Law and Order Blues
| DOI | 10.1375/acri.35.2.127 |
| Author | Don Weatherburn |
| Published date | 01 August 2002 |
| Date | 01 August 2002 |
Don Weatherburn
NSW Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research
This paper discusses law and order politics and policy in Australia. It
challenges the conventional criminological wisdom that Australia does
not have a serious crime problem. It argues that, while political responses
to crime are all too frequently irrational, this is not because Australian
state and territory governments so often rely on punitive law and order
policies. Australian law and order policy is irrational because it usually
lacks any clear rationale, is rarely subjected to any effectiveness or cost-
effectiveness evaluation, frequently ignores the possibility of unintended
side-effects and is occasionally founded on a misdiagnosis of the crime
problem that prompts it.The paper concludes by discussing various expla-
nations for this state of affairs and what can be done about it.
Australian criminologists have had a long-standing interest in the politics of law
and order.1 The common thread running through most law and order commentaries
is that: (a) Australia does not have a serious crime problem, or if it does, then it is
one which is no worse than it has ever been or, if it is worse, then it is worse only in
relation to property crime, not in relation to violent crime; (b) that punitive law
and order policies are not, by and large, a “rational” response to crime; and (c) that
the low standard of public debate about law and order in Australia can be blamed
largely on the cynical pursuit of commercial or political advantage by the media
and politicians.
This article challenges these assumptions. The argument to this end is organised
into four sections. In the first I try to show that the balance of evidence indicates
that both violent and property crime have risen substantially in Australia since the
mid-1970s. In the second I try to show that our crime problems are more serious
than is often assumed and that public concern about crime is in many respects
quite rational. In the third I argue that, while there are many examples in Australia
of ill-considered law and order policies, the principal defect of Australian law and
order policy is not that it is punitive but that it is so rarely evidence-driven or
evaluated. In the fourth I argue that one of the main reasons for the irrationality of
Australian law and order policy is that governments (of any political persuasion)
exert only limited control over crime. This article concludes with a brief discussion
of the future of law and order policy in Australia.
Address for correspondence: Dr Don Weatherburn, NSW Bureau of Crime Statistics and
Research, GPO Box 6, Sydney 2001, NSW Australia.
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VOLUME 35 NUMBER 2 2002 PP. 127–144
DON WEATHERBURN
Does Australia Have a Law and Order Problem?
Figure 1 shows the change in real per capita expenditure by the states and territo-
ries on law and order over the last five years.2
State and territory spending on law and order has increased by 24% in real
terms over this period. In nominal terms, during the financial year 1998/99,
Australian state and territory governments spent a total of nearly 6.2 billion dollars
on law and order (Productivity Commission, personal communication, 2001). To
many within government, Figure 1 signals a serious and growing crime problem.
Many criminologists, though, view increased spending on law and order as
evidence of the extent to which law and order policy is out of touch with reality.
The common theme running through many commentaries is that Australia does
not have a serious crime problem, or if it does, then it is one which is no worse
than it has ever been.
What evidence is there to support this proposition? Surprisingly little, as it
turns out. Most Australian analyses of law and order politics and policy actually
make no attempt to gauge whether Australia has a serious/rising crime problem.
Some, (e.g., Daly 1995; Jackson 1996; Christie 1998) preoccupy themselves with
the way in which media handling of crime issues can influence public policy.
Others (e.g., Dixon 1995; Chan 1995a; Braithwaite 1989) are concerned with
the limited influence criminology has on public policy. Still others (e.g., Travis
et al., 1995) challenge the evidence consistent with the view that Australia has
a serious crime problem but do not adduce evidence to rebut it. Only Hogg and
Brown (1996, 1998) and Indermaur (1995, 2000) have actually tried to present
such evidence.
The central problem facing any claim that crime has not increased in Australia
over the last 25 years is that recorded rates of crime have increased greatly. It is
impossible to obtain a consistent set of police crime data for the entire post-war
period but Mukherjee and Dagger (1990) collated police data on trends in the
major offence categories between 1973/74 and 1988/89. These data show a 382%
FIGURE 1
Australian state and territory expenditure on law and order (constant $).
