Summary
This report examines the role of community cohesion and crime by linking data on neighbourhood cohesion from the local areas with recorded crime data. The paper finds that cohesive communities have five key attributes: a sense of community, similar life opportunities for all regardless of ethnicity, a respect for diversity, political trust, and a sense of belonging. The sense of community factor in particular is found to be a strong predictor of various types of crime. Local areas that have a higher sense of community have lower levels of ‘all reported crime’, burglary from dwelling, theft of and from motor vehicles and violent crime. The evidence suggests that policies targeted at increasing sense of community could have a double effect by reducing levels of neighbourhood crime.
Contents
1. Key findings – 2. Introduction – 3. Local area case studies of community cohesion – 4. The relationship between crime and community cohesion – 5. Key factors in community cohesion – 6. Relationship between community cohesion factors and the all crime measure – 7. Factors of community cohesion as key drivers of reported crime – 8. Conclusions.