate wards are generally located in the outskirts of the city
(suburban areas), and most of them are postwar residential develop-
ments (see Chap. 6) dominated by nonprofit housing, although some
high offender rate wards were found in the southern part of the inner
city (the part with the highest percentage of nonprofit housing in the
inner city).
2. The area age-structure variations were found to be no major cause of
the area offender rate variation.
3. Both type of housing and composition of population explains, respec-
tively, quite a high proportion of the total area offender rate variations,
just below 50% in both cases (just below 40% for the population com-
position variables when using age-standardized offender rates).
4. The offender rate showed a clear association to three different measures
(i.e., population heterogeneity, population mobility, and family dis-
ruption) thought to measure aspects of area social disorganization
(although one of the variables-heterogeneity-lost its significance
when using age-standardized offender rates).
Considering the different subseries for offender categories, the series for
youth and vandalism offenders was not very well explained by either hous-
ing or population composition variables, but that is likely to be due to the
fact that these two variables are highly affected by chance variation.
Moreover, as regards the youth offender series, most crimes included in
the present study are of a more serious nature, and many less aggravated
typical youth crimes have not been studied. It is worth noting, though, that
the findings from the cross-table analysis carried out for the Stockholm
1982 area data, and especially the analysis of the individual-level data for
the childhood and youth period from a 1953 Greater Stockholm cohort
(Project Metropolitan), both showed a pattern of offending by housing
equivalent to that for offenders in general.
As for the other sub series of offender categories, the series of chronic
and serious property offenders were highly correlated, and the offenders in
these two categories overlap to a high degree. Therefore, a comparison of
the remaining series can be restricted to the series of serious property and
violent offenders, in which the following significant differences were found:
1. Of the three different dimensions of population composition studied
(i.e., familism, SES, and social problem households), low SES was the
most important predicator for area variations in serious property offen-
ders, whereas social problem households was the most important pre-
dictor for area variations in violent offenders (that was so regardless of

whether the original or age-standardized offender rate was used).
2. While the area violent offender rate was rather strongly correlated to all
the three measures of area social disorganization (i.e., population
heterogeneity, population mobility, and family disruption), only one of
them (family disruption) showed a significant relationship to the area
serious property offender rate (that was so regardless of whether the
original or age-standardized offender rate was used).
The question of whether the clear association of the area offender rate to
the population composition and housing in the area mainly reflects contex-
tual or pure social group segregational effects cannot be solved with a re-
search design such as the one employed in the present study. On basis of
the data presented here, it is merely a question of interpretation. 18 The fact
that the total offender rate, and in particular, the rate of violent offenders,
showed a clear association with variables traditionally thought to cause
area social disorganization cannot be taken as any proof for the importance
of social disorganization. But on the other hand, the findings are not con-
tradictory to the fact that area social disorganization may influence the area
offender rate, in particular the area violent offender rate.
An Integrated Model
In this final section of this chapter, I shall attempt to formulate a simple,
tentative model of the causal ordering of housing, population composition,
and area offender rates and, somewhat, to discuss the links among these
three.
Housing and Population Composition

The point of departure for the model (see Fig. 7.12) is that area variations
in type of housing strongly influence area population composition. The two
major aspects of housing in this respect are type of residences (Le., single
family houses, or multistory houses) and type of tenure (e.g., owner-
occupied or rented). These two aspects of housing are far from uncorre-
lated, although their relationship varies among countries. For instance, in
Sweden almost all single-family houses are owner-occupied (see Chap. 6).
18. It is, of course, always a question of interpretation, but some research designs
are more apt to answer some questions than others. For instance, Kornhauser
(1978), in discussing this problem with reference to the Shaw & McKay research in
Chicago, points to the value of longitudinal studies when trying to separate indi-
vidual and area contextual effects: "The passage of time itself supplies control on
individual attributes, for during this period community populations have changed
or been replaced, especially in slums. Chicago's slum areas still rank fist in rate or
delinquency, no matter what ethnic or racial origin of their occupants" (pp. 115-
116).
HOUSING POPULATION
COMPOSITION 1--. ...
_~
FIGURE 7.12. Housing, population composition, and offender rate: a simple area-
level model.
Households of different types will have residences of different types; that

is, single people are not very likely to live in houses, whereas families with
small children may prefer to live in houses if they can afford it. The eco-
nomic capabilities of households will also affect their possibility to choose
among residences. Those with few economic resources (especially socially
marginalized people) are often limited in their choice to the rented market,
in particular to the allocations made by the council housing department. In
Stockholm in 1982, around two thirds of the dwellings distributed by the
council housing department belonged to the nonprofit housing sector
(Stockholms bostadsf6rmedlings tjansteutliitande or 8/1983). It has been
shown in the analyses in this chapter, and in Chapter 6 that familism, SES,
and social problem households are three major dimensions of the residen-
tial segregation in Stockholm.
Population Composition and Offending

As stated in the introduction to this chapter, there are two major reasons
why area population composition should influence area offender rate: (a)
More crime-prone social groups are segregated to certain types of areas,
and (b) social life and control in an area (area contextual effects) may
influence the offending of the residents through situational inducements to
offend or through long-term influences on the development of personality
and modes of living (the latter only for youths). Area social disorganization
is the prime area contextual effects hypothesis in the literature. Its effect on
offending is mostly viewed as the lowering of area social control. Other
contextual effects hypothesis are about possible multiplicative or spreading
effects from concentrations of offenders; that is, when the rate of offenders
reaches a certain level this may in itself affect the motivation to offend
among the offenders (mUltiplicative effect) or spread to nonoffenders who
would not otherwise dragged into offending. Some hypotheses about sub-
culture and gang influences belong here.
Housing and Offending

Although the present author holds the view that the major effect of hous-
ing on offending is likely to be indirect, there are numerous suggestions
about how the design of residential buildings and areas may influence
offending and sometimes even residents' motivation to offend. Generally,
it seems that the hypothesis is that the design of the residential areas and
influences offending in an area through the possibility to exert social con-
trol in the area. The design of the residential area and its buildings is be-
lieved to influence social control possibilities, for instance, by its capability
to make clear what are private and nonprivate areas and to make it possi-
ble for the residents (and others) to surveil what is happening in the area.
A Path Analysis
The simple model of influence suggested above was tested for the Stock-
holm 1982 Crime Survey data, with three variables measuring the percent-
age of each type of housing in an area and the three major population
composition variables (for definitions, see section on population composi-
tion and .offending above) measuring area population composition (where
it is a matter of interpretation, as discussed above, whether one is willing to
interpret the social problem household variables as a measure of social
disorganization or not).
As regards the internal causal ordering between the three population
composition variables, a choice had to be made. One alternative was to
view all three as causally unrelated dimensions of population composition,
but because we know from the previous analysis that area SES and social
problem households are rather strongly related, and that familism is re-
lated to area social problem households in areas with moderate to high
levels of social problem households, it was decided to view the area level of
familism and SES as causally prior to that of social problem households,
especially in light of the possible interpretation of the latter as an area
contextual effect (i.e., as measuring area social disorganization). It was
judged that if there is any causal direction among these variables at the
area level, it goes from familism and SES to Social problems (disorganiza-
tion), not in the other direction. No causal relationship was assumed to
exist at the area level between familism and SES.
The model was tested for the series of total offenders and the subseries
of serious property offenders and violent offenders. The models were run
separately with original and age-standardized offender rates. The full
model is shown in Figure 7.13 for total offenders when using the original
offender rate. For all other models, only the influence of the three popula-
tion composition variables on the offending variable is shown because all
other parameters will be the same as the ones shown in Figure 7.13. Of the
parameters (standardized maximum likelihood estimates) in the model, all
are significant, with the exception of the influence from nonprofit housing
on familism and on SES.
The findings show that the housing of the area explains almost two thirds
of the area variation in familism, whereas its explanatory power on area
25 52
-39
R2 = 0.94
Chi Square = 19.4 (df=4)
I Non-
prof i t
GFI = 0.96
RMSR = 0.025
i
57
FIGURE 7.13. A path model of housing, population composition, and total offender
rates (Stockholm, 1982).
SES is quite high, but much lower (just above 40%). Considering the pat-
tern of influence from the different types of housing it may be summarized
that high familism goes strongly together with areas dominated by owner-
occupied houses, whereas the relationship to familism for areas dominated
by dwellings rented privately tends to be weakly negative, and for non-
profit areas nonsignificant (including both areas of low and high familism).
As for area SES, the findings show that it tends to be high in owner-
occupied housing areas and in areas with rented private dwellings. In this
connection it should be recalled that most areas dominated by private rent-
ing of dwellings belong to the inner city of Stockholm-almost all areas of
the inner city are dominated by private renting, and many of these areas
also have comparatively high proportions of tenants'-association-owned
flats, although very few areas in Stockholm are dominated by tenants'-
association-owned flats (see Chap. 6).
The area level of social problem households (disorganization) is to a very
high degree (two thirds) explained by the direct and indirect effects of type
of housing in the area and the direct effects of area familism and SES. The
strongest influences come from familism (positive), owner-occupied houses
(negative), and nonprofit housing (positive). A simple way to summarize
this is to say that areas high in social problem households (disorganization)
TABLE 7.23. Path coefficients (standardized); R2, Chi square, goodness of fit index
(GFI), and root mean square residuals (RMSR) for model; only coefficients shown
for the influence of familism, low SES, and social problems (disorganization) on
original, respective, age-standardized offender rate (Stockholm, 1982).a
Proportion of
offender rate
Path variation
coefficients explained R2 Chi square OFI RMSR
Total offender rate
Familism (OR) -21
(low) SES (OR) 30
Soc. Prob. (OR) 45 48 0.94 19.4 (df=4) 0.96 0.025
Familism (ASOR) -34
(low) SES (ASOR) 40
Soc. Prob. (ASOR) 19 41 0.94 27.9 (df=4) 0.95 0.042
Violent offender rate
Familism' (OR) -17
(low) SES (OR) 15
Soc. Prob. (OR) 63 55 0.94 4.9 (df=4) 0.99 0.013
Familism (AS OR) -26
(low) SES (ASOR) 23
Soc. Prob. (ASOR) 49 49 0.94 8.3 (df=4) 0.98 0.019
Serious property
offender rate
Familism (OR) -15
(low) SES (OR) 40
Soc. Prob. (OR) 17 29 0.94 12.8 (df=4) 0.97 0.033
Familism (ASOR) -21

(low) SES (ASOR) 48
Soc. Prob. (ASOR) 04* 26 0.94 20.3 (df= 4) 0.96 0.047
a All other path coefficients the same as the ones shown in Figure 7.12.
* Nonsignificant (T-value = -0.42).
Note. All path coefficients multiplied by 100.
are areas dominated by nonprofit housing that also are high in familism,
whereas areas low in social problem households (disorganization) are areas
dominated by owner-occupied houses. This is fully in accordance with the
findings presented earlier from the separate analyses of the relationship of
housing and offending, and population composition and offending.
Finally, turning to the influence of housing and population composition
on area offender rate (see Table 7.23), the findings may be summarized in
the following way: In general, all models showed a good fit to data-most
for the model of violent offender rate variations and least for the model of
serious property offender rates. For all models, the major possible im-
provement of the fit of the modeP9 was to free the influence of nonprofit
housing on the offender rate. In contrast to the other two housing vari-
ables, the influence of nonprofit housing on the area offender rate was
highly significant if freed.
The direct influence of the three population composition variables was,
as expected, the same as in the separate analyses of their relationship to the
offender rate. The same difference as the noted earlier between the sub-
series for violent and serious property offenders appeared also in the path
analysis, namely, that area SES was most important for the area serious
property offender rate, whereas the area social problem household (dis-
organization) level was most important for the area violent offender rate.
However, the path analysis also shows that familism has an indirect in-
fluence on the offender rate, especially so for violent offenders, that goes
over the area social problem households (disorganization). Perhaps one of
the major advantages of carrying out the path analysis is to causally order
th~ influence of housing and population composition on offender rates. It
has been shown that most of the influence of housing on offender rates can
be fit to a model where this influence mainly goes over the effects on
population composition by housing in the area. This draws the attention to
the importance of studying how different social groups are allocated to
different types of housing and the effects of such allocation on the area
offender rate variations-be it predominantly individual, contextual, or
both.
19. As judged by the modification indices available in the LISREL computer pro-
gram that was used for running the path models presented here.
8
Routine Activities, Area Crime, and
Victimization Patterns
The land use in the city varies significantly among its pans. Some areas are
predominantly residential, others predominantly nonresidential (i.e.,
industry, .offices , commerce, entertainments, etc.), and yet others mixed.
The patterns of city land use appear to have some universal similarities as
well as unique characteristics depending on country and city in question. I
shall not go into the reasons for the specific development of the urban
geography and its local variations (see, for instance, Harris & Ullman,
1974; Johnston, 1984). It is sufficient for the purpose of the present study to
conclude that land use varies significantly among parts of a city. The major
patterns of land use in Stockholm have been described in Chapter 6.
The differential land use among areas of a city means that the occurrence
of different kinds of human activities (home life, work, leisure, entertain-
ment, etc.) varies among different parts of the city.! The activity dif-
ferentiation in the city also generates patterns of movement in the city,
which are influenced by street networks and the organization of public
transport (work trips, trips to leisure areas, etc.). Because the occurrence
of different kinds of human activities varies throughout the week and day,
the spatial pattern of human activities and the related movements in urban
space will also vary throughout the week and the day. So, depending on the
land use of an area there will be a specific pattern of activities and move-
ments occurring in that area at different times.
The differential land use in the city is probably the key to the under-
standing of the city's crime patterns. It has been claimed that "since illegal
activities must feed upon other activities, the spatial and temporal struc-
ture of routine legal activities should play an important role in determining
the location, type, and quantity of illegal acts occurring in a given society
1. The concepts of human activities and routine activities will be used interchange-
ably in this chapter. Routine activities have been defined as "any recurrent and
prevalent activities which provide for basic population and individual needs"
(Cohen & Felson, 1979, p. 593).
185
186 8. Routine Activities, Area Crime, and Victimization Patterns
or community." (Cohen & Felson, 1979, p. 590). One is therefore to ex-

