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Monday, February 8, 2010

The Theory of Broken Window



The theory of broken window suggests that a high concentration of petty crimes can lead to a higher and bigger crimes. The theory are made based on the observation of James Q Wilson and George L Kelling in New York transit. From their study, the reasons why crime rates are very high especially in the subway area was due to grafitti and vandalisme to the subway train that went unnoticed or ignored by the authorities. Because it is ignored or considered as small and petty crimes, the vandalisers there sees it as a signal for them to become more aggresive and starts to do much more serious crimes.
The theory also suggests that in order to reduce crimes, you must tackle it even at the earliest stage and that is at the broken window stage. By fixing the window immediately, it will leave the message to the would-be criminals that no rooms for law breaking is allowed here even for small crimes as broken window.
How does this relate to Malaysia? In my perspective, in order for the police and authorities to reduce the crime rate in Malaysia in a drastic manner is to focus more on the 'broken window' and take care of it immediately. Among the 'broken window' that worth mentioning is the dvd/vcd pirate sellers. Here in Malaysia, it is a norm to see this particular vendor selling the pirated dvd of the road or 'pasar malam'. They are breaking the law in broad daylight and it seems that the authorities just simply either don't care or considered it as petty crimes so it is not worth their effort to crack down their operations. However, if we follow the theory of the broken window, it leaves the impression that is ok to bend the law, and this will lead to higher crimes.