Government Effectiveness, Crime Rates and Crime Reporting

Azfar, Omar; Gurgur, Tugrul

doi:10.2139/ssrn.723681

Cited by 8 publications

(9 citation statements)

References 14 publications

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“…However, although there may be more malevolent reasons for the comparatively higher levels of assault in more affluent neighborhoods in Tshwane, without more contextual detail available in the crime data-such as the modus operandi, whether the crime occurred indoors or outdoors, or whether alcohol was in any way involved-any association between alcohol, time, and deprivation will be difficult to determine. In addition, it is possible that victims in the more socially deprived quintiles are less likely to report assaults to the police, perhaps because of fear of retaliation or because they do not trust the authorities (see Azfar & Gurgur, 2005;Soares, 2004). Levitt (1999) stated that "there is evidence that the propensity to report crime to the police is a function of a victim's income" (p. 97) with low-income households being less likely to report victimization to the police compared with households with high-income levels.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In addition, it is possible that victims in the more socially deprived quintiles are less likely to report assaults to the police, perhaps because of fear of retaliation or because they do not trust the authorities (see Azfar & Gurgur, 2005;Soares, 2004). Levitt (1999) stated that "there is evidence that the propensity to report crime to the police is a function of a victim's income" (p. 97) with low-income households being less likely to report victimization to the…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Seasonal Assault and Neighborhood Deprivation in South Africa

Breetzke

Cohn

2011

Environment and Behavior

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Little is known about spatial and temporal variations of violent crime in South Africa. This article addresses this gap by investigating the seasonality of assault at a neighborhood level in the city of Tshwane. The authors first investigate whether assault is seasonal, and then examine the association between seasonal levels of assault and area measures of social deprivation for urban neighborhoods in Tshwane. Similar to previous international res earch, the authors found that assault is seasonal, with higher incidences of assault in summer. Deprived neighborhoods exhibited higher rates of assault than more affluent neighborhoods. Assault levels in urban neighborhoods were found to be socially stratified and spatially patterned regardless of the season of the year. More deprived neighborhoods had higher assault rates in summer, whereas in winter, assault rates were more equably split over neighborhoods ranging from high to low deprivation. More affluent neigh borhoods typically exhibited lower assault rates in summer.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Seasonal Assault and Neighborhood Deprivation in South Africa

Breetzke

Cohn

2011

Environment and Behavior

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“…Indeed, the empirical studies discussed here demonstrate a clear negative, linear relationship between various aspects of illegal activity and the quality of governance. Azfar and Gurgur (2005) show that the incidence of different types of crime is associated with higher levels of corruption and lower levels of government effectiveness. Fisman and Wei (2007) and Berger and Nitsch (2008) present evidence from trade statistics that a higher level of corruption is associated with increased smuggling activities.…”

Section: : Literature Review and Hypothesesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This is not surprising, given that state failure results in the complete breakdown of data collection 8 . Even when a state has some data collection capacity, there may be severe concerns about data quality: Soares (2004) and Azfar and Gurgur (2005) show that the willingness to report crime is negatively correlated with institutional quality and corruption. Because of this association between state weakness and the absence of (reliable) data, the states at the very bottom of the governance spectrum have been systematically excluded from the governance studies cited above 9 .…”

Section: Governance and Data Collectionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Gov-Arrrgh-Nance: Jolly Rogers and Dodgy Rulers

Groot

Shortland

2010

SSRN Journal

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Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen:Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden.Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen.Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. Terms of use: Documents in AbstractIn this paper, we argue that the effect of governance on the emergence of crimes of different levels of sophistication is highly non-linear. State failure, anarchy and a lack of infrastructure are not conducive to establishing any business, including illicit enterprises. At the bottom of the spectrum, therefore, both legal business and criminal gangs benefit from improved governance. With further improvements in governance criminal activities decline. We find strong and consistent support for this hypothesis using the International Maritime Bureau's dataset on piracy. Piracy is reported by ship-owners, giving a unique insight into crime in badly governed countries which were systematically excluded from previous analyses. We show that profitable forms of piracy flourish where on the one hand there is stability and infrastructure, but on the other hand the state does not have the capacity to intervene and/or bureaucrats can be bribed to turn a blind eye. For minor acts of theft from ships the pattern is quadratic: piracy first rises and then falls as governance improves.

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“…This has led to the suggestion that factors associated with governance and institutional capacity should be considered in models for examining relationships with crime (Nivette and Eisner 2013). This has begun to happen, with several studies showing how ineffective institutional structures can have an influence on crime (Azfar and Gurgur 2005;Huebert and Brown 2019;Nivette and Eisner 2013;Pinker 2011;Wenmann and Muggah 2010). With particular consideration to the Latin American region, Neumayer (2003) has suggested that political governance could be a predictive variable for explaining the variation in homicide rates across the region.…”

Section: Qualitative Review: Factors Explaining High Homicide Levels-a Latin America Focusmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Influence of Government Effectiveness and Corruption on the High Levels of Homicide in Latin America

2021

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Most research that has examined the international variation in homicide levels has focused on structural variables, with the suggestion that socio-economic development operates as a cure for violence. In Latin America, development has occurred, but high homicide levels remain, suggesting the involvement of other influencing factors. We posit that government effectiveness and corruption control may contribute to explaining the variation in homicide levels, and in particular in the Latin America region. Our results show that social and economic structural variables are useful but are not conclusive in explaining the variation in homicide levels and that the relationship between homicide, government effectiveness, and corruption control was significant and highly pronounced for countries in the Latin American region. The findings highlight the importance of supporting institutions in improving their effectiveness in Latin America so that reductions in homicide (and improvements in citizen security in general) can be achieved.

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Government Effectiveness, Crime Rates and Crime Reporting

Cited by 8 publications

References 14 publications

Seasonal Assault and Neighborhood Deprivation in South Africa

Seasonal Assault and Neighborhood Deprivation in South Africa

Gov-Arrrgh-Nance: Jolly Rogers and Dodgy Rulers

The Influence of Government Effectiveness and Corruption on the High Levels of Homicide in Latin America

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