pect that the rate and structure of crime in different parts of the urban area
will show a general relationship to variations in land use. However, any
simple one-to-one relationship between land use and the rate and structure
of crime is not to be expected.
The routine activity approach (discussed in Chaps. 2 and 5), initially
developed to explain changes over time in crime rates, is also a fruitful
point of departure for analyzing area crime patterns in the city because it
builds upon an ecological model for explaining crime occurrences (Cohen
& Felson, 1979). The basic assumption is that "the probability that a viola-
tion will occur at any specific time and place might be taken as a function of
the convergence of likely offenders and suitable targets in the absence of
capable guardians" (p. 590). The scope of the routine activity approach is
limited to direct-contact predatory crimes, defined as crimes in which
someone takes or damages the person or property of another (p. 589).2
The crimes included in the present study-violence, vandalism, and se-
rious thefts-fit in well under the definition of direct-contact predatory
crimes.
As shown in Chapter 7, the offenders are not uniformily distributed in
different residential areas of a city. The offenders tend to be rather strongly
concentrated in certain types of residential areas. One factor that may
influence the area pattern of crime in the city is therefore the offender
residential distribution. The relationship between the offender residential
distribution and the crime occurrence patterns in the city is directly depen-
dent upon the degree to which offenders commit crime locally (in the home
or the neighborhood). Although previous British (e.g., Baldwin & Bot-
toms, 1976) and North American research (e.g., McIver, 1981; Turner,
1969a) has shown that many types of crimes to a high degree tend to be
committed locally, far from all crimes are locally committed. Moreover,
quite a few of the crimes taking place in the urban area are committed by
people who live outside the city and are just visiting (see further below).
Offenders, as well as other people, are of course not likely to spend time
only in their own neighborhood. Which other parts of a city offenders are
likely to visit and spend time in more frequently is probably highly related
to what kinds of routine activities take place in those parts. Brantingham
and Brantingham (1981) claim that:
Given a uniform distribution of targets, and a nonuniform information base, crim-
inals will probably commit most of their offenses close to home, work, shopping,
their usual entertainment areas, or along paths between home, shopping, work and
entertainment areas; in general, offenses should occur within the criminal's aware-
ness space. (p. 35)
2. It has, however, been argued in later works by Felson (1987, p. 912) that the
routine activity approach can be extended to also include other types of crimes.
Routine Activities, Area Crime, and Victimization Patterns 187
It is often assumed, and some research also suggests, that offenders gener-
ally like to operate in areas familiar to them (e.g., Carter & Hill, 1979).
This also means that targets in areas which offenders are likely to visit and
spend time in, generally speaking, should be more at risk than targets in
other areas.
Depending on what types of crimes are studied, the number of possible
targets is likely to vary among areas of a city. Area differences in the num-
ber of targets may therefore be one influence on the area crime pattern,
although one may argue that there are enough targets for theft, vandalism,
and violence all over the place. Few areas of a city lack things to steal and
vandalize or people to attack. 3 However, if crime were truly randomly
distributed in the city, one would expect that areas with more targets at risk
would have more crime, and hence, one needs to control for targets at risk
in an area before considering more substantive explanations to area crime
variations. 4 This is equivalent to controlling for "population at risk" when
calculating area offender rates (see Chap. 7). I shall return to this problem
below.
However, it is of course possible to find examples of nontrivial hypoth-
eses of the relationship between targets at risk and crime occurrences, for
instance, a "temptation hypothesis" (i.e., other things being equal, more
targets increase the temptations) or a hypothesis that an increasing number
of targets have some necessary (negative) relationship to their level of pro-
tection, other things being equal. A "target at risk" is defined here as any
object (person) that by the definition of the crime in question can be the
target of the crime.
Targets may for various reasons be more or less attractive to a potential
offender, and more attractive targets may be concentrated to some rather
than other areas, which may influence the area crime patterns. Cohen and
Felson (1979) claim that what makes a target suitable is related to its value,
physical visibility, accessibility, and inertia (p. 591). In discussing the con-
cept of attractive (or suitable) targets, it may be helpful to differentiate
between the crimes along two dimension; instrumental versus expressive,4
and interactional versus noninteractional (see Table 8.1). The distinction
between the offender and the target (victim) is generally clear in in-
strumental crimes (e.g., theft, robbery, and rape) regardless of whether
they are interactional or noninteractional. In interactional crimes that are
expressive (e.g., assault) the victim-offender distinction may in quite a few
cases be rather unclear; for instance, many assaults may have the character
of a reciprocal fight rather than a one-way attack (Wikstrom, 1980). In
3. However, in the case of analysis of certain very specific crime types (such as
bank robberies) the target distribution is often likely to be very important simply
because many areas may totally lack targets for the crime in question.
4. As discussed in Chapter 4, this distinction is not always as clear-cut as it may
seem, but as a crude division between categories of crime it may do.
TABLE 8.1. Included acts of crime classified by the dimensions of instrumental ver-
sus expressive and interactional versus noninteractional acts.
Instrumental
YES NO
Interactional
YES Robbery Assault
Rape
NO Burglary Vandalism
Theft of and from cars
crimes that are neither instrumental nor interactional (e.g., vandalism) the
offender-target distinction is generally clear, but in many cases it is difficult
to determine what may constitute a suitable target. Discussion about suit-
able targets in reference to vandalism mostly concerns more or less easy
materials to vandalize.
Building upon the findings from the analysis of the social contexts of
crime in Chapter 4, it will be suggested that although the concept of suitable
targets is generally straightforward for most instrumental crimes, and
generally more so for noninteractional than interactional instrumental
crimes, it is much more problematic when considering expressive crimes.
In the latter cases, there seldom appears to be any more elaborated choice
of target; it is a question of how situations are created that mayor may not
evolve into violence and vandalism rather than a question of a potential
offender taking advantage of a good environmental opportunity. Although
a characteristic of most instrumental crimes is that there is at least a minim-
al search behavior on the part of the offender, this normally appears not to
be the case for expressive crimes.
A special aspect of target vulnerability is the guardianship or lack of
guardianship by so-called capable guardians. A capable guardian may be
any individual who is present and who may be viewed by a potential offen-
der as capable and willing to intervene if a crime were to be committed,
where intervention refers not only to actual physical intervention intended
to stop a crime but also (for civilians) to such things as calling for the police
or being willing to be a witness. Although the police may be the most
obvious capable guardians, it is fairly well-established that police officers
are predominantly reactive rather than proactive (see, e.g., Reiss, 1971;
Knutsson, 1984). Felson (1986) claims that "a capable guardian is seldom a
policeman, more likely a housewife, brother, friend, or passerby" (p. 121).
The guardianship may be stronger in some areas than in others and
stronger at some times of the week and day than at others. Therefore, area
variations in crime may be influenced by area variations in guardianship. It
is predominantly when thinking about instrumental crimes that the concept
of guardianship has its most relevance. For instance, in many assaultive
Routine Activities, Area Crime, and Victimization Patterns 189
crimes, it does not appear that the participants are normally very inhibited,
for instance, by the presence of others (i.e., capable guardians) as they
may be in cases of theft, robbery, and rape (see Chapter 4). The same
appears largely to hold true for the kind of vandalism included in this
study, which is predominantly expressive in nature.
The analysis in Chapter 4 showed that it is important to differentiate
between crimes of violence and vandalism occurring in private and those
occurring in public. The distinction between private and public corre-
sponds to an important distinction among types of routine activities, that is,
those that take place in the home (residential) and those that take place
outside the home (nonresidential). In this chapter, the area distribution of
violence and vandalism in private and in public will be studied separately.
Because crimes in private are almost always committed in residences, it is
the variations among residential areas that are in focus. It will be suggested
here that it is the area residential differentiation of the population that is
crucial for the understanding of area variations of violence and vandalism
in private. Crimes of violence and vandalism in private that are reported to
the police tend to be at the more serious end and generally involve socially
marginalized persons, their spouses, and their mates. It will be hypothe-
sized, and tested in this chapter, that the area crime patterns for violence
and vandalism in private can predominantly be explained by the same
model as that used to explain the area variations in the offender rate (see
Chap. 7).
As for instrumental crimes (excluding rapes and robberies occurring in
private), the city area crime pattern may be hypothesized to be influenced
by area variations in good environmental opportunities (i.e., the amount of
suitable targets with low guardianship) and by the presence of potential
offenders who may take these good opportunities. 5 As for the expressive
crimes occurring in public, it will be suggested here that rather than good
environmental opportunities, it is the amount of friction in meetings be-
tween people that mayor may not generate situations leading to violence
and vandalism that is crucial for the understanding of city area crime pat-
terns for violence and vandalism in public. Although friction in metetings
may seem the most obvious link to violence in public, it will be suggested
on the basis of the findings in Chapter 4 that much of the vandalism that
takes place in public (especially the more serious cases6 ) occurs in the same
kind of circumstances as assaults in public; that is, they are to a large extent
5. It is acknowledged here that propensity to offend is a variable and not a constant,

but for reasons of simplicity, the discussion is made in terms of potential offenders and
others.
6. The reader is reminded that the kind of vandalism included in a study like this of
police reported vandalism is predominantly likely to be the more serious cases of
vandalism and that this vandalism often looks to be an reaction on frustrating situa-
tions normally involving other people (see Chap. 4).
a direct or indirect expression of aggression resulting from friction in meet-

ings or situations, and sometimes the vandalism is also combined with
violence.
All in all, the variation in the land use in the city means that different
kinds of human activities occur with a different frequency at different times
of the week and day in different areas of the city. Different kinds of activi-
ties have a different attraction for different kinds of people (e.g., potential
offenders), so the mix of people in different areas and at different times of
the week and day will vary. The kind of routine activities taking place and,
related to that, the kind of people staying in the area are likely to influence
the enviromnental opportunities for instrumental types of crime, and the
generation of situations that may lead into violence and vandalism, and
hence be an important part of the explanation for the city area variations in
the rate and structure of crime.
It is against this background that the area patterns of crime in Stockholm
will be studied, although it is not possible within the scope of this study to
fully deal with the complex dynamics of the relationships between routine
activities and crime. Eight different crime series will be studied:
1. Family violence.
2. Nonfamily violence and vandalism occurring in residences or their
proximity (i.e., cellar, staircase, lot).
3. Violence in public.
4. Vandalism in public.
S. Thefts of and from cars.
6. Residential burglaries.
7. Cellar and attic burglaries.
8. Nonresidential burglaries.
It should be noted that all cases of violence and vandalism taking place in
residences (and not only those in which the parties were acquainted) are
included in the ecological analysis. The reason for this is that the contex-
tual analysis in Chapter 4 showed that cases between both acquaintances
and non acquaintances in residences generally took place in the same kind
of social context.
The motivation for jointly studying all crimes of violence occurring in
public was the finding presented in Chapter 4 that most of these crimes
tended to occur, at least in a crude sense, in the same social context (i.e.,
in the course of public entertainment and on trips to and from such ac-
tivities). Even though the situations of these crimes are often significantly
different, they follow the same pattern of area variation. The zero-order
correlations among the area distribution of the different legal categories
of violence in public were extremely strong, with some exceptions for the
lower association of the rape series with the others (see Table 8.2). An
inspection of maps of area variations for these crimes (not shown) also
The Crime Area Distribution 191
TABLE 8.2. Zero-order correlations between assaults, violence toward public

officials, robberies, molestations, and rapes in public; all rates calculated per
hectare (Stockholm, 1982) (N = 123).
Violence to
public official Robbery Molestation Rape
Assault 81 90 83 54
Violence to public official 92 70 58
Robbery 81 62
Molestation 68
Note. All correlations significant at the 0.001 level or better. Coefficients multiplied by 100.
revealed an almost remarkable similarity in pattern, again, with a slight

exception for rape. This is not to say that there are no interesting spatial
differences in the distribution of assaults, robberies, and rapes, but just to
say that the most interesting differences appear to show on a lower level
(i.e., within the area distribution of places of crime commission, whIch
from the inspection of point maps appears to show some interesting differ-
ences in patterning).
Although the area crime patterns will be the main focus of this chapter, I
shall also deal with the victim residential patterns. In that analysis, crimes
that did not involve personal victimization (i.e., nonresidential burglaries
and vandalism in public) will be excluded because there are generally no
specific persons victimized, and hence it is not possible to study victim
residence patterns. The reason for especially taking up the victim residen-
tial patterns is two-fold. First, the study of victim residence patterns is a
rather neglected area in the study of city crime patterns. Second, place of
residence is often considered in victimological theory to be an important
risk factor (see Chapter 5).
The Crime Area Distribution

For a long time the study of crime within the city was dominated by studies
of offender residential patterns, while less, if any, attention was given to
the area variations in crime occurrences. More recently there has been an
increasing interest for the study of the area crime patterns. These studies
show that there are significant area variations in crime rates and that the
patterns may be different for different types of crimes. Moreover, the area
crime pattern may also in some cities show a pattern quite different from
that of the offender residential distribution (see, e.g., Schmid, 1960a,
1960b; Werner, 1964; Boggs, 1965; Pyle, 1974; Baldwin & Bottoms, 1976)
Area Crime Rates and Differential Reporting

and Recording
Before turning to the description of the area patterns of police-reported
crime in Stockholm, it is necessary to briefly bring up the question of
whether the patterns to be revealed give a biased pieture of the area crime
rate variations. In discussing the findings from his study of area crime
patterns in Seattle, Washington (USA), Schmid (1960b) lists a number of
possible problems with regard to using police-recorded data as a measure
of area variations in crime:
(1) For one reason or another, crimes frequently are not reported at all; (2) there
may be differential reporting of crime from one area to another, which may distort
in varying degrees and directions the derived crime rates for different parts of a
city; (3) there may be differential reporting of crime according to the type or nature
of the crime; (4) sometimes the police, in order to make a good showing or to
protect the name of a community, may suppress or alter official crime records; (5)
the policy of the police in making arrests, as well as the assignment of greater
proportions of officers to certain areas, may bias recorded statistics" (p. 675).
The assumption that will be made in this study, however, is that it is not
likely that area crime rates based on police-recorded criminality will gener-
ally give a biased picture of the pattern of area crime rate variations.
Moreover, it will be further assumed that any bias that will follow from
comparisons of area rates of police-recorded crimes is because area differ-
ences in crime are under- rather than overestimated. This is so, it is argued
here, because it is more likely that people in high crime areas have a higher
threshold for reporting than people in low crime areas (especially as re-
gards less serious crimes), and that the police (if there is any significant
discretion) are less likely in high crime areas than in low crime areas to
record less serious offenses. At least, it appears less likely that any bias
would take the form that more of the crimes actually committed would be
reported in high rather than in low crime areas and that the police would be
more inclined to record crimes in high rather than in low crime areas.
However, the support for these assumptions cannot be claimed to be
dramatic because there are few studies, to this author's knowledge, that
have dealt with aspects of this problem, although the ones that have are
largely in line with the assumptions stated.
Herbert (1978, p. 247) shows, in a comparison of three high and three
low youth offender rate areas in Cardiff, Wales, that residents in the high
youth offender rate areas were less likely to state that minor offenses
should be reported. In the case of serious offenses, there were small differ-
ences in the stated propensity to report between the high and low youth
offender rate areas. Mawby (1979), in a study of nine areas in Sheffield,
England, draws among others, the following conclusion:
The finding that the discretionary role of the police as regards the discovery and
detection of offences is considerably muted, allied to the apparent willingness of
residents of high crime areas to call the police, seems to question widespread
assumptions that police polices create area differences in crime rate. It is evident
that the recorded information shows no indication of area differences being radical-
ly altered due to different actions of the police (or indeed the public) in different
areas. (p. 247)
In this context it should be mentioned that eight of the nine areas Mawby
studied were working-class areas, although both high and low crime rate
areas were included.
Swedish studies of the types of crimes included here show that only a
very low percentage of the recorded crimes have been detected by the
police themselves; most recorded crimes have been reported by victims
and nonpolice witnessess (e.g., Wikstrom, 1985, p.37).
Smith (1986) finds in a study of 60 neighborhoods in three large U.S.
cities that:
When encounter-level variables such as the type of problem and the race and sex of
victims are controlled for, police are less likely to file reports of incidents in higher-
crime neighborhoods. A threshold effect may operate here, in which offenses must
reach a higher level of seriousness in high-crime neighborhoods before police will
report the incident. (p. 339)
In this context it should be pointed out that one has to allow for the possi-
bility that police practices in these matters may show significant variations
among countries and in some countries even among cities.
All in all, the assumptions that will be made in the following analysis of
the Stockholm area crime patterns are that the police-recorded data overall
will give an adequate representation of the pattern of relative variation in
crime rates among the areas and, if there is any major area bias, it is likely
for the kind of crimes studied here to go in the direction of underestimating
the area differences in crime rates.
The Problem of Calculating Valid Area Crime Rates

A problem that has been touched upon a few times above is that of calcu-
lating valid area crime rates. The comparison of crime rates among area
units of different sizes (land area and population) is rather complicated.
Unlike the comparisons of area variations in rates of offender and victim
residences, where the residential population is a natural denominator (i.e.,
the population at risk), there is no obvious choice of a common denomina-
tor in an area comparison of crime rates.
This problem has been acknowledged for quite a while now (see, e.g.,
Boggs, 1965; Harries, 1981), and one of the major conclusions to emerge
from the discussion of this problem is that one has to seek for crime-specific
rather than common denominators and, in case of heterogeneous legal

categories, sub-crime-specific denominators.
There are two main reasons to calculate crime ratios when comparing
different areas of a city; one is to control for targets at risk, the other to
control for differences in environmental opportunities. It is argued here
that it is essential to keep these two aspects analytically separate. The dis-
cussion here is restricted to the problem of controlling for differential
targets at risk. As a target at risk is considered any object that by the
definition of the crime in question can be the target of the crime. Some-
times targets at risk and opportunities are used as interchangeable con-
cepts, but here the term opportunity will be used to refer to good environ-
mental opportunities to commit crime'? (See discussion earlier in this
chapter.)
In discussing the problem of calculating area crime rates, it might be
fruitful to differentiate between mobile targets, and nonmobile targets.
The problem of calculating area crime rates looks quite different for these
two categories of crime targets. Crime does not only have a spatial but also
a temporal distribution (see Table 8.3). In case of nonmobile targets, such
as residences, one might overlook the temporal distribution of the crimes
in the calculation of the crime rates because the spatial distribution of
targets at risk does not change over the week or during the day.
In cases of mobile targets, such as people and cars, the problem is com-
plicated by the fact that the targets might be concentrated in some areas at
some parts of the day and in other areas in other parts of the day, so that
the targets at risk may show a temporal distribution different from that of
the crimes. The problem of calculating a meaningful crime rate for these
types of crime then partly becomes a problem of trying to link the temporal
area distribution of the crimes and the targets at risk (Wikstrom, 1982).
This problem is particulary relevant when the crime rates are used as esti-
mates of risks of victimization because the victimization risk may vary
significantly by time of the day in the same area.
In many cases, it may be very difficult to extract direct denominators,
and this problem is generally greater for mobile rather than for nonmobile
targets. Even if in most cases there are good direct denominators, these
might not be available to the researcher for economic or other reasons.
Often it becomes a question of finding a not too bad indirect denominator.
When one is trying to establish differences in crime rates among different
areas of a city using indirect denominators, it is important to bear in mind
that what one is really looking for is a control variable (a poorer substitute
for a direct measure of targets in an area), not an explanatory variable. If
these two get confused, one risks controlling away what might be part of a
7. It should be mentioned here that Harries (1981, p. 155) used opportunity and
risk in the meaning reverse as that in the present study.
TABLE 8.3. Crimes per hour at different time intervals of the day (Stockholm, 1982).a
Nonfamily violence
Time-interval Family & vandalism Violence Vandalism Residential Cellar/attic Nonresidential Thefts of and
of the day violence in residences in public in public burglary burglary burglary from cars
04:00-05:59 0.01 0,07 0.08 0.18 0.10 0.16 0.79 0.10

06:00-08:59 0.03 0.02 0.03 0.12 0.03 0,07 0.20 0.01
09:00-10:59 0.05 0,07 0.05 0.11 0.16 0.04 0.09 0.05
11 :00-12:59 0.04 0,07 0.29 0.18 0.24 0,07 0.14 0.01
13:00-15:59 0.03 0.14 0.29 0.13 0.38 0.02 0.22 0.01
16:00-17:59 0,07 0.13 0.53 0.14 0.30 0.07 0.19 0.09
18:00-21:59 0.19 0.29 0.65 0.37 0.17 0.01 0.10 0.03
22:00-24:59 0.10 0.23 0.63 0.70 0.09 0.10 0.68 0.11
01:00-03:59 0.05 0.11 0.66 0.48 0.15 0.15 1.33 0.22
~
(1l
Note. The number of cases with missing information about hour of crime is quite high for crimes of vandalism and serious property crimes in comparison (J
with the violent crimes, where such information is available in most cases (there is, in violent crimes, normally at least one person-the victim-who can tell ::I.
when the crime happened; this is more rarely the case for vandalism and property crimes.) This means that any direct rate comparisons between the S
(1l
categories of crime is difficult to make; moreover, the temporal pattern for vandalism and serious property crime may also be more subject to bias than that ;l>
for violent crimes. The time-interval classification in the table is an attempt to make an classification broadly corresponding to temporal patterns of activities @
I>'
during a day, for instance, 06:00-08:59 is the normal time when people travel to work, 11:00-12:59 are the normal lunch hours, 16:00-17:59 is the normal
time when people travel home from work. Crimes per hour are calculated in the following way: For the time interval 04:00-5:59 there will be 728 hours for a 9-
year and the crimes occuring in this period have been divided with that number of hours. Crimes per hour for the other classes have been calculated by the
'"S.
a
same principle. :=.
aPeak hours in bold type. o
I:j
......
\0
VI
TABLE 8.4. Suggested best denominators and chosen denominators for the calcula-
tion of city area crime rates.
Suggested Chosen
Crime best denominator denominator
Family violence No. of households No. of households

Nonfamily violence and
vandalism in residences No. of residences No. of residences
Violence in public No. of meetings Hectare

between people
Vandalism in public ? Hectare
Residential burglaries No. of residences No. of residences

