Crime and the Structure of Social Relations

Abstract

The geography of crime spans a broader range of subject matter than is often recognized. Using the example of victimization in an ethnically mixed inner city, it is suggested in this paper that the distribution of crime reflects the lifestyle and activity patterns of a community; and that the effects of crime, in turn, help to shape these routine urban behaviours. Thus, social structure and its spatial organization are both reflected in the form of criminal activity, and affected by the fear that this behaviour engenders. Crime infuses a range of social, economic and political relations; its geography offers insights into how these structural phenomena are played out in everyday life.