NCJ Number
204612
Journal
Criminology Volume: 41 Issue: 3 Dated: August 2003 Pages: 611-643
Editor(s)
Robert J. Bursik Jr.
Date Published
August 2003
Length
33 pages
Annotation
This study conducted a cross-national test of three theoretical perspectives: social support, institutional anomie, and macrolevel general strain which have emerged as explanations of aggregate levels of crimes.
Abstract
Criminological theorists have made major strides in recent years, including the emergence of new theoretical traditions, the development of sophisticated multilevel explanations of crime, and the refinement and reformulation of well-established criminological theories. One of the most visible trends is the movement toward theoretical integration. Social support, institutional anomie, and macrolevel general strain theory all exist as integrated alternatives. This article attempts to demonstrate how social support, institutional anomie, and macrolevel general strain theories specify similar relationships among measures of social support, economic inequality, and crime. It attempts to highlight the similarities across these theories in terms of how they view the dynamics of social support, inequality and crime. It addition, the study empirically tests the core propositions shared by these theories concerning the relative effects of social support and economic inequality on homicide rates. It addresses the issues of whether social support and economic inequality maintain significant independent effect on homicide rates, whether controlling for the effects of either social support or economic inequality moderate the effects for either variable, and whether there is a significant interaction effect between social support and economic inequality on homicide rates in the cross-national setting. The analysis shows that significant relationships among social support, inequality, and crime rates do exist. Particularly, measures of both social support and economic inequality maintain strong and stable main and interaction effects with homicide rates. In addition, the interaction effects revealed that the criminogenic effects of economic inequality are enhanced. These relationships remained stable when assessed under different sampling conditions and under different methodological specifications. Overall, this study indicates that state-based crime control efforts do not necessarily have to come in a punitive form. References