Cellar/attic burglaries No. of residences No. of residences
in multistory houses in multistory houses
Nonresidential burglaries No. of companies No. of people
and public institutions working in area
Thefts of and from cars No. of cars Hectare
substantive explanation for area variation in crime rather than controlling

for trivial effects from differences in targets.
Of the crimes included in this study, the variation among them, as re-
gards the problem of calculating a valid measure of the area crime rate, is
substantial. Below I shall discuss this problem for each of the eight differ-
ent crime series included in this study and present the solution chosen for
each of them (see Table 8.4).
For the family violence series, the number of households appeared to be
the best denominator, and it was also available to use in the study. The
objection that only households with two adults should have been used may
be refuted on the grounds that much of the family violence studied con-
cerns relationships in which the parties have split up (see Chapter 4), and
hence many single-adult households will be involved in family violence.
The objection that not all family violence cases occur in the area where the
offender or the victim resides is valid, but may be ignored on the grounds
that this proportion really is marginal. For the nonfamily violence and
vandalism in residences, the best denominator is obviously the number of
residences, and it was also available to use in the study.
The best denominator to use for crimes of violence in public, it will be
suggested, is the number of meetings between people, because a violent
crime requires an interaction between at least two people. However, even
if data about the number of meetings between people in an area were
possible to obtain (which is a theoretical but not a practical possibility), we
still are faced with the problem of the temporal distribution of the crimes.
Most crimes of violence in public take place late in the evening and night
(see again Table 8.3), and this may, for instance, cause problems if there
are a lot of meetings in an area in the daytime but comparatively few at

night. The denominator chosen for this study was the hectare. This is, of
course, far from any ideal denominator to measure targets but was at least
believed to be better than residents which are very few for the areas of the
city were most violence in public occurs. Moreover, it is seldom that the
residents in these areas are involved in the crimes. However, as an alterna-
tive measure of area crime variations for violence in public, another
method was also tried. The number of people residing in an area and the
number of people working in the area were regressed on the number of
violent crimes in public and the resulting residuals were used as a new
variable supposed to measure the variation in violence in public that re-
mained after controlling for the time people spend in public in an area. To
be valid, this measure requires that there is a rather close correspondence
between people residing and working in the area and the number of people
out in public, which is not an entirely safe assumption. The two measures
will be used as alternatives in this study, although neither of them is to be
considered fully satisfactory.
As for vandalism in public, I have not succeeded in finding any obvious
best denominator for measuring targets at risk because almost anything can
be vandalized. One way to deal with this problem may be to split up the
vandalism cases in more detail after object vandalized, for instance, dam-
ages on cars, damages on buildings etc, and using different denominators
for each. Although, it would have been easier to find good denominators
for some of the categories, that would still have been problematic for
some, and moreover, this was not practically possible. Instead, on the basis
of the findings in Chapter 4, I chose to use the same denominator for van-
dalism in public as for violence in public (i.e., the hectare) and the alterna-
tive measure consisting of the residuals when regressing the number of
residents and people working in an area on the number of crimes of vandal-
ism in public. Although the two measures in themselves are far from ideal,
one obvious advantage is that the denominators are the same for the two
types of crimes.
For residential burglaries, the number of residences was an obvious de-
nominator to choose for this study. As for burglaries of cellars and attics,
these types of crimes are in practice restricted to multistory houses, be-
cause burglaries in cellars and attics in single-family houses are difficult to
separate from burglaries of the actual residence. It is only under very odd
circumstances that a burglary in a single-family house is recorded by the
police as a crime of cellar or attic burglary. Therefore, the best denomina-
tor for these types of crimes is the number of residences in multistory
houses, and that was also the denominator chosen.
The best denominator to use for nonresidential burglaries is likely to be
the number of companies and public institutions (i.e., shops, industries,
offices, schools, etc.). However, this information was not available for the
present study, so the denominator chosen was the number of people work-
ing in an area; the rationale for using this denominator is the assumption
that there is a rather close correspondence between the number of people
working in an area and the number of companies and public institutions. 8
This denominator has the great disadvantage of not being a direct denomi-
nator, so the rates will not show crimes per targets at risk. The same as is
the case for the rates of violence and vandalism in public. However, it is
assumed that the rate calculated will show, at least crudely, the relative
variation in victimization rates for nonresidential burglaries among the
areas.
The obvious best denominator to use for thefts of and from cars is the
number of cars in an area. However, the use of this denominator means the
same problem as for violence and vandalism in public as regards the possi-
ble disturbance from differences in the temporal distribution of targets and
crimes. Moreover, information on the number of cars in different areas was
not available for the present study. Instead, the same strategy as applied in
the case of violence and vandalism in public was used. The hectare was
chosen as the primary denominator, whereas the residuals from regressing
the number of residents and people working in area on number of theft of
and from cars were used as an alternative measure. The rationale for this is
the assumption that there is a fairly strong relationship between the num-
ber of people residing and working in an area and the number of cars in the
area.
The definitions of the eight primary crime series are listed below, fol-
lowed by the result from the multiple regression analysis carried out to get
the alternative measure for violence in public, vandalism in public, and
thefts of and from cars (see Table 8.5). It should be pointed out that only
cases of pure vandalism (see Chapter 4) have been included in the area
series of vandalism.
Family violence. Crimes of violence (homicides, assaults, robberies,
rapes, and molestations) within the family per 1,000 households.
Nonfamily violence and vandalism within the home. Crimes of violence
(homicides, assaults, violence to a public official, rapes, and molesta-
tions) and crimes of vandalism occurring in recidences or their proximity
per 1,000 residences.
Crimes of violence (homicides, assaults, violence to public officials,
rapes, and molestations) occurring in public places (streets, sqaures,
parks, public transport) per hectare.
Crimes of vandalism occurring in public places (streets, squares, parks,
and on public transport) per hectare.
Thefts of and from cars per hectare.
8. As an alternative was considered the number of nonresidential buildings, but

this was judged to be less good because a single nonresidential building may in-
corporate from one to a great number of companies and public institutions.
TABLE 8.5. Multiple regression analysis (Stockholm, 1982) (N = 123).

Dependent/independent U nstandarized Standarized Probability
variables coefficients coefficients T-value value
Violence in public
Number of residents -0.003 -0.117 -2.02 0.046
Number of working in area 0.013 0.798 13.81 0.000
Multiple R2 x 100: 61.4
Vandalism in public
Number of residents 0.004 0.383 5.50 0.000
Thefts of and from cars
Number of residents 0.042 0.475 8.70 0.000
Residential burglaries per 1,000 residences .

Cellar and attic burglaries per 1,000 residences in multistory houses.
Nonresidential burglaries (excluding burglaries in cellars and attics) per
1,000 persons working in an area.
For crimes occurring in public (violence, vandalism, and thefts of and
from cars), alternative crime rates were computed by using the residuals
from a multiple regression analysis, where the two independent variables
were the number of residences and the number of people working in an
area, and the dependent variable was the number of crimes in the area.
The findings from the multiple regression analysis show that both the
number of residents and the number of people working in an area, when
controlling one for the other, have a significant association with the num-
ber of cases of violence in public, vandalism in public, and thefts of and
from cars. However, in the case of violence in public the influence of resi-
dents is negative (and almost fails to reach statistical significance at the 5%
level) when controlling for people working in the area. The zero-order
correlation between the number of residents and the number of cases of
violence in public is nonsignificant and close to 0 (r = .038).
The zero-order correlations between the primary measure (crimes per
hectare) and the alternative measure (the residual measure) were in all
cases highly significant and rather strong: violence in public (r = .52), van-
dalism in public (r = .57), and thefts of and from cars (r = 0.48). A closer
penetration of the correspondence between the two measures showed
some interesting differences. Regressing one of the two different measures
on the other and studying for in which wards the biggest residuals were to
be found showed that the biggest differences between the two measures
generally occurred in the northern part of the inner city and in some of the
nonprofit housing problem areas in the outskirts. In the former case, the
relative rates were significantly lower when using the alternative (residual)
measure than when using the crimes per hectare measure, whereas in the
latter case the direction of the difference was the reverse.
The relative merits and problems of the two alternative measures of
crimes of violence and vandalism in public and crimes of theft of and from
cars will be further discussed in connection with their use in the different
analyses below.
The Area Crime Rate Distributions

The range and median for the primary crime rate distributions are shown in
Table 8.6. All of the different crime rates show significant variation, and all
of the series are positively skewed. Vandalism and, in particular, violence
in public places show the most skewed distributions, whereas crimes in
private (violence and vandalism in the family, and nonfamily violence and
vandalism in residences) show the least skewed distributions. The number
of zero-rate wards is higher for crimes of violence and vandalism, in par-
ticular for violence and vandalism occurring in private rather than for the
crimes of theft (with the exception of cellar/attic burglary, which has a
percentage zero-rate wards on the level with violence and vandalism in
public). The number of zero-rate wards is especially low for thefts of and
from cars.
TABLE 8.6. Range, median, percentage of zero-rate wards, and measures of skew-
ness for the crime series.
% wards with
Series Range Median zero rate Skewnessa
Family violence 0.0-9.3 0.78 40.7 1.48

Nonfamily violence
and vandalism
in residences 0.0-11.7 1.55 35.7 1.41
Violence in public 0.0-11.9 0.05 26.8 6.29

Vandalism in public 0.0-5.7 0.17 20.3 3.23
Residential burglaries 0.0-119.2 12.23 14.6 2.88

Cellar/attic burglary 0.0-73.1 10.91 23.6 1.88
Nonresidential
burglaries 0.0-124.0 14.38 12.2 1.82
Thefts of and
from cars 0.0-11.4 0.85 4.1 1.96
aMeasured as 3(mean - median)/standard deviation.

The Area Crime Rate Distributions 201
Extreme Values
An inspection of extreme values (defined in the same manner as was the
extreme values for the offender residential rates in Chap. 7) revealed that
none of the extreme rates could be attributed to factors that would moti-
vate their removal from the analysis. Therefore all identified extreme
values were included. The most significant extreme values were found for
violence and vandalism in public in one of the two CBD wards. The same
holds true when using the alternative (residual) measure, although the
extreme value was less extreme.
High and Low Crime Areas

As to the general pattern of crime in the city, Davidson (1981) states that
"the most striking feature of the general distribution of crime within the
city is its concentration in the centre and diminishing incidence towards the
periphery" (p. 25). The finding that the central city generally tends to have
the highest rates of crime has been shown in North American (e.g.,
Schmid, 1960b, p. 660; Pyle, 1974), and British studies (e.g., Baldwin &
Bottoms, 1976), as well as in Swedish studies (Werner, 1964). However,
some research shows differences in patterning between different types of
crimes (see, e.g., Pyle, 1974; Davidsson, 1981). Boggs (1965) has ques-
tioned, with particular regard to property crimes, the finding that the cen-
tral cities have the highest rates of crimes, on the grounds that when other,
denominators more relevant than the commonly applied crime per resi-
dents are used, the dominance of the city center is not so obvious. 9 (See
previous discussion about this problem.)
Crimes of violence, in particular those in public, are generally found to
be extremely strongly concentrated in the urban setting. This has been
shown both in North American (e.g., Bullock, 1955, p. 567; Bensing &
Schroder, 1960, p. 105) and in British studies (e.g., Downes 1958, p. 145;
McClintock, 1963, pp. 201-203). In a study of a medium-sized Swedish
city, it was shown that 23% of all assaults were committed within an area of
25 blocks in the most central part of the city (Wikstrom, 1980). In another
and earlier study of violent criminality in Stockholm in 1978, it was shown
that 25% of the violent crimes in public were committed within an area of
100 blocks in the central city (Wikstrom, 1981).
As for crime in Stockholm in 1982, there is a rather strong concentration
numerically to the inner city for some but not all of the studied crimes. The
inner city consists of 18% of the total Stockholm land area, and has 35% of
its residential population, but has the following percentages of crimes:
9. In this context it should be mentioned that not all of the studies referred to in
this section have measured the crime rates per residents, or the crimes per residents
only.
75% of the crimes of violence in public.

50% of the thefts of and from cars.
49% of the vandalism in public.
47% of the cellar and attic burglaries.
46% of the nonresidential burglaries.
43% of the residential burglaries.
36% of the cases of nonfamily violence and vandalism in residences.
30% of the family violence cases.
Of the crime categories, violence in public shows an extreme concentration
to the CBD area, which has 1% of the total Stockholm land area and
0.12% of its residential population. As much as 30% of the cases of vio-
lence in public occurred in the CBD area. The next crime types, in rank
order, are vandalism in public, with 9% of the cases occurring in the CBD
area; thefts of and from cars; and nonresidential burglaries, both with 7%
occurring in the CBD area.
However, the picture changes quite a lot for the property crimes, except
for thefts of and from cars, when considering the rates of crime (as mea-
sured here-see above) instead of the actual numbers. An inspection of
the maps showing the area crime rate distributions in Stockholm in 1982
(see Maps 8.1 to 8.8) reveals the following:
The highest rates of crimes in private (i.e., family violence, and non-
family violence and vandalism in residences) tend to be found in some of
the outer-city areas (see Maps 8.1 and 8.2).
The highest rates of violence and vandalism in public tend to be found in
some inner-city areas, in particular the CBD and nearby areas (see Maps
8.3 and 8.4).
Residential burglaries tend to have the highest rates in some outer-city
wards, but not the same as those that have high rates for crimes in private
(see Map 8.5).
Both burglaries in cellars and attics and nonresidential burglaries tend to
have the highest rates in some wards in the outer city, and there appears
to be a fairly good deal of overlap among high-rate wards for crimes in
private and high-rate wards for cellar and attic burglary and nonresiden-
tial burglary (see Maps 8.6 and 8.7).
Thefts of and from cars show a pattern similar to that for violence and
vandalism in public, with the highest rates occurring in the CBD and the
nearby inner-city wards (see Map 8.8).
All in all, it is only violence and vandalism in public, and thefts of and from
cars that show a marked concentration of high crime rate wards to the
inner city, or parts of the inner city. The question to be raised here is, What
happens with this pattern if we use the alternative rate (residual) measures
for these three types of crime?
An inspection of maps of the residual rates for violence and vandalism in
public, and thefts of and from cars shows the following:
Femily violence per

1.000 househol ds .
6 .6-
4.6 - 6 .0
.3.1 - 4.5
g] 1.6 - 3.0
o 0.0 - 1.5
inc1.
MAP 8.1. Family violence per 1,000 households (Stockholm, 1982).
Non-femily crimes
in privele,
per 1.000 residences.
9 .7-
7 .3 - 9.6
4 .9 - 7.2
g] 2.5 - 4.8
o 0.0 - 2.4
inc1.
MAP 8.2. Nonfamily violence and vandalism in residences per 1,000 residences
(Stockholm, 1982).
Violence in public
per hectere;
. 2. 1 -
1 .6 - 2 .0
1. 1 - 1.5
fKl 0.6 - 1.0
D 0.0 - 0 .5
incl.
MAP 8.3. Violence in public per hectare (Stockholm, 1982).
Vende1tsm in public
per hectere;
. 2. 1-
1.6 - 2 .0
1. 1 - 1.5
fKl 0.6 - 1.0

D 0.0 - 0.5
Not incl .
MAP 8.4. Vandalism in public per hectare (Stockholm, 1982).

Residentiel burgleri es
per 1.000 res ide nces .
41 -
31 - 40
21 - 30
[] 11 - 20
0 0 - 10
incl.
MAP 8.5. Residential burglaries per 1,000 residences (Stockholm, 1982).
Burglaries in cellars}
attics per 1.000 residen-
ces in multi~torey houses .
41 -
. 3 1 - 40
. 2 1 - 30
EJ 11 - 20
o 0- 10
i ncl.
MAp 8.6. Burglaries in cellars and attics per 1,000 residences in multistory houses
(Stockholm, 1982).
Non-resident i III burg -

Illries per 1.000
working in IIrell .
41 -
.31 - 40
21 - 30
[ill 11 - 20
o 0- 10
incl .
MAp 8.7. Nonresidential burglaries per 1,000 people working in area (Stockholm,
1982).
Thefts of lind from cllrs

per heclllre;
8 -
.6-7
.4-5
r;:;:::]
[:;:j 2 - 3
00-1
incl.
MAP 8.8. Thefts of and from cars per hectare (Stockholm, 1982).
Violence in public.

Residue.! measure.
237 -

132 - 235
27 - 131
lIT! 78 - 25
0 - 184- -79
j ncl.
MAp 8.9. Violence in public; residual measure (Stockholm, 1982).
Vandelism in public
Residue.! mellSUre.

72 -
38 - 71
4 - 37
8ill -30 - 3
D -65 - -31
incl.
MAP 8.10. Vandalism in public; residual measure (Stockholm, 1982).

