The Great American Crime Decline

Few criminologists were surprised when crime rates rose sharply in the 1960s. The upturn reflected demographic causes, one of the “usual suspects” of criminological theory. As the baby boomers matured, crime rates would fall just as sharply as they had risen. When crime rates continued to rise well into the 1980s, criminologists blamed fundamental societal changes for the failure of their theoretical predictions. Some of the more daring predicted that this “brave new world” would result in higher crime rates until at least the end of the century. But this prediction failed too. Describing the course of a complex, highly aggregated time series is an art, not unlike fiction writing. With that said, sometime between late 1991 and early 1994, the rates of virtually all common crimes began a steady decade-long decline. Criminologists were initially skeptical of the decline—and more so when politically savvy big city police officials stepped forward to take credit for it. By late 1995 or early 1996, the skeptics had become a small, ignored minority of the discipline. Although the length and breadth of the great decline embarrassed a few criminologists, most recognized it as an historic opportunity to extend and refine their theories. Symposium volumes sponsored by the National Institute of Justice (Travis, 1998) and the National Consortium for Violence Research (Blumstein and Wallman, 2000) outlined an emerging disciplinary research program. By June 2008, the two symposium volumes had racked up several hundred citations, demonstrating that the historic downturn had become a “cottage industry,” if not a subdiscipline. This large and growing literature raises the question of whether The Great American Crime Decline adds anything new. It does. Readers who need closed-form answers to narrow policy questions may not appreciate the book’s novelty. The book reports no “results” to speak of and has few “findings. ” Zimring’s conservative rhetoric and reliance on soft visual evidence—plots and charts— may also frustrate. Conservative rhetoric and soft evidence are well suited to larger questions, on the other hand. Readers who are interested in the sociological significance of the phenomenon will appreciate this book. After describing the length and breadth of the great decline, Zimring considers the “usual suspects” of criminological theory— the big three. By apparent coincidence, demographic and economic trends favored declining crime rates during the 1990s. At about the same time, California and other states enacted Draconian sentencing reforms that might also produce lower crime rates. Could this “perfect storm” explain the great decline? Zimring argues that, although the big three “usual suspects” might explain some part of the great decline, the onset, duration, and depth of the decline implicate other causes. Searching retrospectively for these other causes, criminologists suggested in the late 1990s that the great decline might be due to the joint effects of innovative policing strategies and the stabilization of big city drug markets. At about the same time, economists suggested that the great decline was due to the coincidental, independent effects of two causes: first, increases in the number of police in big cities—more police, less crime; and second, greater access to abortion in the wake of the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision—fewer unwanted pregnancies in 1974, fewer poorly socialized young men in 1991. Zimring dismisses all four explanations. His arguments about the effects of innovative policing and stabilized drug markets will not be controversial. The criminologists who proposed these explanations would probably agree. Zimring’s arguments about the effects of beefed-up police forces and liberalized abortion policies may be controversial, in contrast, especially in light of the on-going turf war between criminologists and economists. The weight of opinion across the social science disciplines has tilted towards Zimring’s view, I think. But since the contrary view is cited prominently, readers can draw their own conclusions.