Urban security in southern Europe
| Author | Josefina Castro,Amadeu Recasens,Gian Guido Nobili,Carla Cardoso |
| DOI | 10.1177/1477370812473535 |
| Published date | 01 May 2013 |
| Date | 01 May 2013 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
2013
Article
European Journal of Criminology
10(3) 368 –382
Urban security in southern
© The Author(s) 2013
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DOI: 10.1177/1477370812473535
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Amadeu Recasens, Carla Cardoso
and Josefina Castro
University of Porto, Portugal
Gian Guido Nobili
University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, Italy
Abstract
This article examines comparative developments in the politics, policies and practices in public safety
and crime prevention across Italy, Portugal and Spain. The article begins by plotting the relatively
recent history of what may be termed ‘the preventive turn’ in this region of Europe. It is argued
that systematic thinking and coordinated policy and practice regarding crime prevention and public
safety remain limited and fragile, with notable exceptions in some cities (such as Barcelona) and
regions (such as Emilia-Romagna) across the three countries. Overall, the progress of local safety
and security programmes in southern Europe is uneven and fragmented when compared with much
of northern Europe. In turn, the current pressures on these countries’ governmental capacities and
resources in the light of the profound economic crisis they are undergoing are discussed and their
implications for progressive as against repressive urban security management assessed. The article
then compares the major areas of convergence and divergence across the three countries.
Keywords
Urban security, southern Europe, crime prevention, security management, comparative analysis,
public safety
What are we comparing?
This article considers three countries – Italy, Portugal and Spain – on the subject of urban
security. That, of necessity, means a comparative methodology that has its specific rules.
Nelken (1995: 332) stated that, when comparing, ‘the most important question that needs
to be asked is as follows: What is the purpose of our comparisons and what is it that
should be compared?’
Corresponding author:
Amadeu Recasens, University of Porto, Faculty of Law, Rua dos Bragas 223. 4050-123 Porto, Portugal.
Email: arecasensb@gmail.com
Recasens et al.
369
Comparing states
What we are trying to compare is the application of a particular concept (urban security1)
in three different states in relation to their urban contexts. The comparison raises a prob-
lem of measurement. As we reduce the area, we enter the field of differences that the
biggest lens does not allow one to see.2 Historically and geopolitically, these are three
states (in some cases we will use the term ‘southern European countries’) with common
elements taking a general overview, but also with great differences between them when
viewed through a specific and focused lens.
Italy was late to be unified and still maintains a strong local-based structure deriving
from the centuries before its unification, whereas Portugal, despite the prominent role of
some municipalities, has clear national roots. Spain is a kind of asymmetric semi-federal
state with large internal tensions. The concept of Spain as an unitary country is a political
construction of the central government that is contested by some important and determi-
nant nationalities (Catalonia and the Basque Country), which have parliamentary majori-
ties and a large popular base claiming the right to choose their future inside or outside the
Spanish state.
None of the three states was fully incorporated into the industrial revolution of the
19th century, although this does not apply to some regions of northern Italy or to Catalonia
and the Basque Country, which experienced it but with notable differences.
The three states suffered dictatorships but these governments occurred in different
eras and had different durations, natures and goals.3 The burden of these dictatorships,
especially in Portugal and Spain, affected the development of these countries in the fol-
lowing decades, and they suffered backwardness relative to European democracies.
Although universal healthcare, education and social insurance were achieved in the
course of the 1980s, the welfare state remained below expectations and the quality of its
services far from the reference European countries. Security issues were influenced by
repressive and militaristic models (Ballbé, 1983) and these models strongly permeated
the security forces in their structure, training and performance. The repressive culture
blocked the implementation of preventive policies, which had some recognition only
from the 1980s, when the resources of the welfare state were already depleted in Europe
(Agra et al., 2002; Recasens, 2001). However, that description does not apply to Italy,
which was fully incorporated into the formal European democracies and economies from
the end of the Second World War.
Currently, southern European countries are suffering an economic crisis greater than
that of most European states, although its origin and its causes are different (urban specu-
lation, the banking crisis, industrial bankruptcy, lack of productivity) and its resolution
follows divergent paths and guidelines, despite the apparent homogenization produced
by similar European policies. In addition, it is necessary to consider the concept of con-
urbation. The growth of large suburban areas around cities, through successive waves of
mass migration, requires new forms of planning for their problems, outstanding among
which are issues of security and coexistence, as well as social inequality and exclusion.
Moreover, since the 1960s mass tourism has provoked enormous seasonal imbalances in
particular zones of the three countries.
370
European Journal of Criminology 10(3)
In Italy and Spain, the progressive abandonment of powers by states nearing bank-
ruptcy hides debt by transferring balances to sub-state administrations. Municipal gov-
ernments, because of their proximity to citizens, are not able to avoid their responsibilities
to them and are in an untenable situation, without the legal or economic resources to deal
with immediate problems such as security. The economic issue has resulted in unprece-
dented municipal indebtedness,4 and the municipalities try to overcome their legislative
incapacity by sanctioning administrative law, as reflected in the proliferation of munici-
pal safety by-laws, especially in Italy (Selmini, 2012b; Nobili, 2004: 33) and Spain
(Recasens and Rodriguez, 2012). These regulations do not always meet the minimum
standards for guaranteeing citizens’ rights, even, in some cases, showing significant lev-
els of arbitrariness.5
But if states abdicate their role as guarantors of welfare, they do not renounce the
exercise of power, both real (justice, criminal law, police, collection and redistribution of
most taxes) and symbolic (international representation). The neoliberal model of ‘state
downsizing’ and privatization policies and the model of participatory and co-managerial
governance6 have contributed to create urban spaces of safety with very specific charac-
teristics. These correspond to a ‘glocal’ model of security problem management, having
placed urban security questions at the centre of controversy in southern European
countries.
In summary, comparing states such as Italy, Spain and Portugal means comparing
three clearly differentiated realities, although on a small scale (north–south Europe) they
may seem similar. It seems much more useful to abandon the artificial political divisions
between states in favour of larger and more accurate scales, such as regions or
municipalities.
Following a classic distinction (Marradi, 1980 [2000]: 122), we can say that the research
approach adopted, rather than ‘cross-national’, is ‘cross-local’ but with a transnational
dimension. In other words, we could largely describe the approach as ‘cross-glocal’
(Edwards and Hughes, 2005).
Comparing concepts
Although there is a lack of conceptual development of urban security in the three coun-
tries (Castro et al., 2012; Selmini, 2012a; Recasens, 2012), this comparative analysis will
be focused on public safety and crime prevention politics, policies and practices.
In fact, we do not find at any level of the three states the broad concept of ‘urban
security’ in the sense of the US model of ‘homeland security’, based on extending to the
civil field the technology and the interests of large military industries, the use of large-
scale military deployments for major security issues and the development of the ideology
of the ‘internal enemy’ (Light, 2002). However, it should be noted that the processes of
globalization of security – and especially global terrorism7 – are increasingly introducing
into European security policies the discourse of the primacy of repression, the ‘criminal
law of the enemy’ and the concept of a ‘war against crime’. These aspects are related to
the wider problems of transnational crime, which are not, as yet, part of the tradition of
urban security in the southern European countries.
Recasens et al.
371
‘Sicurezza urbana’ in Italy
In Italy, ‘urban security’ policies are to be found partly in an already existing framework
of powers (which we could term social prevention) and partly in a new area of interven-
tion for local authorities, in which the right to live safely is considered a public good akin
to other citizens’ rights, and responsibility for it belongs to the local government (a better ...
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