Thefts of and from

cars.
Residuel measure .
376-
144 - 375
- 88 - 143
[ZI -320 - - 89
D -553 - -321
Not i nc l.
MAp 8.11. Thefts of and from cars; residual measure (Stockholm, 1982).
The pattern of extreme location of wards with high rates of violence in

public to the CBO and some nearby areas is not as pronounced as when
using the crime per hectare measure, although the wards with the highest
crime rates are still found in the inner city, which includes a CBO ward
(see Map 8.9, and compare with Map 8.3).
The pattern of location of high-rate wards of vandalism in public is rather
similar to the crime per hectare measure when using the residual measure
(see Map 8.10, and compare Map 8.4).
As for thefts of and from cars, the basic pattern found when calculating
these crimes per hectare remains when using the residual measure,
although some outer-city wards emerge as high-rate wards (see Map
8.11, and compare Map 8.8).
A comparison of the wards in the upper quartile by rate, between the
primary and the residual measure of violence and vandalism in public, and
crimes of thefts of and from cars, shows that the degree of overlap is
greatest for vandalism in public (19 out of 30 wards), followed by violence
in public (17 out of 30 wards) and thefts of and from cars (14 out of 30
wards). Regardless of whether the primary or the residual measure is used
for these three series, the major CBO ward and some neighboring wards
belong to the upper quartile wards, and the majority of the wards in the
southern part of the inner city belong to the upper quartile wards.
The major difference between the two measures for all three series is
that many of the wards in the northern part of the inner city that belong to
the upper quartile of ward rates when using the primary measure, do not
belong to the upper quartile when using the residual measure. Another
major difference between the two measures is that more outer-city wards
belong to the upper quartile wards when using the residual measure. All in
all, the extreme pattern of the location of high-rate wards to parts of the
inner city for violence and vandalism in public, and thefts of and from cars,
diminishes somewhat when using the alternative (residual) measures.
The Relationship Among the

Different Crime Rate Distributions
Already from the inspection of the maps it is clear that the area distribution
of the studied crimes differs significantly and that some of the crimes have a
distribution more similar than do others. The zero-order correlations of the
crime series are shown in Table 8.7. A factor analysis of the primary crimes
series is shown in Table 8.8. An oblique solution (Promax) was also tried,
but the interfactor correlations were very low (all under .13 in value), and
therefore the orthogonal (Varimax) solution was chosen. The conventional
criteria of only including factors with an eigenvalue greater than 1 was
applied. Three factors emerged that together explain 67% of the variance;
they may be labeled as follows:
Crimes in public (Factor 1).10
Crimes in private and crimes against semipublic space (Factor II).
Crimes in private, or residential burglaries (Factor III).
Using the alternative (residual) measures of rates of violence and vandal-
ism in public and thefts of and from cars in the factor analysis (not shown)
instead of the primary measures did not at all change the factor structure, 11
although the coefficients were, of course, not exactly the same.
Plotting the factor scores for the three factors on maps in five classes (not
shown) reveals, as might be expected from the analysis presented so far in
this chapter, that Crimes in Private and Against Semipublic Space and Re-
sidential Burglaries tend to have their highest rates in some outer-city
wards, whereas the factor of Crimes in Public tends to have its highest rates
10. The reader is reminded that most of the thefts of and from cars takes place
when the car is parked in streets (see Chap. 4).
11. Meaning that the same variables were loading high (i.e., 0.40 or higher) on
respective factor.
tv
.....
o
00
TABLE 8.7. Zero-order correlations between the area crime series (Stockholm, 1982) (N = 123). S'
~
o.
~
Family Nonfamily Violence Vandalism Residential Cellars/attics Nonresidential Car o
violence violence in public in public burglary burglary burglary theft (")
>
....
Primary crime series ~:
....
Family violence 100
o
Nonfamily violence
'"
& vandalism 22* 100
>
....
o
~
Violence in public 3 1 100 (')

::1.
Vandalism in public 8 9 77** 100 3
o
Residential burglary -8 -15 4 0 100 ~
~
Burglaries in cellars/attics 23* 16 12 11 0 100 0..
Nonresidential burglaries 38** 49** -12 0 -1 18* 100 <:
Thefts of and from cars 9 54* 75** -4 16 -11 100 a"
Alternative measures
sN
Violence in public -3 12 58** 10 4 25' 45" ~
Vandalism in public 21* 23** 2 3 37" 32** o
~
Thefts of and from cars 5 7 3 4 9 '"ti
~
....
Note. Coefficients multiplied by 100. Significant correlations in bold type. o
'Significant at 5% level.
:3
'"
TABLE 8.8. Factor loadings and communalities; Varimax rotated factors (Stock-
holm, 1982) (N = 123).
Crime series FI FII Fill h2
Primary series
Family violence 7 68 - 1 46
Nonfamily violence and vandalism 70 -28 57
Violence in public 86 - 2 6 75
Vandalism in public 93 9 0 88
Residential burglary - 2 - 5 95 90
Cellar/attic burglary 19 50 25 35
Nonresidential burglaries -15 81 0 69
Thefts of and from cars 86 2 - 4 74
Contribution % 31 23 13
Note. All coefficients multiplied by 100.
in the inner city. The outer-city high-rate ward pattern for Crimes in
Private and Against Semipublic Space is markedly different from that
for Crimes Against the Private (Residential Burglaries). When using the
alternative (residual) measures for Crimes in Public in the factor analysis,
the inspection of a map plot of the factor scores (not shown) for this factor,
shows that the major difference is that the high-rate wards tend to be less
extremely inner-city concentrated.
The pattern of relationship between the area crime series was also ana-
lyzed separately for the inner-city and the outer-city wards. The zero-
order correlations are shown in Table 8.9. The findings from the factor
analyses carried out separately for the inner city and the outer city (not
shown) are discussed below.
The separate factor analysis for the outer-city wards (not shown), using
the primary crime measures, gave basically the same result as for the whole
city. Three factors with an eigenvalue above 1 were extracted (together
explaining 65% of the variance). The same variables were loading high
(i.e., .40 or higher) on respective factors as in the analysis of the total city,
although one significant difference was that the factor of Crimes in Private
and Crimes against the Semiprivate was stronger than the factor of Crimes
in Public (the former contributing with 36%, and the latter with 15%, to
the explained variance).
The result of the separate factor analysis for the inner-city wards (not
shown) was somewhat different. Four factors were extracted with an eigen-
value above 1 (together explaining 77% of the variance). The basic factor
structures identified for the whole city and the outer city separately were
not fully reproduced for the inner city. Only the factor of Crimes in Public,
which was the strongest factor (contributing with 31% to the explained
TABLE 8.9. Zero-order correlations between the area crime series, separately for the inner city (N = 35) and the outer city (N = 88); N
outer-city correlations given below inner-city correlations (Stockholm, 1982). .....
N
Family Nonfamily Violence Vandalism Residential Cellars/attics Nonresidential Car

violence violence in public in public burglary burglary burglary theft ?O
:;0
0
Primary crime series =
Family violence 100 S
(1l
100 ;:t>
Nonfamily violence 0 100 ~
& vandalism 28** 100 ~:
....
Violence in public 3 3 100 (ii'
27** 27** 100 Y'
;:t>
Vandalism in public -3 7 76** 100 0-;
(1)
36** 33** 58** 100 po
Residential burglary -16 -2 27 29 100 (")

::to
-7 -16 -7 -10 100 3
.(1)
Burglaries in cellars/attics 34* -28 23 16 -13 100
po
21 24* 21 12 2 100 ::l
Q.
Nonresidential burglaries 7 -3 -9 16 9 -3 100
46** 56** 28' 41*' -4 23' 100 $
~
Thefts of and from cars 10 -10 45** 66*- 17 30 23 100 S'
19 19 45** 51** -10 11 13 100 N'
~
Alternative measures 0'
::l
Violence in public -22 4 66*' 32 -2 20 61"
'"d
19 27' 51" 4 14 47" 10 ~
Vandalism in public 17 33 4 35' 48"
....
(1l
33*' 29*' -7 3 48** 13 a

Thefts of and from cars 0 4 29 7 17 '"
9 10 -4 3 13
Note. Coefficients multiplied by 100. Significant correlations in bold type, A higher value on the correlation is needed for the inner-city than for the
outer-city series to reach significance because the observations are fewer in the former case,
*Significant at 5% level.
., Significant at 1% level.
Crime and Distance 213
variance), was the same. However, because the inner-city wards are rather
few (N = 35), one should interpret the findings for the inner city with some
care-there is room for significant chance variation, although it appears
likely, given the overall environmental difference between inner-city and
outer-city areas, that some difference in the area crime patterns and the
associations between the crime series would show in a separate analysis of
the inner city and the outer city.
Introducing the alternative (residual) measures for the series of crimes in
public (violence, vandalism, thefts of and from cars) resulted in some
changes in the factor structure in the separate analysis of the outer city (not
shown). Three factors were extracted with an eigenvalue above 1 (together
explaining 60% of the variance). The major difference in the factor struc-
ture, compared to when the primary measures of the series of crimes in
public were used, was that thefts of and from cars did not load high (Le.,
over .40) on any of the three factors, and, moreover, nonresidential bur-
glaries loaded high not only on the factor of Crimes in Private and Crimes
Against Semiprivate Space but also on the factor of Crimes in Public.
All the findings from the factor analysis so far presented have been based
on orthogonal rotations (Varimax) because the oblique rotations (Pro-
max), which also were performed, showed very low interfactor correlations.
However, for the separate factor analysis of the outer city, when using the
alternative (residual) measures for Crimes in Public, showed that two of
the factors were moderatley positively intercorrelated (0.27), namely, the
factors of Crimes in Public and Crimes Against the Private (Residential
Burglary). As to using the alternative (residual) measures in the separate
factor analysis of the inner city, the result was close to that achieved when
using the primary measures, although only three factors with an eigenvalue
above 1 were extracted (together explaning 64% of the variance)..
All in all, the area crime series relationship pattern identified for the
whole city appears to be fairly robust, although the separate analysis for
the inner city showed a stronger deviation from the total city pattern than
did the separate analysis for the outer city. Partly one is to expect that the
patterns for the inner city and the outer city should show some differences;
the difference may to some extent be influenced by the fact that the chance
variation may be greater for the inner city taken by its own, given its rather
few numbers of observation. I shall return to the question of explaining the
area city crime pattern later on, but before that, the issue of crime and
distance will be treated in the next section.
Crime and Distance

The study of crime and distance (i.e., the distance between the offender's
residence and the place of crime commisson) is a way to try to link the
offender residential distribution with the distribution of crime (see, e.g.,
Turner, 1969a; Pyle, 1974, pp. 142-180; Capone & Nichols, 1976; Baldwin
& Bottoms, 1976, pp. 78-98; Phillips, 1980; Rhodes & Conly, 1981; Mc-
Iver, 1981; Wikstrom, 1985, pp. 212-230).
In general, it has been reported in Anglo-American studies of crime and
distance that there is a "distance-decay" function-that is, the number of
crimes committed tends to decrease with the distance from the offender's
residence-and that the distance traveled tends to be shorter for violent
than for property crimes. For instance, Phillips (1980) concludes from a
review of the literature that "all researchers have reported finding a
distance-decay relationship" (p. 168), and many studies, including Phil-
lips's own (p. 169), show that, on average, violent crimes are committed
closer to the offender's home than are property crimes (see, e.g., Pyle,
1974, p. 149; Baldwin & Bottoms, 1976, p. 81). Partly this latter finding is
expected, because quite a few violent crimes take place in the offender's
residence (see Chap. 4), which is almost never the case in property crime,
although some U.S. findings show for violent crimes that, even after the
subtraction of family violence cases, the distance between the offender's
residence and the place of crime commisson was short (Porkny, 1965).
It has been pointed out by Turner (1969a) that "if the delinquent lives
close to his offense, there would be little difference between defining a high
delinquency area in terms of offender's residence or offense location" (p.
25). If this were generally true, it would also mean that the same models
used to explain area variations in offender residence rates (see Chap. 7)
would be applicable to the explanation of the area crime rates. Turner
himself draws the conclusion from his Philadelphia study that the high
offender residential and high crime areas are basically the same. However,
this is not a universal finding.
Baldwin and Bottoms (1976, p. 97), commenting upon Turner's findings,
state that offense and offender areas could not be regarded as synonymous
in Sheffield. Swedish studies of, for instance, property crimes in Malmo
(Werner, 1974), and assaults in Gavle (Wikstrom, 1980), also show that
the area distribution of the crimes and the offender residences are far from
identical.
These differences in findings may at least partly be explained by differ-
ences in patterns of housing among different cities. The fact that the high
offender residential areas in many big U.S. cities tend to be located near to
the city center, which generally is the area of the city where most crimes, at
least numerically speaking, take place (see above), means that the differ-
ence in location between high crime and high offender residential areas
tends to be less significant in big U.S. cities than in big British and Swedish
cities, where, at least nowadays (see Chap. 7), high offender residential
areas are less often located close to the city center. Brantingham and
Brantingham (1984) claim that "in cities with a free housing market, crim-
inal areas tend to be located near the central business district. In cities
with zoning and extensive public-housing programs, criminal areas may be
located anywhere" (pp. 330-331). In this connection it can also be of in-

terest to mention that Schmid (1960b), in his Seattle study, found that
although both the crimes and the offender residences showed concentra-
tion to the central part of the city, there were differences among differ-
ent parts of the central city as regards their level of crime and offender
residences. The CBD had generally the highest crime rates, whereas the
nearby skid-row area had the highest rates of offender residences
(pp.662-663).
An interesting question raised by Brantingham and Jefferey (1981) re-
gards the possible importance, for the motivation to commit crime, of
the distance between residential areas and areas with good environmental
opportunities to commit crime: "If there are more opportunities near
home, the probabilities suggest more trouble" (p. 236). If this generally
holds true, one would predict that residential areas located nearby good
opportunity areas would have higher offender rates than what could be
expected, from their population composition and its related social conse-
quences (see Chap. 7). Brantingham & Jeffery state that they primarily
have crimes of theft (in particular shopliftIng) by youth in mind when dis-
cussing this, and probably they also have in mind the fact that many de-
linquency areas in big U.S. cities are located near the city center.
Some Preliminary Methodological Remark

Quite a few of the offenders in Stockholm, more so in some than in other
types of crimes, do not reside in the city (see Table 8.10). The majority of
the offenders (in all kinds of crime) not residing in Stockholm were resi-
dents of the Greater Stockholm area (71 %). It should be pointed out that
the offenders not residing in the city of Stockholm are not included in the
figures on average distance traveled. Generally speaking, these non-
included offenders would in most cases belong to those with a longer dis-
tance traveled, and therefore the mean distance figures are somewhat
biased toward overrepresenting crimes with a shorter distance traveled,
and this bias is likely to be greater for those crimes having a greater propor-
tion offenders who are nonresidents of Stockholm.
For some of the offenders not residing in Stockholm, however, the dis-
tance may in fact have been short; I am referring to those offenders living
just outside the border of the studied area and committing crimes just in-
side the borders. This possibility was investigated, but it turned out that it
was really for a very marginal proportion of the cases that this could be
applicable. This was possible because all offender residences in the whole
Greater Stockholm area were plotted on a map, although only those offen-
ders residing and committing crime in Stockholm (the research area-see
Chap. 6) were included when measuring the distances. The fact that there
also are offenders in the city who have committed crimes outside the city-
and these are not included in the distance figures-is no problem to the
N
.....
0\
00
:;0
TABLE 8.lD. Crimes and distance by type of crimes (Stockholm, 1982). o
J:
O.
::I
Location of crime n>
in relation to % Family % Nonfamily % Violence % Vandalism % Residential % Cellar % Nonresidential % Car ;:.-
offender residence violence violence in public in public burglary burglary burglary theft ~
~:
In offender's G'
V>
residence or
proximity" 56.7 51.5 1.7 4.2 0.5 3.3 1.4 1.1 ..,;:.-
n>
po
In offender's
neighborhood b 8.3 13.8 16.7 15.5 18.8 23.4 21.6 17.2 n
::1.
Other place in S
n>
Stockholm 21.7 20.1 42.6 43.7 54.4 60.0 24.5 52.3 po
Offender living ::I
0-
outside Stockholm 13.3 14.6 39.0 36.6 26.3 13.3 24.5 29.4
<:
~.
Median distance" 0.0 0.0 27.0 20.0 25.0 34.0 23.0 30.5
S
No. of included cases 834 1,337 2,177 710 1,360 360 834 2,958 N'
Missing cases 103 269 1,775 3,470 3,944 4,710 9,408 23,205 ~
o
Total cases 937 1,606 3,952 4,180 5,304 5,070 10,242 26,163 ::I
% missing 11.0 16.7 44.9 83.0 74.4 92.9 91.9 88.7 "tJ
~
n>
"Proximity = within 100 meters of the residence. ::I
V>
bWithin 1,000 meters from the offender's residence, excluding cases in offenders residence/proximity.
"In hundreds of meters; distances measured only for offenders residing in Stockholm.
present study because its scope includes only those crimes occurring in the
city. Finally, it should be mentioned that there is a smaller group of offen-
ders with no fixed address. If they were living with some permanence in an
institution, hostel, or other such place, this address was used as their home
address otherwise, they have been referred to as missing cases in the eco-
logical analysis.
Many crimes lack a known offender, and this proportion is much higher
for vandalism and property crimes than for violent crimes (see again Table
8.10). Insofar as the unknown offenders' crimes are distributed differently
as regards distance traveled compared to those of the known offenders, a
source of bias is introduced. It may, for instance, be the case that offenders
not living in the area where the crime is committed may have a lesser
apprehension risk than the local offenders. Unfortunately, very little is
known about this.
The distance from the offender's home to the place of crime commission
can be qteasured in several different ways. The two most common mea-
sures are (1) the shortest line between the two points (line distance), and
(2) the shortest way by road (wheel distance). Arguments may be raised
against the use of both these measures. I have used line distance for this
study. Wheel distance is a much more time-consuming measure to obtain
and, as Phillips (1980) states, "there is no reason to assume that the short-
est street distance measured from a map has any relation to actual travel
routes" (p. 173). Phillips states further that both of these methods yield
very similar results, although that opinion is not agreed with by all research-
ers. Rhodes and Conly (1981, p. 178) point to such factors as natural
barriers (e.g., rivers) that, according to their view, make wheel distance a
more appropriate measure.
In measuring the distance between the o.ffender's home and the place of
crime commisson for this study, the goal has been to have errors not above
100 meters from the various measured points. Although larger errors are
likely to occur in some instances, there is no reason to believe that these
would in any way be systematic (i.e., correlated with other studied vari-
ables) but rather random. Crimes occurring just outside the residence of
the offender have been referred to as zero distance because, as noted, it
was not judged possible to have a precision finer than hundreds of metres.
Crime and Distance in Stockholm

