Book Review: Experiences of Crime across the World: Key Findings of the 1989 International Crime Survey.
| Published date | 01 January 1991 |
| Date | 01 January 1991 |
| Author | Wesley G. Skogan |
| DOI | 10.1177/026975809100100406 |
| Subject Matter | Book Reviews |
International
Review
of
Victimology,
1991,
Vol. 1, pp. 363-368
0269-7580/91
$10
©
1991
A B Academic Publishers-Printed in Great Britain
BOOK
REVIEWS
EXPERIENCES
OF
CRIME ACROSS·
THE
WORLD: KEY
FINDINGS OF
THE
1989
INTERNATIONAL CRIME SURVEY.
J.J.M. Van Dijk, P. Mayhew and
M:
Killias. Kluwer; Deventer and
Boston,
1990.
ix
and
188
pp. £30.00.
This book reports on the first truly cross-national survey of victimization,
the International Crime Survey (ICS) of 1989. In order to cut through the
complexities of different national legal systems and bypass differences in
how crimes are reported to the police and processed by them in various
countries, comparable victimization surveys were fielded in
14
nations
or
regions. The countries involved ranged in size from Australia to Belgium,
and in language from Finland to Spain. The United Kingdom was
represented by separate surveys of Scotland, Northern Ireland, and
England. In addition, the book discusses some findings from comparable
city surveys in Warsaw (Poland) and Surabaja (Indonesia). In most places,
standardized
10--15
minute telephone interviews were conducted with
random population samples
in
January-February of 1989, asking people
about their experiences with crime. The project was co-ordinated by
researchers
in
the Dutch Ministry of Justice, the British Home Office, and
the University of Lausanne
in
Switzerland, but the surveys were paid for
locally.
The ICS broke little theoretical ground.
It
was grounded in the vague
variant of 'opportunity theory' that underlines most victimization surveys.
This approach stresses the physical and social vulnerability of various
social groups, the attractiveness of their possessions to potential thieves,
and the ways in which individuals expose
or
protect themselves from risk
as they
go
about their daily routines. Because surveys gather data only on
the experiences of victims, important determinants of local crime rates like
the supply of motivated offenders escape notice. Instead, the ICS and
surveys like it focus on people's backgrounds, possessions, and household
organization to explain which
of
them are victimized.
The ICS found that individuals who are more 'exposed to risk' were
more heavily victimized; this included respondents who lived
in
big cities,
reported going out frequently in the evening, and owned a car, bicycle, or
scooter. The relationship between income and victimization was a positive
one; this
is
usually interpreted as reflecting the greater attractiveness of
affluent households as targets of crime, and in the ICS this pattern proved
to be fairly constant across nations (only the Netherlands violated this
rule, largely due to the distribution of bicycle theft).
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