A short history of crime prevention in Australia.

• Author: Homel, Peter

L'Australie se distingue en matiere de prevention du crime par d'importantes innovations et realisations dans plusieurs domaines. En revanche, plusieurs facteurs structurels empechent de bien tirer parti de ces reussites, dont une fragmentation continue entre l'etat/les territoires et les organismes nationaux, l'absence de leadership national et de vision commune en matiere de prevention du crime, les changements frequents de direction et de priorites strategiques a tous les paliers de gouvernement, les mesures provisoires qui empechent de passer du stade > au stade >, un manque de cohesion et de coordination entre les organismes cles (particulierement la police) et l'absence d'une base de donnees probantes a l'appui du bien-fonde de l'approche strategique dominante--le modele communautaire de prevention du crime. Cet article traite de chacune de ces questions sous l'angle de la gestion de la prevention du crime aux divers paliers de gouvernement australiens et propose certaines reflexions sur les orientations et pistes possibles a suivre pour remedier aux insuffisances existantes. On s'interesse particulierement aux consequences d'un engagement plus ferme en faveur de l'utilisation de modeles valables pour l'ensemble du gouvernement a l'appui de l'elaboration et de la mise en oeuvre de mesures de prevention du crime, a l'emergence du modele de > comme cadre pour l'elargissement et le renforcement de l'approche communautaire en matiere de prevention du crime, au role changeant de la police dans ce domaine, et on fait valoir la necessite de constituer des bases de donnees probantes a l'appui de la prevention du crime.

Introduction

The history of crime prevention in Australia has been a very "stop-and-start" affair. While some individual projects have produced real achievements through occasionally highly innovative strategies (e.g., in reducing violence at public events, approaches to dealing with drug-related crime), these results have not been easily or consistently achieved--see Gant and Grabosky (2000) for some examples--nor have they always been sustainable. In fact, a casual observer of the crime prevention experience in Australia could be forgiven for thinking that, in general, more importance and effort tend to be devoted to heralding the introduction of new crime prevention plans and strategies than are accorded to delivering the programs and resources necessary for real crime prevention action.

Part of the explanation for this situation lies in the fact that Australia has never had strong national leadership on crime prevention or a significant national crime prevention program. In fact, the first major national crime prevention program emerged only in 1995, with the launch of the Safer Australia initiative (Australia, Attorney General's Department 1995). Safer Australia was a relatively short-lived initiative that attempted to define national crime prevention priorities under the guidance and patronage of a panel of crime, business, and community "experts" who oversaw the dispersal of a small fund ($2.8 million over four years) "to trial specific crime reduction measures that will have application elsewhere in Australia" (Australia, Attorney General's Department 1995).

However, Australia has a federal system of government, and Safer Australia made only loose provision for the involvement of state and territory governments. This meant that the level of government with the bulk of responsibility for the major institutions of the criminal justice system, such as police, courts, and prisons, was in practice excluded from any substantial role in determining the national crime prevention agenda. At the same time, the national government also lacked ready access to the very programs known to have a significant influence on future participation in crime, in areas such as health, education, and housing, because these are also the primary responsibility of the states and territories.

As a response, the Safer Australia program placed significant emphasis on working with community groups at the local level, as well as on attempting to work directly with the third level of government in Australia: local government authorities. A precedent existed for adopting this sort of approach to crime prevention action, but it was one fraught with difficulties in terms of translating the experience of one nation to another. The referent was the Bonnemaison model from France (Bonnemaison 1991), which stressed the capacity of local authorities to undertake local actions directed at addressing the factors likely to promote criminal participation that are found within particular communities. Part of the translation difficulty related to the very different powers and responsibilities of local governments in Australia to those found in many European nations, or in parts of North America, where health, education, and even significant social welfare responsibilities are vested in local government. This has never been the case in Australia, which meant that crime prevention approaches such as the Bonnemaison model did not always easily fit into an Australian context.

Community-based crime prevention in Australia

When people talk about crime prevention in Australia, they usually mean approaches that are community based. Over the past 20 years, along with New Zealand and some parts of Western Europe, Australia's national, state, and territorial governments have consistently turned to the community development model as the basis for constructing viable strategies for the prevention of crime (Cameron and Laycock 2002).

The community development model strongly emphasizes the underlying belief that crime in a particular community is not primarily or solely the result of the actions of a small number of criminogenically disposed individuals but, rather, the result of the interplay of a series of structural determinants present within particular communities (e.g., differential rates of access to housing, employment, education, and health services). The argument goes that if these crime-promoting structural stress factors can be...