As to the distribution of crimes by distance for the different crime types
(see Table 8.11), the findings show, first, that the distance is 0 not only in
the great majority of cases of family violence (which is to be expected), but
also in cases of nonfamily violence and vandalism in residences. The latter
may be a bit surprising, because the analysis in Chapter 4 showed that most
of the cases of nonfamily violence between acquaintances occurred in the
N
......
00
?O
::0
0
~
::to
::I
Cl>
TABLE 8.11. Distance between offender residence and place of crime commisson in hundreds of metres; only cases where offender resided >
~
in Stockholm (Stockholm, 1982). ~:
~
Distance in % Family % Nonfamily % Violence % Vandalism % Residential % Cellar % Nonresidential % Car

o
hundreds of meters violence violence in public in public burglary burglary burglary theft
"'"
>
..,
Cl>
~
0 65.4 60.2 3.0 6.7 0.8 3.8 1.9 0.4 (J
1-5 4.8 12.1 19.2 15.5 13.5 15.4 14.3 2.7 ::I.
6-10 4.8 4.2 8.0 8.9 11.9 11.5 14.3 16.9 3
"Cl>
11-15 2.5 4.0 5.5 13.3 10.2 1.9 8.6 9.1 ~
16-20 3.5 1.2 7.3 6.7 5.9 7.6 3.0 ::I
3.8 c..
21-25 2.6 1.8 6.1 0.0 9.3 3.8 9.5 4.4 $
26-30 0.0 1.6 4.9 8.9 3.4 5.8 2.8 6.5 ~
31-35 2.0 0.0 6.0 6.7 2.5 5.8 1.9 8.2 S
36-40 0.9 0.0 2.8 0.0 5.1 0.0 5.7 4.4 N'
41-45 1.2 0.7 1.8 2.2 3.4 5.8 1.9 4.0 o~
46-50 0.0 0.1 4.1 0.0 2.5 0.0 1.9 1.5 ::I
'""d
51-55 1.2 1.2 1.8 0.0 2.5 3.8 1.9 2.5 ~
~
56-60 1.4 1.8 2.4 2.2 4.2 1.9 3.8 0.4 Cl>
..,
61-65 0.7 1.8 2.6 2.2 3.4 3.8 1.9 6.5 ::I
66-70 1.4 0.5 2.8 2.2 3.4 7.7 1.9 3.2 '"
71-75 0.0 1.0 2.2 2.2 3.4 3.8 2.8 0.4
76-80 0.7 1.3 4.0 2.2 2.5 0.0 2.8 1.5
81-85 0.8 1.4 0.4 0.0 1.7 5.8 0.9 1.1
86-90 0.0 0.0 2.9 0.0 0.0 0.0 2.9 1.1
91-95 1.3 1.4 2.2 0.0 1.7 O.V 2.8 5.3
96-100 1.1 0.2 2.6 0.0 0.8 1.9 0.0 3.6
101-105 0.9 0.4 0.0 4.4 3.4 0.0 1.9 0.0
106-110 0.1 0.1 0.7 0.0 0.8 0.0 0.9 1.1
111-115 0.0 0.2 1.0 4.4 0.8 3.8 0.9 0.0
116-120 0.0 0.7 1.7 0.0 2.5 3.8 0.9 0.4
121-125 1.1 0.1 1.3 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 2.5
126-130 0.0 0.7 0.6 0.0 0.0 0.0 1.9 0.0
131-135 0.1 0.1 0.9 4.4 0.0 0.0 0.0 1.1
136-140 0.0 0.2 0.0 0.0 0.0 1.9 0.0 1.1
141-145 0.0 0.4 0.2 2.2 0.0 0.0 0.9 0.0
146-150 0.1 0.0 0.0 4.4 0.0 1.9 0.0 1.1
151-155 0.0 0.0 0.2 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 2.9
156-160 0.7 0.0 0.4 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
161-165 0.0 0.0 0.2 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.4
166-170 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 2.5
171-175 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 1.9 0.0 0.0
176-180 0.0 0.7 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
180 or more 0.7 0.7 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
Total 100.0 100.8 99.8 99.7 99.6 99.6 99.5 99.8
Note. Peak percentages in bold type. The maximum possible length of distance traveled for an offender living in Stockholm and committing a crime there is
300, or 3 Swedish miles (1 Swedish mile is, roughly speaking, 6 English miles). However, the shape of the city of Stockholm makes a distance as long as that a Q
rather unlikely event. s
(!)

0-
9-
CJ>

(')
(!)
N
.....
\0
victim's residence. 12 This means that quite a big number of the offenders in
this type of crime are neighbors to their victims.
Second, the findings for the other crime categories-violence and van-
dalism in public and the property crimes-show that there is a distance-
decay pattern with a concentration of places of crime commission to the
area close to the offender's homeY although zero distance for these
crimes, for natural reasons, is uncommon-that is, by definition of the
crime types, there will be no crimes taking place in the offender's resi-
dence, so the zero distance cases all refer to cases taking place just outside
the offender's residence. Roughly speaking, between 20 and 30% of the
crimes of vandalism and violence in public, and the property crimes, occur
within 1 kilometer of the offender's home, including zero distances (see
Table 8.11). This percentage is, of course, lower if those offenders not
residing in Stockholm are included (see again Table 8.10). When excluding
violence and vandalism in private (family violence, and nonfamily violence
and vandalism in residences), there is no clear pattern that violent crimes,
on average, tend to be committed closer to home than property crimes,
especially when taking into consideration that violence in public is the
crime category that has the highest proportion of offenders not residing in
the city (see again Table 8.10).
All in all, the findings show that (with the expection of crimes in private,
which are predominantly local crimes) although a significant pmportion of
the crimes are locally committed (i.e., within 1 kilometer of the offender's
residence), the majority of the crimes occur quite a distance away from the
place were the offender resides. Between 40 and 55% of the crimes, de-
pending on crime type, occur more than 3 kilometers from the offender's
residence (see again Table 8.11), and if the non-Stockholm resident offen-
ders are also included these proportions will, of course, increase.
Locally and Nonlocally Committed Crimes

It will be suggested here that the most interesting division between crimes
is to divide between those that are locally committed and those that are
nonlocally committed, and among the locally committed crimes to further
divide between those taking place in private (family violence, and violence
and vandalism in residences) and others. The latter category can be viewed
as neighborhood crime. The crimes taking place in private will be further
12. The reader is reminded that in the ecological analysis all cases of nonfamily
violence in residences are included, not only those occurring between acquain-
tances.
13. It should, in this case, be noted, that even though all the distance classes (with
the exception of the 0 distance and the 180 and greater distance classes) have equal
distance intervals, the higher the distance class, the greater is the area of land
covered. For a discussion of this, see Turner (1969a, pp. 14-17).
analyzed below, whereas in this section I shall concentrate on the area offen-
der rates for local offending (outside the private) and nonlocal offending.
The definitions of these two series are as follows:
Local crimes are those in the offender's neighborhood, that is, within
1 kilometer from the offender's residence, excluding cases occurring in
the offender's residence or its proximity .
Nonlocal crimes are those outside the offender's neighborhood, that is,
more than 1 kilometer from the offender's residence.
One outer-city ward was found to have extreme values both for local and
nonlocal crimes, due to one serial clearance case, and this ward was there-
fore deleted from the analysis.
In Chapter 7, it was demonstrated that the offender residential distribu-
tion showed significant area variation and that this variation to a high de-
gree could be explained by the area variations in population composition
(and possibly also its related social consequences), which in turn was highly
related to area variations in housing. In this section, the question will be
raised as to whether the offender residential distribution affects the area
crime rate: Do high offender residential areas have a higher rate of local
offending than other areas? To answer this question, one cannot just corre-
late the offender residential distribution with that of the crimes, because
such a correlation says nothing about whether or not it is the residents who
commit the crimes in the area. Another-approach was applied here.
The total area offender rate was strongly correlated both to local offend-
ing (r = .69, p = 0.000) and to nonlocal offending (r = 0.75, P = 0.000) by
the residents. The area offender rates of local and nonlocal offending were
also significantly positively correlated to each other (r = .30, P = 0.000,
N = 122). Regressing nonlocal offending on local offending and inspecting
the wards with high residuals revealed that the five wards with the highest
rates of nonlocal offending (rates of 15 or more) all had a very low rate of
local offending-in four out of five cases the rate of local offending was O.
When these five wards were deleted from the computation, the value of the
correlation increased significantly to .52, but this is just to say that there
are some significant outliers in the regression that markedly reduce the
value of the correlation between local and nonlocal offending. The area
distributions of local and non local offending is shown in Maps 8.12 and
8.13.
All in all, the impression is that local and n~~local offending by residents
are distributed in rather the same way. But this does not,necessarily mean
that the offender residential distribution is a good predictor of the area
crime distribution, just that living in a high offender residential area means
that one can expect one's neighbors to commit more crimes in the neigh-
borhood than if one were living in a low offender rate neighborhood. There
are many factors other than the offender residential distribution that may
explain the area crime rate variations.
Locolly commit ted crimes

per 1.000 inhllb. 10 yeors
or older.

13 -
10 - 12
7- 9
EJ 4- 6
0 0- 3
inci.
MAP 8.12. The rates of local offending.
Non-locally committed
crimes per 1.000 inheb.
10 years or older.

21-
16 -20
11 -15
ffiJ 6 -10
0 a -5
i ncl.
MAP 8.13. The rates of nonlocal offending.

TABLE 8.12. Zero-order correlations between

local offending and area crime rates (Stockholm,
1982) (N = 122).
Crime series Local offending rate
Primary series
Family violence 40**
Violence and vandalism in
residences 40**
Violence in public 16
Vandalism in public 28**
Residential burglary -04
Cellar and attic burglary 13
Nonresidential burglary 32**
Thefts of and from cars 29**
Alternative measures
Violence in public 15
Vandalism in public 26**
Thefts of and from cars 25*
* Significant at 5% level. ** Significant at 1 % level.
Local Offending and Area Crime Rate

To try to directly test the importance of the offender residential distribu-
tion for the area crime distribution, the area rate of local offending was
correlated with the area crime rates (see Table 8.12). The zero-order cor-
relations between local offending and crime rates showed that the rate of
local offending is clearly significantly related to the variation in crimes in
private (note that crimes in the offender's home/proximity, i.e., zero dis-
tance, was excluded when calculating local offending rate), vandalism in
public, nonresidential burglaries, and thefts of and from cars, but is not
significantly related to violence in public, residential burglaries, and bur-
glaries from cellars and attics. The fact that the local offending rate did not
explain more of the area crime variation could be expected because quite a
lot of the crimes, as previously shown, are committed oustside the offen-
der's residential area and are committed by offenders residing outside
Stockholm, although the analysis indicates that at least for some types of
crime, the area offender residential distribution is likely to influence the
area crime rate variations.
The same analysis was made separately for the outer city (not shown).
The result was, by and large, the same, although the associations tended to
be stronger, which may be expected because most areas with a high rate of
"visitor crime" are located in the inner city.
TABLE 8.13. Percentage of crimes committed in major types of urban environments

in Stockholm, 1982, that were committed by local offenders. a
Inner city Outer city
High social High social

CBD rank Other rank Problem Other
All types of crimes 1.8 21.0 26.1 29.8 51.7 32.3

Crimes of violence 1.5 19.9 33.6 b 61.9 48.1
Vandalism 3.8 28.6 24.6 b 53.0 37.5
Crimes of theft 0.0 4.5 19.7 29.2 34.4 20.3
a"Local offenders" are deli.ned as those offenders not living more than 1 kilometer from the
place of crime commission.
bNo crimes of this kind occurring in area, or too few to calculate percentage.
Crimes by Locals and Visitors

The character of the criminality in an area, as regards whether the offen-
ders tend to b!! "locals" or "visitors," might vary considerably among differ-
ent types of urban areas. This may partly be dependent on the crime mix in
an area because some types of crime tend to be more local than others (see
again Table 8.10). This type of analysis is different from the one discussed
earli~r in thi~ section because it takes the area of crime commission as point
of departure, looking into how many of the crimes occurring in the area are
committed by locals instead of whether offenders residing in the area tend
to commit their crimes locally or nonlocally. In this case, the residential
population cannot be used as denominator because, obviously, the nonlo-
cally committed crimes are not committed by residents. So it was decided
to look for the proportion of locally committed crimes in various parts of
the urban area. This analysis could not be done on the ward level because
in many wards there were too few crimes with known offenders to calculate
reliable percentages, so instead it was conducted at a much higher level of
aggregation: Stockholm was divided into major types of urban environ-
ments. (See Chap. 6 for a definition of this division.)
The findings (see Table 8.13) show that crimes (especially crimes ofvio-
lence and vandalism) are much more often committed by locals in the
outer-city areas, and that the proportion of locally committed crimes is
highest in the outer-city problem areas. The CBD area has an extremly low
rate of crimes committed by local offenders, and moreover, more than half
(54%) of the offenders committing crime in the CBD resided outside the
city of Stockholm.
In contrast to all other types of crimes, almost all of the locally commit-
ted crimes (of which the great majority were residential burglaries) in the
outer-city high social rank residential area were committed by people who
did not reside in the area but just outside its borders. This was possible
Explaining Area Variations in Crime 225
because the criterion for an offender to be considered local was, as already

mentioned, that he was not living more than 1 kilometer from the scene of
the crime, and this means that he could live just outside the borders of the
studied area and yet be counted as a local offender. So it seems that the
outer-city high social rank areas attract residential burglars from nearby
areas.
Explaining Area Variations in Crime

In the introduction to this chapter, it was suggested that differences in land
use among areas is the key to understanding the city crime pattern. Differ-
ences in land use means differences in the patterns of activities in different
areas at different times, which in turn are likely to influence the area varia-
tion of the presence of motivated offenders and good environmental
opportun,ities for instrumental types of crime, or in the case of violence and
vandalism in public, the production of friction in meetings/situations that
may evolve into violence or vandalism. Residences from a particular type
of land use, and variations among different areas in crimes occurring in
private (violence, vandalism) and crimes against the private (residential
burglaries) may be related to the social characteristics of the residents,
which in turn is dependent on the mechanisms for housing allocation (see
Chap. 7). In cases of crimes against the private, the physical structure of
the area may also be of relevance. Because there is quite a significant res-
idential segregation of offenders, this may also contribute to the variations
in area crime rates, as was discussed in the previous section. Already the
inspection of the maps of the area distribution of crime and the analysis of
the relationship among the crimes (see above) showed that different types
of crime tended to show different area patterns and that these patterns, in a
broad sense, were related to variations in land use in the city. In this sec-
tion we shall look some more into factors that may influence the area varia-
tions for different types of crime, although it was not possible within the
scope of this study to deal fully with this in all its complexity.
Crimes in Private (Violence and Vandalism)

In Chapter 4 it was shown that the offenders in cases of family violence,
especially in cases of nonfamily violence and vandalism occurring in resi-
dences, were to a high degree previously recorded for crime, and in case of
nonfamily violence and vandalism in residences, the victims were also to a
rather high degree recorded for crime. The analysis of the circumstances of
the crimes showed, among other things, that these types of crime to a great
part appeared to be related to the life-style of socially marginalized people.
The analysis in this chapter of the relationships among the area crime dis-
tributions showed that the rate for these two types of crime tended to cov-

SES, social problem (disorganization), and rates of crime in private (Stockholm,
1982) (N = 123).
Nonfamily violence and
Independent variables Family violence vandalism in residences
Familism -4 -2
LowSES -1 8
Social problem 62** 49**
Multiple R2 x 100 38.1 28.6
Note. Coefficients multiplied by 100. * Significant at 5% level. ** Significant at 1% level.
ary, although the association was not dramatically high. Against this back-
ground it seemed reasonable to hypothesize that the same factors that
explained the area variations in the offender rate also would explain area
variations in the rate of crimes in private. Because it was shown in Chapter
7 that the influence of housing on offending mainly relates to its effects on
the area population composition, it was decided to restrict the multiple
regression analysis to the influence of the three major population composi-
tion variables of crimes in private. The findings (see Table 8.14) show that
both kinds of violence are significantly related to variations in the area
population composition; however, the only significant predictor of the
three variables is the social problem variable, which may be interpreted
alternately as measuring area social disorganization (as discussed in Chap.
7).
Crimes Against the Private (Residential Burglary)

In Chapter 4, it was concluded that single-family houses had a higher rate
of victimization in cases of residential burglary than flats in multistory
houses. It was also shown (Chaps. 3 and 4) that the offenders in residential
burglaries to an extreme degree were persistent offenders, many of whom
were known intravenous drug abusers. In this chapter, when considering
the area distribution of the residential burglaries (see above), it was noted
that the distribution for these crimes deviated from the distribution of all
other crimes. The inspection of the map of the distribution for the residen-
tial burglaries (see again see Map 8.5), comparing this distribution with
that for Social Rank (SES) and Social Problems (see Chap. 6), shows that
high rates of residential burglaries tend to be located in high-SES residen-
tial areas, whereas the problem residential areas tend to have low rates of
residential burglaries (the zero-order correlation of residential burglaries
with the area social problem variable is nonsignificant and negative,
r = - .16, and with low SES it is also negative, but significant, r = - .31). It
was, moreover, shown earlier in this chapter that the residential burglaries
taking place in outer-city, high-SES areas to a high degree were committed

by offenders from nearby, non-high-SES areas.
These patterns indicate that area target attractiveness is one important
general influence for the area pattern of residential burglaries, and that
another may be proximity to high offender rate areas (see below). The fact
that there is a significant positive zero-order correlation (r = .51) between
the rate of wealthy people residing in area (i.e., households with an income
of 200,000 SEK or more or roughly 35,000 u.s. Dollars) and rate of re-
sidential burglaries may be taken as some support for the view that target
attractiveness influences the rate of area residential burglaries. The possi-
ble importance of lack of guardianship in an area is indicated by that fact
that the peak in residential burglaries is in the early afternoon, when most
residences are empty, and not in the evening or at night as for all other
studied types of crimes (see again Table 8.3), although it was not possible
within the scope of this study to study the influence of area variations in
guardianship on the rate of residential burglary.
The findings from this study conflict somewhat with the general finding
from Anglo-American research suggesting that the rates of residential
burglaries are greatest in, or in areas close to, socially disadvantaged hous-
ing areas (Winchester & Jackson, 1982, p.13), because it was shown that
the residential burglary rate tended to be lowest in the problem areas of
Stockholm. However, a detailed inspection of the area distribution of high
offender rate wards (see Chap. 7) and the map of the distribution of the
residential burglaries (see Map 8.5) shows that wards with high rates of
residential burglary tend to be located near high offender rate areas in the
outer city or to parts of the inner city. One may speculate about whether
the latter may be a consequence of the fact that in the city center of Stock-
holm there are a lot of well-known meeting places for drug addicts (see
Chap. 6) and that the city center, in addtion to the offender's home base
(i.e., the high offender rate wards), may be the two places they mainly
operate from when searching for targets to burglarize.
Crimes Against Semiprivate Space (Nonresidential