128
THE AUSTRALIAN AND NEW ZEALAND JOURNAL OF CRIMINOLOGY
LAW AND ORDER BLUES
increase in recorded rates of serious assault, a 121% increase in recorded rates of
robbery, a 122% increase in recorded rates of break and enter, a 106% increase in
motor vehicle theft, a 220% increase in fraud and an 80% increase in general steal-
ing offences. More recent national police crime data produced by the Australian
Bureau of Statistics, covering the period between 1993 and 1999 show no evidence
of a reduction in crime and, in some cases, such as robbery, clear evidence of a
substantial increase (Australian Bureau of Statistics, 1993a, 1999)
Hogg and Brown dismiss this evidence on the basis that large numbers of non-
fatal crime incidents are not reported to or recorded by police. They point out that
the legal definition of what constitutes violence has become clearer, possibly leading
to increases in the reporting of domestic violence and sexual offences. In addition,
they speculate, the public has become more intolerant of violent behaviour, further
increasing the frequency with which such behaviour comes to official attention
(Hogg & Brown 1998). Because homicide is nearly always reported to police Hogg
and Brown contend that it is a much more reliable indicator of trends in rates of
violent crime. Because the rate of homicide has remained stable in Australia since
the 1970s, they conclude that Australia is not experiencing “dramatically higher”
violent crime rates than in the past (Hogg & Brown, 1998, p. 47).
Indermaur (2000) also dismisses police crime data on the grounds that it is
vulnerable to changes in police and/or public sensitivity about crime. Echoing
Hogg and Brown, he maintains that homicide data provide a “gold standard”
(Indermaur 2000, p. 288) when it comes to judging trends in violent crime, arguing
that, if Australia’s violent crime rate had risen, we would have seen some increase
in the level of homicide. As further evidence of the stability of Australian violent
crime rates, he draws attention to data from Australian victimisation surveys.
According to Indermaur, “when adjustments are made for changes in survey
methodology” (Indermaur 2000, p. 289) these data show no increase in the preva-
lence of assault between 1975 and 1993.
What can be said about these arguments? Firstly, one cannot forbear observing
that there is something strange about an argument to the effect that we cannot
measure levels of non-fatal violence but we can be sure homicide is a reliable index
of levels of non-fatal violence. If the argument appears plausible it is only because
some homicides occur in the context of assaults which inadvertently prove fatal.
But homicides are not all instances of assaults gone wrong. Many are intended.
Even if they were all instances of assaults gone wrong we have no basis for assuming
that fatal violence is a constant proportion of non-fatal violence. Homicides make
up less than 1% of all violent crime. Factors such as the level of gun ownership
might be expected to exert quite different effects on homicide and assault rates.
The suggestion, then, that trends in recorded homicides provide a barometer of
general trends in violent crime is at best an implausible conjecture. At worst, it
begs the question at issue.
Hogg and Brown’s and Indermaur’s main point — that police-recorded crime
can be influenced by changes in public willingness to report crime — is undoubt-
edly true. In the United States (O’Brien, 1996), although not in Britain (Langan &
Farrington, 1998), crime victim survey data and police assault data present a very
different picture of trends in non-fatal violent crime. Fortunately, Australian victim
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129
DON WEATHERBURN
survey data provide some basis for gauging the extent to which changes in recorded
crime might have come about because increased public willingness to report crime.
Both Hogg and Brown (1996, 1998) and Indermaur (1995, 2000) are principally
concerned with violent crime. Before turning to the issue of violent crime,
however, it is worth considering trends in the major categories of property crime
since these offences also arouse a great deal of public concern (Australian Bureau of
Statistics, 1998).
The increases in recorded rates of break and enter and motor vehicle theft
reported by Mukherjee and Dagger (1990) between 1973/74 and 1988/89 and by
the Australian Bureau of Statistics between 1993 and 1999 (Australian Bureau of
Statistics, 1999) are entirely consistent with results from Australian crime victim
surveys. The 1975...
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