Burglaries and Burglaries in Cellars and Attics)
Nonresidential Burglaries
The analysis above of the relationship between the area distributions of the
different crimes series showed that the rates of nonresidential burglaries
tended to covary with the rates for crimes in private. The offenders tend to
be younger in cases of nonresidential burglaries than in cases of residential
burglaries (see Chaps. 3 and 4), and this may explain that these crimes, in
contrast to the residential burglaries, tend to occur in areas with high offen-
der rates (i.e., problem areas), assuming that younger offenders, to a high-
er degree than older, commit their crimes locally, which turned out to be
the case (see below). In contrast to residential burglaries, nonresidential
TABLE 8.15. Median distance" between

offenders home and place of crime com-
mission by age group of offender; burglary
offenders only (Stockholm, 1982).
Age group Median distance N
19 and below 11 31
20-29 23 137
30 and above 32 105
a In hundreds of meters.
burglaries showed a significant positive relationship to the local offending

rate (see again Table 8.12).
Both British (Baldwin & Bottoms, 1976) and U.S. (Rhodes & Conly,
1981) research on crime and distance has shown that young offenders,
gen<:rrally commit their crimes at a shorter distance from home than older
offenders. Comparing the median distance between the offender's home
and the place of crime commission by age of offenders known for burglary
(all kinds) in Stockholm in 1982 revealed that the median distance traveled
tended to increase with the age of the offender (see Table 8.15).
As regards target attractiveness, Davidson (1981) claims, based on a re-
view of relevant Anglo-American literature, that "the risk of burglary to
business premises is higher in suburban areas, perhaps because in such
locations the premises may offer greater rewards to the thief and may be
less well protected against him" (pp. 43-44). This statement fits in well
with the findings already reported that the highest rates of nonresidential
burglaries tend to be found in the outer-city (suburban) areas of Stockholm
(see above). To make a crude test of whether the location of a business in a
commercial centers or industrial area was more "protective" than a loca-
tion elsewhere, two measures on the extent of commercial (shops, depart-
ment stores, etc.) and industrial premises, respectively, in the area were
included in the multiple regression analysis, in addition to the population
composition variables found to predict a fair amount of the offender rate
variations (see Chap. 7). For these two variables, it was hypothesized that
their relationship to the rate of nonresidential burglaries should be
negative-that is, premises located in less business-dense areas should
generally be more at risk.
The findings of the analysis (see Table 8.16) are in line with the assump-
tion that area social problem level is positively related, and area business-
premises level is negatively related to the rate of nonresidential burglaries.
Burglaries in Cellars and Attics

The same analysis (not shown) as that for nonresidential burglaries was
tried for burglaries in cellars and attics, but the result was less promising.
TABLE 8.16. MUltiple R2 and standardized partial regression coefficients; familism,

SES, social problems (disorganization), commercial and industrial premises, and
rate of nonresidential burglaries (Stockholm, 1982).
Crimes series:
Independent variables Non-residential burglaries
Familism 5
LowSES 19*
Social problem 46*'
Commercial premises -25**
Industrial premises -9
Multiple R2 x 100 42.6
The model could only explain 9% of the area variation in burglaries in

cellars and attics, and the only variable of those included that reached
statistical significance at the 5% level was the number of commercial
premises, which was positively related to the rate of cellar and attic bur-
glaries.
Crimes in Public (Violence, Vandalism, and

Thefts of and from Cars)
Violence and Vandalism
There is an extensive Anglo-American body of literature connecting the
area distribution of violence in public to the area variations in locales of
public entertainment-restaurants, discos, pubs, and so forth (see, e.g.,
McClintock, 1963, p. 40; Downes, 1958, p. 145; Curtis, 1974, pp. 143-
145). Previous Swedish studies (e.g., Wikstrom, 1980, 1981) show that
if one plots out the restaurants in a city, the cases of assaults in public tend
to cluster around these places, more so around some than others. The
analysis presented in Chapter 4 also showed that most of the violence and
vandalism in public actually occurred in and around locales of public enter-
tainment or when people were traveling to and from public entertainment
areas. Most of these crimes also occurred on weekends, in the evening, and
at night-the times when public entertainment flourishes.
Against this background, it was hypothesized that the area variation in
violence and vandalism in public in Stockholm in 1982 to a large degree
could be explained by area variations in the rate of public entertainment
locales. The locales of public entertainment in Stockholm are heavily con-
centrated in the city center (see Chap. 6), and so are violence and vandal-
ism in public. These extreme concentrations in the city center may there-
fore mask the fact that other factors may be important for the variation of

SES, social problems (disorganization), public entertainment, and rate of violence
and vandalism in public (Stockholm, 1982).
Crimes series!
independent variables Total city (N = 123) Outer city (N = 88)
Violence in public
Familism -4 -19
LowSES 7 4
Social problem 0 44**
Public entertainment 81** -5
Multiple R2 x 100 63.9 27.2
Vandalism in public
Familism -17* -6
LowSES -17* -15
Social problem 26** 65**
Public entertainment 57*' -4
Multiple R2 x 100 51.3 34.0
Note. Coefficients multiplied by 100. * Significant at 5% level. Significant at 1% level.
violence and vandalism in public, especially in the outer-city areas, where

there are not many locales of public entertainment. Therefore, the three
major population composition variables were also added to the measure of
public entertainment in the multiple regression analysis carried out for the
hole city. In this context, it can also be mentioned that there were signif-
icant positive correlations between the local offending rate and the rate of
violence and vandalism in public, when these correlations were calculated
separately for the outer-city area. Moreover, a special analysis restricted to
the outer city was also conducted. Public entertainment was measured as
the number of restaurants per hectare in an area. Only restaurants open in
the evening or at night were included.
The findings (see Table 8.17) show that the area variations in public
entertainment localizations to a very high degree explain the area varia-
tions in the rates of violence and vandalism in the public, and that in the
outer city, a significant proportion of the area variation in violence and
vandalism in public is explained by area variations in social problems
(disorganization) .
The same analysis for the total city and the outer city separately (not
shown) was also carried out using the alternative measures of violence and
vandalism in public (see above). The major difference when using the
alternative measures was that the proportion of variance explained by the
model decreased, although exactly the same variables were significant pre-
dictors as when using the primary measures. The variance explained de-
creased, studying the total city, to .21 for violence in public and to .24 for
vandalism in public and, studying the outer city only, to .14 for violence in
public and to 0.25 for vandalism in public, using the alternative measures
on violence and vandalism in public.
Theft of and from Cars
As reported earlier in this chapter, the area variations in thefts of and from
cars were strongly correlated to the area variations in violence and vandal-
ism in public (see again Table 8.7). In Chapter 4, it was shown that most
thefts of and from cars occur when cars are parked on the street and, for
those cars belonging to private persons, mostly when they are parked in
proximity to the owner's home (i.e., within 500 meters of their residence).
The map (see again Map 8.8) of the distribution of car thefts showed that
the highest rates were found in the city center of Stockholm or areas near-
by the city center. The distribution for the suburban areas separately (not
shown) ~hows that the rates of thefts of and from cars tends to be highest in
the problem areas.
Assuming that the highest presence of motivated offenders will be in the
problem areas (where offenders are likely to reside) and in the city center
(where they are likely to spend quite a lot of their time), One may hypothe-
size that the area variations in the rate of thefts of and from cars is related
to area variations in the presence of motivated offenders. In this context it
can be noted that the area rates of thefts of and from cars showed a positive
and significant relationship to the area rate of local offending (see again
Table 8.12).
To make a crude test of these assumptions, the same independent vari-
ables as those used for explaning the area variations in the rate of violence
and vandalism in public were used in the analysis of the area rate variations
for crimes of theft of and from cars. However, in this analysis the res-
taurant variable is rather thought of as an indicator of the presence of
motivated offenders rather than a measure of the production of friction in
meetings/situations. The reader is reminded, as reported in Chapter 4, that
Swedish studies of persistent criminals/delinquents show this group to have
a very high participation in public entertainment activities (see also the
description of the CBD area in Chap. 6). For this reason, the use of there-
staurant variable can be justified, at least, as a crude measure of the nonre-
sidential presence of motivated offenders in an area.
The findings (see Table 8.18) give some at least weak support for the fact
that the highest rates of thefts of and from cars are likely to occur in areas
where motivated offenders reside or tend to spend time. Of further interest
in the analysis presented in Table 8.18 is the significant negative association
of the rate of thefts of and from cars to area familism. This is interesting
from a guardianship point of view, because many of the areas high in famil-
ism are single-family house areas, and the guardianship of cars parked in
such areas (often at the ho.use lot or in a garage) may be considered to be

SES, social problems (disorganization), public entertainment (motivated offen-
ders), and rate of thefts of and from cars (Stockholm, 1982).
Independent variables Total city (N = 123) Outer city (N = 88)
Familism -43** -37**

LowSES -29*' -13
Social problem 25** 30*'
Public entertainment
(motivated offeners) 28" 10
Multiple R2 x 100 42.1 23.1
Note. Coefficients multiplied by 100. Significant at 5% level. ** Significant at 1% level.
higher than in other areas where cars are are mostly parked in public
spaces. Supporting this view is the rather high negative zero-order correla-
tion between the percentage of single-family houses in an area and the rate
of thefts of and from cars (r = - .46, p = 0.000). Therefore, it may be sug-
gested that the evidence points to the fact that the lowest rates of thefts of
and from cars tend to be found in areas where guardianship as regards cars
parked in the area is highest.
As in the analysis of violence and vandalism in public, using the alter-
native measure of the rate of thefts of and from cars in the analysis (not
shown) significantly reduced the proportion variance explained by the
model, although the pattern of single variables' influence on the crime
rate was the same. However, in the analysis of the total city (Multiple
RZ = .10), only social problems was a significant predictor, and in the
analysis of the outer city (Multiple RZ = .06) no one of the single indepen-
det predictors reached statistical significance at the 5% level. The question
of whether one is more willing to believe in the accuracy of the results using
the alternative or the primary measure is left to the reader to decide,
although it should be noted that the major difference between the use of
the two is the level of variance that is explained by the model.
The Area Distribution of Victims of Personal Crime

In this section, the residential patterns of victimization of crime will be
taken up. This analysis is restricted to the types of crime, of those included,
that have private persons as victims, and hence nonresidential burglaries
and vandalism in public places, but also to those crimes of thefts of and
from cars where the car was owned by a public entity (e.g., a company) is
excluded. Moreover, it should be noted that the victimization rate for res-
idential burglaries will be close, although not identical to, the crime rate
for residential burglaries (the former have residents aged 10 or more as the
denominator, the latter the number of residences as the denominator).
The Area Distribution of Victims of Personal Crime 233
TABLE 8.19. Victimization rates per 1,000 residents aged 10 or older. Range,
median rates, percentage of wards with zero-rate, and a measure of skewness of
distributions (Stockholm, 1982).
Series Range Median % zero rate Skewness a
Victims of violence 0-24.0 6.5 8.9 0.76

Victims of serious
property crimes 0-458.0 37.1 2.4 5.83
aMeasured as 3(mean - median)/standard deviation.
Two different series of victimization will be considered:

Violence victimizations. The number per 1,000 of residents aged 10 or
older who have been a victim of violence (all kinds) or a victim of vandal-
ism in their residence. The latter group is only a tiny proportion of all
victims'in this group so, for short, the series may just be referred to as
violence victimizations .
Victims of serious property crimes. The number per 1,000 residents aged
10 or older who have been a victim of a residential burglary or a theft of
or from their car.
The range and median for the two victim rate series is presented in Table
8.19, together with information about the percentage of zero-rate wards
and a measure of the skewness of the distributions. The distribution for the
rates of victimization for serious property crimes is highly skewed, and this
depends on the fact that there are five wards with extreme values (two of
them are the two CBD wards). However, there was no special condition
found that motivated the removal of these extremes from the analysis.
The area distribution of the rates of victimization for violence and
serious property crimes is shown in Maps 8.14 and 8.15. A first inspection
of the map for victimizations of violence shows that the high rates tend
to occur in outer-city problem areas and in parts of the inner city, particu-
larly in the CBD and nearby wards (Map 8.14).
Anglo-American studies of the area distribution of violent offenders and
their victims show that there tends to be a positive relationship between the
area rate of offenders and victims of violent crimes (e.g., McClintock,
1963, p. 40; Bensing & Schroder, 1960, p. 106; Lundsgaarde, 1977, pp.
48-49; Porkny, 1965). The findings of the present study show that there is a
strong zero-order correlation between area rates of violent offenders and
of victims of violence (see Table 8.20). Moreover, the zero-order correla-
tion between the rate of local violent offending and the rate of victims of
violence is highly significant and positive (r = .55). This was calculated by
the same principle as was the total local offending rate (see above), but
with the restriction to violent offending only.
Against the background described above, it was assumed that the same
factors as those found to influence the area offender rate distribution would
Victims of violence
per 1.000 inheb.
10 years or older .
21-
16 - 20
11 - 15
[] 6 - 10
o 0- 5
inc1.
MAP 8.14. Victimizations for violent crime per 1,000 inhabitants aged 10 or older
(Stockholm, 1982).
Victims of serious pro-

perty crimes per 1.000

inheb. 10 years or older .
73 -

55 - 72
37 - 54
181 19 - 36
0 0- 18
incl.
MAp 8.15. Victimizations of serious property crimes per 1,000 inhabitants aged 10
or older (Stockholm, 1982).
The Area Distribution of Victims of Personal Crime 235
TABLE 8.20. Zero-order correlations between area rates of offenders and victims of
violent crimes and serious property crimes (Stockholm, 1982) (N = 122).
Offenders Victims of violent crimes Victims of serious property crimes
Violence 60" 10
Property 30** -11
Note. Coefficients multiplied by 100. Significant at 5% level. ** Significant at 1% level.
TABLE 8.21. Multiple R2 and standardized partial regression coefficients. Familism,

SES, social problems (disorganization), public entertainment, and rate of victim-
ization for violence.
Independent variables Victimization series: Violence
Familism -21 *.
Low SES 20'
Social problem 47'*
Public entertainment 17*
Multiple R2 x 100 42.9
Note. Coefficients multiplied by 100. * Significant at 5% level. ., Significant at 1% level.
also influence the area rate distribution of victims of violence. Moreover, it

was assumed that living in the areas where most violence in public takes
place also might influence the victimization risk for violence; therefore, the
measure found to be a good predictor of violence in public (i.e., the public
entertainment variable) was also included, together with the three popula-
tion composition variables, in the multiple regression analysis carried out.
The findings suggest that both the population composition of area and
whether one is living in a public entertainment area or not influence the
risk for victimization of violence (see Table 8.21). The population com-
position variable most strongly positively related to victimization rate for
violence is the area social problem (disorganization) level.
As regards victims of serious property crimes, the distribution of victim
residence and score of crime is, for obvious reason, close. Moreover, and
as also previously noted in this chapter (see above), thefts of and from
privately-owned cars tended to occur in close proximity to the victim's resi-
dence. This suggests that the area variations in the victimization risk for
serious property crime will be influenced by the same factors as those that
influence the area rate of serious property crimes. In other words, if one is
living in an area with high rates of serious property crime, one is more
likely to be a victim of a serious property crime (note that this is not a
necessary relationship for thefts of and from cars, although it is for residen-
tial burglaries treated separately).
TABLE 8.22. Multiple R2 and standardized partial regression coefficients; Familism,

SES, social problems (disorganization), wealthy people, city center, and victim-
ization for serious property crimes (Stockholm, 1982).
Victimization series: Serious property crimes
Total city Outer city

Independent variables (N= 123) (N= 88)
Familism -13 -38

LowSES 16 9
Social problem 2 15
Wealthy people 30 51
City center 79*' 0
Multiple RZ = 100 60.5 N.S.

N .S. = Model not significant at 5% level.
As reported earlier in this chapter, both residential burglaries and thefts

of and from cars tend to have high rates in parts of the inner city-the
CBD area and its nearby areas. For the outer city, the pattern for these two
types of crime differed in that residential burglaries tended to have high
rates in areas of wealthy people, whereas thefts of and from cars tended to
have high rates in problem areas. An inspection of the map of the area
distribution of victimizations for serious property crimes shows that the
highest rates tend to be found in the CBD and nearby areas in the high
social rank areas and in some high social problem areas in the outer city.
Against the background described, it was decided to try a model includ-
ing, in addition to the three population composition variables, the special
measure of proportion wealthy people in an area (because the residential
burglary rate was highly related to this proportion) and a measure of city
center degree, that is, people working with commercial activities in an area
(because both residential burglary and thefts of and from cars tended to
have high rates in the CBD and nearby areas).
The findings (see Table 8.22) show that for the total city, the victimiza-
tion risk for serious property crimes is highly related to residing in the city
center, whereas, for the outer city considered separately, the model does
not at all predict area variations in victimization for serious property crime.
But this latter finding is likely, as already discussed, to mask that fact that
the patterns of victimization for different types of serious property crimes
varies significantly with type of area of residence-that is, the risk for
residential burglary covaries positively with proportion of wealthy people
in the area, and the risk for thefts of and from cars covaries positively with
the problem level of the area.
9
Integration and Discussion
of Findings
In this concluding chapter, I shall present and discuss the general picture of
urban crime, criminals, and victims that has emerged from the findings
presented in the earlier chapters. I shall also try to link the findings from
the four different approaches to the study of crime and offending that have
been treated in this book.
Urbanization and Crime

As in the Anglo-American countries, in Sweden, traditional crimes (vio-
lence, vandalism, and theft) show concentration to urban areas, and gener-
ally, the bigger the place, the greater its criminality. Moreover, it appears
that the general increase in crime that has taken place in the postwar
period has been faster in the more urbanized areas than in other areas. In
general, the rate difference by urbanization is greater for property crimes
than for violent crimes. Among the violent crimes, the rate difference by
urbanization appears to be greater for violence in public than for violence
in private. Certain types of crime (e.g., robberies, residential burglaries,
and thefts of and from cars) show a special concentration to big-city areas
(see Chap. 2).
The relationship between crime and urbanization, which appears to hold
true for most countries, is likely to be dependent on the wider societal
(cultural and structural) context in which the process of urbanization de-
velops and specific urban areas are embedded, but this is a question out of
the scope of this book. For instance, the process of urbanization and its
outcomes appear to show some significant differences among different
societies. The development and shape of cities appear to show some rela-
tionship to the wider societal context in which they develop. There is an
obvious need for cross-national studies, utilizing the same kind of data and
methods in different countries and exploring the relationship between
urbanization and crime in different societal contexts.
All other things being equal, it seems reasonable to assume that the
237
238 9. Integration and Discussion of Findings
Weaker social More motivated

control offenders
Urbanization
/
!
Greater oppor-
tunities
1
More criminal
events
FIGURE 9.1. The relationship between urbanization and crime: a tentative model.
degree of urbanization (i.e., population in densely built-up areas) is an

important factor influencing the rate and structure of crime in an area (see,
e.g., Clinard, 1974, pp. 42-57). Although this is a highly plausible hypoth-
esis,' there is still a lot of research needed to explore the nature of the
mechanisms and processes that relate urbanization to the rate and struc-
ture of crime. Our knowledge on this complex issue is still very crude.
Having acknowledged this, I shall take a simplistic model as a point of
departure for discussing the relationship between crime and urbanization
(see Fig. 9.1).
It has been claimed that the distinguishing features of the urban area are
its size, density, and heterogeneity (Clinard, 1974, p. 49; Wirth, 1938).
These three aspects, through their implications for social life, may be
hypothesized to have a general influence on the strength and form of social
control and the rate and kind of opportunities for crime. All in all, any
given area's social life is likely to be influenced by its size, density, and
heterogeneity.
Population size is important for social life in that with increasing size,
there is an increasing number of stranger-to-stranger contacts, and a great-
er part of social life is likely to take place in public space. The private and
public aspects of social life tend to be different in many important respects,
and hence the size of a settlement should be of general importance for its
social life. Hunter (1985) differentiates among three main types of social
order: the private, the parochiaI,1 and the public. In Table 9.1, I have
summarized some of the main features of these different types of social
orders as discussed by Hunter.
Density (i.e., population per land area), does not necessarily have a one-
to-one relation to size-some urban areas of similar size are, for various
1. The parochial order refers to acquaintance-types of relationships; Hunter (1985)

states that this order "is based on the local interpersonal networks and interlocking
of local institutions that serve the diurnal and sustenance needs of the residential
community" (p. 233).
Urbanization and Crime 239
TABLE 9.1. Characteristics of main types of social orders following Hunter (1985).
Private Parochial Public
Relationship Intimate Acquaintance Stranger

Structural position e.g., friend e.g., neighbor Citizen
Collective unit Primary groups Local community The state
Spatial domain Households, networks of Neighborhood Streets, squares,
households in the city public transport
Social exchange Emotional ground Voluntary exchange Societal rights and
of labour duties
Social control units e.g., family e.g., neighbors e.g., the police
reasons, more densely built than others-but is important for social life in
that it is likely to further influence the rate of stranger-to-stranger meetings
and hence contribute to the importance of the social life occurring in the
public domain.
The urban area is characterized by a mixture of commercial, industrial,
administrative, and entertainment activities and, partly related to that, by
a social mix of its population. The degree of heterogeneity in activities, and
in the social background and characteristics of the population, is likely to
show a positive relation to population size, although far from any one-to-
one relationship. Different cities of the same size may vary considerably in
their heterogeneity. Degree of heterogeneity is important for social life
because it influences the degree of meetings and interactions with people of
different social backgrounds and the degree of contact with different kinds
of activities.
Social control is a major causal factor in many theories of crime (e.g.,
Hirschi, 1969; Kornhauser, 1978), and it is also a factor often pointed to as
an explanation for the positive relationship between the degree of urban-
ization and the rate of crime. Increasing urbanization is hypothesized to
weaken social control.
Social control has many forms. Following Kornhauser (1978, p. 74), one
may distinguish among different forms of social control after the dimen-
sions of internal-external and direct-indirect controls. Internal control re-
fers to the conscience (direct) built up in the socialization process and to
rewarding social bonds with others (indirect). External control refers to
general prevention from the risk of sanctions or of losing rewards in others'
command (indirect) and surveillance (direct) .
It seems to be a reasonable hypothesis that there is a relationship be-
tween degree of urbanization and the conditions for social control. Direct
and indirect internal controls are predominantly developed and maintained
in the private and semipublic (parochial) spheres of people's lives, and
social institutions, such as the family, the school, and peer groups, all play
important roles as agents of social control at different stages in a person's
life. It is highly plausible that social institutions of the type mentioned, in
their role of fostering children and youth, work under different conditions
in areas of different population size and heterogeneity. One may hypothe-
size that the development of a strong internal control generally is more
easily achieved in smaller, more homogeneous areas than in larger, heter-
ogeneous areas. As for external controls, it is highly plausible that the
control that result from the monitoring and surveillance of other's behavior
is generally speaking a more difficult task in bigger as compared to smaller
settlements. At the same time, it is likely that direct external control plays
a greater role in bigger places because a greater part of the social life in
such places takes place in public and involves strangers.
If weaker social control is one of the two major explanations, for the
relationship between degree of urbanization and rate of crime, greater
opportunities for crime is the other. The size, density, and heterogeneity of
an area is likely to influence the amount of available goods to steal and the
amount of meetings with other people of different social backgrounds that
may develop into conflict and violence. If by the phrase opportunity for
crime is understood the presence of good environmental conditions to com-
mit crime (i.e., a suitable target in the absence of guardianship), the degree
of direct external social control (see above) in an area is likely to be an
important influence on the amount of good environmental opportunities
that a resident in the area is confronted with.
However, as discussed in Chapter 8, one may question the relevance of
direct external social control in influencing the occurrence of expressive
forms of violence and vandalism, because many expressive crimes of vio-
lence involve formal agents of control (police, doormen, etc.) and because
the study of these types of criminal events shows that in many cases the
parties appear to take little notice of whether capable guardians are pres-
ent or not (see Chap. 4).
Together with other motivational forces that may operate in the area
(dependent on structural and cultural characteristics of the society in ques-
tion), the average success of an area in developing among its residents
strong internal controls against breaking the law may be assumed to in-
fluence the rate of motivated offenders in the area (or perhaps more cor-
rectly, acknowledging that offending is a variable-the rate of individuals
with a higher propensity to offend). The rate of motivated offenders in an
area may also be hypothesized to be influenced by the general level of
temptations, related to the degree to which the residents are confronted
with good environmental opportunities for crime.
Perhaps the most important aspect of Cohen and Felson's (1979) work
on routine activities and crime is their emphasis on, for a crime to occur,
the necessary convergence of, minimally, one motivated offender and a
suitable target in the absence of guardianship (although the guardianship
aspect can be questioned for many expressive forms of violence, as already
stated). This implies that a given city structure (i.e., the inner differentia-
tion of the residential population and routine activities)-regardless of the
The Urban Offender 241
overall city rate of motivated offenders and good environmental

opportunities-may influence the city rate of crime events in itself.
Moreover, the interaction (pattern of convergence) of motivated offenders
and good environmental opportunities in a given city may also influence
the rate of participation and frequency in crime in different ways. For inst-
ance, cities with an equal rate of participation in crime by its residents and
visitors may still have a different rate of offending (aggregate crime rate)
because of differences in frequency of crime related to a different pattern
of convergence of motivated offenders and good environmental opportuni-
ties.
Although there have been quite a number of studies on intercity varia-
tions in the rate of crime and victimization (e.g., Schuessler, 1962; Schues-
sler and Slatin, 1964; Beasley, 1974; Gibbs & Erickson, 1976; Harries,
1976; Farley & Hansel, 1981; Crutchfield, Geerken, & Gover, 1982; Samp-
son, 1986), very little is known about how important, for intercity varia-
tions in aggregate crime rates the different city structure's specific influence
is on the pattern of convergence of motivated offenders and good environ-
mental opportunities. This appears to be a highly important and interesting
line of research, worthy of exploration in future studies of urban crime.
The fact that highly urbanized areas have comparatively high rates of
crime does not, however, mean that the crime rate is high everywhere in
the urban area: Crime shows rather strong concentrations in certain types
of areas and places; some types of crime are more concentrated than
others; and, moreover, the pattern of distribution of crime differs among
different types of crime (see further below). Large parts of big urban areas
have comparatively low or modest overall rates of crime. Certain types of
environments and places, rather than the urban area as a whole, have high
rate of crime and offending and, consequently, a high risk of victimization.
An interesting question in this connection, relating to what has been
said above on the issue of the importance of the convergence of motivated
offenders and good environmental opportunities, is to what degree the re-
lationship between urbanization and the rate and structure of crime and
offending is a reflection of the presence, number, size, and relative location
of special "criminogenic" environments and places (e.g., slum areas, red-
light districts, etc.), and to what degree the number and relative size of
such places in different cities are major reasons for the reported variability
in the rate and structure of crime and offending among cities of similar
sizes.
The Urban Offender

As has been discussed above, the size, density, and heterogeneity of a
place are likely to have a general influence on the residents' propensity to
offend, through their relevance for the social life in an area (social control
and opportunities). However, the pattern of individual development of

offending in different ecological contexts (e .g., urban-rural areas and differ-
ent areas of cities) is a largely neglected area in criminological research.
Most studies of relevance for this are either concerned with ecological in-
fluences on crime or the individual development of offending but seldom
with the interaction between the two. Hence, we know quite little about
the influence of the ecological context on the pattern of the individual de-
velopment of offending. This appears to be an important area in need of
research.
Although offending is not such a deviant behavior in the male urban
population, most urban offenders are occasionals. Judging from self-report
studies, most males break the law at least once during childhood and
youth. Both the distribution of crime in the population and the distribution
of crimes by offenders are highly skewed. There is a smaller group of offen-
ders that are responsible for a lot of the crimes, especially for the more
serious ones. These offenders have often started early with crime. The cir-
cumstances of crime vary a lot. However, it appears largely to be the same
group of people causing most trouble (at least as regards serious crime).
Frequent offenders are best described as versatile (see chap. 3). Many of
the expressive crimes appear to be a consequence of a criminal life-style
(i.e., a life-style involving heavy drinking and/or drug abuse), whereas
the more instrumental types of crime rather define this life-style (see
Chap. 4).
It appears that few people get involved in committing traditional crimes
(violence, vandalism, and theft) if they have not started before late youth
(see Chap. 3), which puts the emphasis on the importance of the formative
years in childhood and youth for the development of persistent offending, a
period in life that may also be viewed as critical as regards the development
of internal direct controls through the socialization process. One may
further hypothesize that those who have survived youth without getting
into any greater involvment in crime are further inhibited from starting
with crime by having, in general, developed strong enough internal indirect
controls, that is, bonds to conventional society (through involvement
in education, work, etc.), which make traditional crime a less attractive
choice.
The fact that females have a low rate of debuts in crime during this
period, but a rate closer to the males at older ages, and the fact that the
difference in debuts among the social classes are significant at younger
ages, but vanish at older ages (late youth), may suggest that there are sex-
and class-related factors in childhood and youth that are differentially pro-
tective against criminogenic influences. It has been suggested (see Chap. 3)
that differences in parental social control and group behavior may be two
important factors accounting for these sex and class differences in patterns
of offending. Another way to put this is to say that if individuals survive
youth and get involved in a conventional life-style, they are not likely to get
The Urban Victim 243
into crime. This may also explain the low female rate of offending, assum-
ing that females, generally speaking, are through the socialization process
likely to develop stronger (direct and indirect) intemal controls than males.
The same line of reasoning may hold true for the social class differences
noted in Chapter 3.
It is well-known that there is a significant residential segregation of dif-
ferent social groups in the urban area. (Patterns of segregation may show
some differences between cities and countries.) It is also well-known that
the offender area residential distribution is highly skewed and that the
offenders are differently distributed from the normal population by social
groups (e.g., by social class or family status). Finally, it is well-established
that the offender area distribution shows a strong association to area
population composition (family status, household socioeconomic status,
problem households), which, in turn, is dependent on housing allocation
mechanisms, which may be different in different countries (see Chap. 7).
The question as to what degree the residential segregation of offenders is
due to social group segregation or area contextual effects is a key issue in
studies of the patterns of urban crime and one that still largely remains
unsolved. The main contextual variable pointed to in the literature on
urban crime is the possible influence of residential area social disorganiza-
tion (i.e., community structural difficulties in establishing common values
and solving common problems) on children's and youths' propensity to
offend. Degree of area social disorganization is generally seen as a result of
population heterogeneity and mobility and family disruption. Area social
disorganization means that important social institutions, such as the family
and the school, do not as effectively succeed in fostering strong internal
controls among its children and youth as they do in more stable areas. The
importance of such social institutions as the family and the school in de-
veloping internal social control among children and youth (i.e., for the
socialization process) has often been stressed, whereas less attention has
been given to the interplay between the family and the school in this task in
different types of residential areas. It is most likely that the family and the
school work under very different conditions in different types of residential
areas and that the interplay between the two may show differences depend-
ing on the general characteristics of the area and its population. This
appears to be an important area in need of further research.
The Urban Victim

Living a criminal life-style or being associated in one way or another to
people living such a life-style appears to be a prime risk factor for victim-
ization in expressive types of violence and vandalism. For non-socially-
deviant persons, a prime risk factor for being subjected to expressive
forms of violence and vandalism appears to be to have a similar life-style
(in a broad sense) to socially deviant persons (i.e., high participation in risk
milieus such as public entertainment), or to have a job that means coming
into frequent contact with socially deviant persons (see Chaps. 4, 5, and 8).
It is noteworthy in this context that the residential pattern for victims of
violence shows a rather close relationship to that of the offenders (see
Chap. 8).
In a general way, one may state that the risk of victimization for expres-
sive crimes of violence and vandalism (and some types of instrumental
violence) is dependent on the degree to which the individual has risk
relationships and the frequency with which he or she is confronted with
risk meetings. Risk relationships may loosely be defined as relationships
to socially deviant persons, and risk meetings as meetings in socially un-
stable public milieus (e.g., public entertainment areas). The frequency of
risk relationships and risk meetings may be assumed to be a consequence
of life-style.
The risk of being subjected to noninteractional instrumental types of
crime (predominantly crimes of theft) appears to be both more evenly dis-
tributed in the population than the victimization risk for expressive forms
of violence and vandalism and highly dependent on the area of residence.
In the case of noninteractional instrumental crimes, it is perhaps better to
relate the victimization risk to living in risk areas rather than to having risk
relationships and risk meetings. However, the evidence suggests that differ-
ent types of areas may show different risks for being subjected to different
types of noninteractional instrumental crimes (see Chaps. 4, 5, and 8).
City Structure and the Rate and Structure of Crime

Although, as previously stated, the urban environment as a whole is gener-
ally characterized by a social life related to its size, density, and hetero-
geneity, the local variations in social life between parts of the urban area is
significant. This is largely dependent upon area variations in land use.
Human activities may basically, as discussed before, be divided into activ-
ities in the private, parochial, and public spheres (see again Table 9.1).
Activities in different spheres of life are related to different forms of crime.
The social context of legal categories of crimes, especially against the per-
son, varies a lot depending upon what sphere of life they do occur in. There
are a lot of different aspects of specific types of crime (e.g., assaults) that
differ among different contexts in which the crime occurs (see Chap. 4).
Differences in land use means that different types of activities occur with
a different frequency in different parts of the city at different times of the
week and day. Because there is a relationship between types of activities
and types of social groups participating in them, this also means that there
is a spatial and temporal variation in the social mix of people (residents and
visitors). Thus, social life and, related to that, the presence of and condi-
City Structure and the Rate and Structure of Crime 245
tions for different types of external social control and the amount of risk
relationships, risk meetings, and opportunities for noninteractional in-
strumental types of crimes are likely to show significant variablity among
times and among areas of a city (see chap. 8). This is probably the key to
understanding city area variations in the rate and structure of crime and
victimization.
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Appendix A
The Stockholm 1982 Crime Survey
What is called the Stockholm 1982 Crime Survey in this book consists in
fact of several different studies on urban crime, directed by the author and
conducted at the Department of Criminology, University of Stockholm,
and at the Research Unit of the National Council for Crime Prevention,
Sweden. Although these are separate research projects, they have all been
designed as to be compatible with the first original study of crime in Stock-
holm, 1982, which included homicides, assaults, robberies, vandalism, and
residential burglaries (see Wikstrom, 1987b). The latter research projects
have added violence to a public official, rapes, molestations, l nonresiden-
tial burglaries, and thefts of and from cars to those crime types originally
studied. All in all, the Stockholm 1982 Crime Survey includes a detailed
study of the investigation records of samples of police reported crimes of
violence (including molestation), vandalism, and serious property crimes
(burglaries and thefts of and from cars). In total the sample covers 7,575
cases (see Table A.l).
The Samples
The sampling of crimes was basically systematic (e.g., every third, every
fifth etc.) crime, depending on category of crime in question, was included.
The exceptions are serious assaults and rapes, for which all cases during the
sampling period (see below) were included. A systematic sample can be
viewed as a random sample if the list from which the sample is drawn is
ordered so that the values on the different included variables appear ran-
domly. The list from which the samples were drawn were the police records
ordering number list, in which the crimes are ordered succsesively, from 1
to the maximum number of crimes reported during the year in question, by
the point in time they are reported to the police. There is no reason to
1. The study on molestation was made by L. Nilsson (1988) as exam work for a law
degree.
260
The Samples 261
TABLE A.I. Number of studied crimes, number of total crimes (sample weighted to
I-year figures) and percentage of all reported crimes included in study (The Stock-
holm 1982 Crime Survey).
No. of studied Total crimes a % of all crimes
Crime crime (I-year figure) reported studied
Serious assaults b 148 252 58.7

Petty assaults 799 3,995 20.0
Violence to a public
official 294 882 33.3
Robbery 326 1,141 28.6
Rape 309 155 200.0c
Molestation 503 1,509 33.3
Vandalism 626 6,260 10.0
Residential burglary 624 5,304 11.8
Non-residential burglary 2,583 15,498 16.7
Thefts from cars 524 17,292 3.0
Thefts of cars 839 4,195 20.0
Total 7,575 56,483 13.4
aWeighted by sampling fraction to I-year figures.

blncluding homicides.
cAll cases during 2 years (1982-1983) included, hence the weighting figure for calculating the
1-year figure is 0.5.
suspect that the values of the variables included (e.g., sex, age, place of
crime) will show any systematic variation with the ordering number (other
than, of course, month of crime and similar variables).
However, in addition to the systematic samples, all remaining cases with
a known suspect were included for those crimes with low clearance rates.
The obvious reason for that was to get a sufficient number of cases with
offenders to analyze. These "extra samples" were made for robberies, res-
idential burglaries, nonresidential burglaries, and thefts of and from cars.
Finally, the period from which the sample was drawn differed for the
types of included crimes. For serious and petty assault, robberies, vandal-
ism, and residential burglaries the sample was taken from the cases re-
ported January-July 1982. For violence toward a public official, molesta-
tion, nonresidential burglary, thefts of and from cars, the sample was taken
from all cases reported during 1982 (with the exception of molestation, for
which the sample was drawn from all cases reported during 1983). Finally,
for rapes, all cases reported during 2 years were included (i.e., 1982 and
1983). There is no specific reason for the differences in sampling periods
other than that different sampling periods were employed in the different
research projects making up the Stockholm 1982 Crime Survey. It was, as
far as possible, investigated whether the restriction of the sampling period
to parts of the year for some types of the crime would significantly affect
the results in comparison with whether the sample had been drawn from a
full year. These tests showed, however, that the results are not significantly
262 Appendix A
affected by the restriction in the sampling period, and that is so because the
major seasonal differences in crime circumstances are between the warm
and cold part of the year, and a part of both the warm and the cold period
of the year was included (see Wikstrom, 1987b, pp. 45-53).
The fact that cases with a known offender have been oversampled for
some of the included types of crimes means, of course, that for these
crimes we have more known offenders than what applies to all reported
cases. Moreover, insofar as cases with a known offenders deviates, as re-
gards the crime circumstances and victim characteristics, from those with
unknown offenders, a bias is introduced in the description of crime cir-
cumstances and victim characteristics. However, the extent of the possible
bias introduced has to be viewed in reference to the size of the extra sam-
ples, which are rather small compared to the systematic samples.
Sources of Basic Crime Data

The basic data about the crimes, the offenders, and the victims for this
study are taken from the police investigation records. In addition to the
police investigation records, data about previous recorded criminality of
the offenders and victims have been extracted from the General Criminals
Register (PBR). For some, but not all, types of crime data about known
intravenous drug abuse were possible to collect from Professor Bejerot's
register of intravenous drug abusers in Stockholm.
The first source of information is the crime report sheet. In some cases
(especially minor) the whole record may consist of the crime report sheet.
This includes a short description of the crime and certain other data about
the crime, such as date, hour, address of place of crime commission. Data
about the victim and the offender (in cases where he or she is known) is
rather limited (e.g., name, ID number, and address ofresidence). In addi-
tion, in cases with missing offenders, there may be offender signal. Data
about the victims have only been fully extracted for this study in cases of
crimes against the person.
In cases where a "reasonable suspect" is identified, a personlia sheet is
set up. This includes more detailed information about the suspect (i.e.,
place of birth for foreign residents, occupation, employment, etc.). There
are some exceptions from the rule that a personalia sheet should be set up,
but the only exception of importance to this study is that such sheets should
not be set up for offenders under the age of 15.
As mentioned, sometimes the whole case file consists of the police report
sheet, but many times, especially in more serious crimes against the per-
son, there are a lot of information. available from victim, offender and
witness statements, medical examinations of victims, and technical exam-
inations of the scene of the crime.
To explore offender and victims, previous criminality extracts from the
Sources of Basic Crime Data 263
General Criminals Register were made for all known offender/victims.

This register includes all "reasonable suspicions" for crime (i.e., set up
personalia sheets-see above). If it is decided not to prosecute (using the
section in the law permitting withdrawal of charge), if the offender receives
a summary penalty (that he or she accepts), or if the offender is convicted
for the crime, then the crime is included in the register; otherwise, it is
deleted. It is thus only for the period just after the offender has become
known as "reasonable suspicions" are included.
Some limitations with the General Criminals Register that should be
mentioned are as follows:
Crimes committed before 1945 are not included.
Individuals under the age of 15 or who have reached the age of 80 are not
included.
Individuals included only for minor crimes are deleted from the register
after a period of 5 years if during that period the have not appeared with
a new' crime in the register. The corresponding time for deletion for
serious crimes is 10 years.
Figures about the number of crimes known are likely to be underesti-
mated because it is not unusual that the records in the register may state,
for example, "known for theft, at least, at nine different occasions." In
these cases the maximum reported figure has been recorded in this study.
For the crimes of serious and petty assault, robbery, vandalism, and res-
idential burglary, data about known intravenous drug abuse was collected
from Professor Bejerot's register of intravenous drug abusers. These data
refer to whether the offender, or victim, was known at least once as an
intravenous drug abuser during the period January 1981 to June 1982.
Bejerot's register of intravenous drug abusers consists of all those
arrested in Stockholm who have been examined for the presence of needle
marks. The method has been described by Bejerot (1975, pp. 59-72) and
judged by him as a reliable method to diagnose intravenous drug abuse.
The major limitation with these data is that they only apply to those offen-
ders who have been arrested in Stockholm and examined for needle marks.
The number of intravenous drug abusers in the data are therefore likely
to be an underestimate. Moreover, they refer only to intravenous drug
abusers and not to those with just a nonintravenous drug abuse.
For the ecological and environmental parts of this study, all addressess
of places of crime commission, victim's home addressess, and (if known)
offender's home addressess were pinned on a large map of Stockholm.
Distances between address of the scene of the crime, and the victim's
and the offender's home addressess, were measured for all cases in which
these were known, with the restriction that only distances between addres-
ses within the boundaries of Stockholm were measured. All addresses pin-
ned out were also referred to the ward in which they were located (see
Chap. 6).
AppendixB
Legal Definitions of Crimes Included
in the Stockholm 1982 Crime Survey
In this appendix, the legal definitions, as stated in the Swedish Penal Code,
are given for the crimes included in the Stockholm 1982 Crime Survey. The
source for this section is the 1986:2 report by the National Council for
Crime Prevention, Sweden, which is an English translation of the Swedish
penal code.
Homicide (Murder and Manslaughter)

A person who takes the life of another shall be sentenced for murder to
imprisonment for 10 years or life.
If, in view of the circumstance that led to the act or for the reasons, the crime is
considered to be less grave, imprisonment for manslaughter shall be imposed for at
least 6 and at the most 10 years.
Assault (Serious/Petty, and Violence Toward a

Public Official)
A person who inflicts bodily injury, illness, or pain upon another or ren-
ders him unconscious or otherwise similarly helpless shall be sentenced for
assault to imprisonment for at most 2 years or, if the crime was petty, to
pay a fine.
If the crime is considered grave, the sentence shall be for aggravated assault to
imprisonment for at least 1 and at most 10 years. In judging the gravity of the
crime, special attention shall be paid to whether the deed involved mortal danger or
whether the offender had inflicted grievous bodily harm or severe illness or had
otherwise shown great ruthlessness or brutality.
If a person, by violence or threat of violence, attacks anyone in his exercise
of authority to compel him to perform or to prevent him from performing
264
Robbery 265
an official act, or for the purpose of taking revenge for such act, he shall be
sentenced for violence or threat to public servant to imprisonment for at
most 4 years or, if the crime is petty, to pay a fine or to imprisonment for at
most 6 months. The same shall apply if a person attacks someone who has
previously exercised authority for something he had done or failed to do
while in office. 1
Rape
If a person, by violence or by threat involving or appearing to the
threatened person as imminent danger, forces the latter to copulate or
have other comparable sexual intercourse, he or she shall be sentenced for
rape to imprisonment for at least 2 and at most 6 years. Rendering the
person unconscious or putting the person in other such state shall be re-
garded as equivalent to violence.
In view of the nature of the violence or the threat and the circumstances in other
respects the crime is considered less grave, a sentence to imprisonment for at most
4 years shall be imposed.
If the crime is grave, a sentence to imprisonment for at least 4 years and at
most 10 years shall be imposed for aggravated rape. In judging whether the
crime was grave, special attention shall be paid to whether the violence
involved a danger to life or whether the offender inflicted serious injury or
serious illness or otherwise displayed particular brutality.
Robbery
A person who steals by means of violence against another or by means of
threat implying or appearing to the threatened person as imminent danger
or who, after committing a theft being caught in the act, resists by such
violence or threat the one who wants to recover the stolen property, shall
be sentenced for robbery to imprisonment for at least 1 and at the most 6
years. The same shall apply if a person by such violence or threat forces
another to do or not do something resulting in gain to the offender and loss
to the person so forced or to someone he represents. Rendering a person
unconscious or similarly helpless is eqvivalent to violence.
If the crime is of a less serious nature in respect of the violence, threat or other
circumstances, the sentence shall not be for robbery but for such other offense as
the procedure entails.
1. Only the cases toward a public official involving actual violence have been in-
cluded in this study.
266 Appendix B
If the crime is regarded as grave, a sentence to imprisonment for at least 4

and at most 10 years shall be imposed for aggravated robbery. In judging
the gravity of the crime, special attention shall be paid to whether the
violence was dangerous to life or the offender inflicted serious bodily injury
or a severe illness or whether he otherwise had shown considerable brutal-
ity or had grossly taken advantage of the victim's defenceless or exposed
situation.
Molestation
A person who manually molests or by discharge of a firearm, throwing of stones,
making loud noise, or other heedless conduct harrasses another, shall be sentenced
for molestation to pay a fine or to imprisonment for at most 6 months.
Vandalism
A person who destroys or damages real property or chattels to the detri-
ment of another's right thereto, shall be sentenced for inflicting damage to
pay a fine or to imprisonment for at most 6 months.
If, considering the minimal harm and other circumstances of the act, the
crime is regarded as petty, a fine shall be imposed for trespassing.
If the crime is regarded as grave, imprisonment for at most 4 years shall be imposed
for inflicting gross damage. In judging the gravity of the crime, special attention
shall be paid to whether the act had given rise to substantial danger to anyone's life
or health or damage had been done to something of great cultural or economic
importance or else keenly felt.
Crimes of Theft (Burglaries and Thefts of and

from Cars)*
A person who, with the intent of appropriating it, unlawfully takes what
belongs to another shall, if the appropriation involves loss, be sentenced
for theft to imprisonment for at most 2 years.
If the crime is regarded as petty, considering the value of the stolen
goods and other circumstances of the crime, a sentence to pay a fine or to
imprisonment for at most 6 months shall be imposed for petty theft.
* Burglary, and thefts from cars, do not appear as special types of crimes in the
Swedish Penal Code, but under the legal code for crimes of theft. Residential burg-
laries are normally considered to be grand thefts.
Crimes of Theft 267
If the crime is regarded as grave, imprisonment for at least 6 months and at most 6
years shall be imposed for grand theft. In judging the gravity of the crime, special
attention shall be paid to whether it was aimed at an object which someone carried
on his person, whether the offender was equipped with a weapon, explosive, or
other similar means or whether the act otherwise was of a specially dangerous or
unscrupulous nature, directed at substantial values or involved a keenly felt loss.
If a person unlawfully takes or uses a motor vehicle or other motor-driven
conveyance belonging to another, he shall, unless the crime is punishable
under earlier provisions of this chapter, be sentenced for vehicle theft to
imprisonment for at most 2 years or, if the crime is of a petty nature, to pay
a fine.
If the crime is grave, imprisonment for at least 6 months and at most four
years shall be imposed.
AppendixC
Definitions of Variables Used in the
Factor Analysis of the Stockholm
Urban Structure
In this appendix the definitions are given of the variables used in the factor
analysis of Stockholm urban structure presented in Chapter 6.
Variable Comment
Ward Characteristics
Distance from city center Distance in hundreds of meters from the Sergei square to
the midpoint of the built-up part of the ward
Workplaces in commerce Number of persons working in an area in shops, service
institutions, hotels, restaurants, etc.
Manufacturing workplaces Number of persons working in an area in manufacturing
Workplaces Persons working in an area divided by the sum of persons
working and residing in the area (this measure will be
100 if there are no residences in an area and 0 if there are
no workplaces)
Demographic characteristics
Young persons Percentage of the residential population aged 0-14
Old persons Percentage of the residential population aged 60 or older
Females Percentage of females 15 years and older of the residential
population aged 15 years and older
Foreigners Percentage of the residential population with foreign
citizenship
Household characteristics
Household size Mean
Overcrowding Percentage of all households with more than two persons
per room, kitchen and one room excluded
Households with children Percentage of households with members aged 0-17 years.
Single working parents Households with single working parents with children aged
0-12 years
Housing characteristics
Houses Percentage of all residences in area in one- and two-family
houses
268
Appendix C 269
Nonprofit housing Percentage of all residences in an area in multistory houses

owned by nonprofit housing organization
Small residences Percentage of residences with two rooms and kitchen or
less
Large residences Percentage of residences with five rooms and kitchen or
more
Old residences Percentage of residences built before 1951
Vacant residences Percentage of vacant residences
Socioeconomic characteristics
Incoqte Mean
Income heterogeneity Mean-median
Blue-collar workers Percentage of residential population employed in manufac-
turing
Females gainfully employed Percentage of females with an income of 20,000 Swedish
Crowns or more of all females 15 years and older
Public welfare assistance Percentage of residential population receiving public wel-
fare assistance
continued
Selective Incapacitation and the Serious Offender:

A Longitudinal Study of Criminal Career Patterns
Rudy A. Haapanen
Deterrence and Juvenile Crime: Results from a National Policy

Experiment
Anne L. Schneider
Understanding Crime Incidence Statistics:

Why the UCR Diverges from the NCS
Albert D. Biderman and James P. Lynch
Developments in Crime and Crime Control Research: Gennan Studies

on Victims, Offenders, and the Public
Klaus Sessar and Hans-Jiirgen Kerner (Eds.)
Human Development and Criminal Behavior: News Ways of

Advancing Knowledge
Michael Tonry, Lloyd E. Ohlin, and David P. Farrington, with
contributions by Kenneth Adams, Felton Earls, David C. Rowe,
Robert J. Sampson, and Richard E. Tremblay
Urban Crime, Criminals, and Victims: The Swedish Experience

in an Anglo-American Comparative Perspective
Per-Olof Wikstrom

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Per-Olof H. Wikström Auth. Urban Crime, Criminals, and Victims The Swedish Experience in An Anglo-American Comparative Perspective

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Research in Criminology

Understanding and Controlling Crime: Toward A New Research Strategy

The Social Ecology of Crime

The Reasoning Criminal: Rational Choice Perspectives on Offending

The Social Contexts of Criminal Sentencing

Predicting Recidivism Using Survival Models

Coping, Behavior, and Adaptation in Prison Inmates

Prison Crowding: A Psychological Perspective

Off School, In Court: An Experimental and Psychiatric Investigation

Policing and Punishing the Drinking Driver:

Judicial Decision Making, Sentencing Policy, and Numerical Guidance

Criminal Behavior and the Justice System: Psychological Perspectives

Male Criminal Activity from Childhood Through Youth:

Multiple Problem Youth:

continued on page 271

Urban Crime, Criminals,

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

I. Crime-Sweden. I. Title. II. Series.

Printed on acid-free paper.

1991 Springer-Verlag New York Inc.

Typeset by Asco Trade Typesetting, Ltd., Quarry Bay, Hong Kong.

In addition it can be mentioned that Project Metropolitan operates on grants

Chapter l. Introduction ........................................................... .

Chapter 2 The Rate, Structure, and Trends in Urban Crime............... 7

Chapter 3 The Urban Offender .................................................. 16

Chapter 4 The Social Contexts of Urban Crime.............................. 49

Chapter 5 The Urban Victim..................................................... 100

Chapter 6 Stockholm: Its Crime and Urban Structure....................... 111

The Basic Units of Analysis................................................. 115

Chapter 7 Housing, Population Composition, and Offending.............. 130

Chapter 8 Routine Activities, Area Crime, and Victimization Patterns.. 185

Chapter 9 Integration and Discussion of Findings ........................... 237

Appendix A The Stockholm 1982 Crime Survey ............................ 260

Appendix B Legal Definitions of Crimes Included in the Stockholm 1982

Appendix C Definitions of Variables Used in the Factor Analysis of

Scope and Aim of Study

Some Brief Notes on Swedish Society and Its Crime

TABLE 1.1. Unemployment rates in Sweden,

TABLE 1.2. Age structure in Sweden in 1981.

TABLE 1.3. Population in Swedish localities with 500 or more inhabitants.

50,000 and above 33 18

Source: Swedish official statistics for 1980.

TABLE 1.4. Traditional crimes recorded by the police in Sweden in 1988.

Crimes of violence 46,975 55.5 6.0

Total 774,l36 915.2 100.0

aComplet~d homicides and assaults causing death.

Crimes of violenCe" 12 13 26 35 52 333%

TABLE 1.6. Percentage of selected categories of crimes reported to the police in

Assault (serious and petty) 34,757 9.4 2.1

30,000 immigrants to Sweden each year. However, the peak in immigra-

In this chapter, differences in the aggregate crime rate will be studied. It

The Rate of Crime

2. For some examples of deviations, see Clinard (1978) or Shelley (1980).

FIGURE 2.1. Scattergram of the relationship between degree of urbanization and

Rape" 2.3 2.1 1.9 1.3

Vandalism 129 108 123 92

Crimes of theft 1,205 958 1,117 591

Source: Statistiska meddelanden R 12 SM 8901 and population statistics.

Crime (Population) Big-city areas ('Yo) Rest of Sweden ('Yo)

Robberies 66.7 33.3

Populations 31.4 68.6

A comparison of the rates of police-reported traditional crimes in 1988 in

City of Medium-sized Small places and