Can we improve security risk assessments by understanding why people commit crime? Part Three.

Part Three: Right vs Left Realism

The story so far…

• Classicism says that criminals commit crime because they choose to. It’s because they make a rational calculation that it would be inherently pleasurable to do so.

• Biological, psychological, and sociological positivism says that criminals commit crime because they have a predisposition to do so.

• Together, they suggest that crime is caused by many factors, internal and external, to the individual.

• Security must, therefore, understand and think creatively about addressing both the internal and external factors that lead to incidents in the workplace.

Why do people commit crimes?

Let’s push the idea that people commit crime because of factors that are both inside and outside their control a little bit further.

Let’s talk about realism.

Realism came on the scene in the 1970s and 1980s in response to frustration around rising crime rates and the seemingly ineffective social policies aimed at tackling the root causes of crime.¹

As a result, the elections of Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher in the UK in 1979 and President Ronald Reagan in the US in 1981 were dominated by what to do about crime.² This coincided with political, economic, and social shifts towards “strong government”, economic liberalism and the individualistic consumerist culture.³

There are two types of realism:

1. Right Realism

2. Left Realism

Right Realism

Right realism has this interesting blend of classicism, biological positivism, and social positivism. Right realists agree with the classical perspective that people are rational and that if they are offending it’s because they are intellectually and “morally impoverished”.⁴

Therefore, the best way to deal with offenders is to increase deterrence through police control, legal sanctions (prison and probation), and social controls (church, education, homogenous values, etc.).⁵

In my opinion, this looks a lot like how the US government regulates immigration and border control. Several months ago, when President Trump was elected, he argued that it was due to porous borders with Canada that was the source of their fentanyl problem. To solve this, Trump wanted more guards, and of course, more walls…

While I question the data that Trump used to make Canada the problem, his decision can be clearly understood through a right realist lens.

Left Realism

Left realism, on the other hand, emerged as a result of the right realism and critical criminological approaches to crime control.⁶ Left realism makes the argument that crime is caused because there is something deeply flawed in our societal structures, like “zero tolerance” and “competitive individualism and aggressive masculinity”.⁷

Left realists take a multifaceted approach that emphasizes the interactions between the offender, the victim, the community, and the criminal justice system. They look at the causes of crime - not cause, but causes.⁸

Let’s take an example - residential burglary by juvenile delinquents. A left realist may tackle residential burglary by youngsters in a few ways:

• make it more difficult to commit the crime (think situational crime prevention, which I’ll cover next week)

• work with the education and medical systems to reduce accessibility barriers and unemployment

• focus criminal justice efforts on restoration and rehabilitation, not just punishment

• provide proper food in the education system - thank you Jamie Oliver

• provide sport or other programs to engage the youngsters.

What do I like about these theories?

First, they both recognize that crimes are committed for many reasons and not all of them are because we simply choose to be bad people or not. Right realism focuses primarily on the individual, but acknowledges some biological and moral factors as the causes of crime. Left Realism, on the other hand, focuses on sociological factors, but acknowledges some individual factors as well as the causes of crime.

The crime response is then almost predictable. Right realism emphasizes situational crime prevention and places a minor emphasis on social crime prevention, whereas left realism emphasizes social crime prevention and places a minor emphasis on situational crime prevention.⁹

Second, they provide an important historical context that we can use as voters to evaluate our political leaders’ approaches to controlling crime. In Canada, we just had a really interesting federal election, which was a relatively close race between the liberals and the conservatives. What grieved me though was that many of the people that I know didn’t take a critical approach to evaluating the parties’ platforms, which both surprised me and didn’t surprise me. Positivism emerged in the enlightenment era and suggests that only knowledge which has been proven ought to be permitted in the public domain. Yet, the rise of right and left realism suggests that people’s political leanings influenced their perspectives on crime, not their understanding of what has been proven. Knowing now how these theories emerged, might we be more critical of what our leaders propose in the future?

Third, they try to be realistic about what can be done with crime. Thus, both approaches have elements of both social and situational crime prevention.

What do I think?

First, both approaches have merit. The question is not which one is correct, but which one is most helpful and for whom.

You see, many of the approaches taken to security risk management have their theoretical underpinnings in right realism:

• Routine Activities Approach

• Rational Choice Perspective

• Situational Crime Prevention

• Crime Pattern Theory

For the security professional, these are enormously helpful. Even the criminologist or sociologist that is commissioned to reduce crime during a politician’s 4-year cycle will find that right realism is quite helpful.

Controlling crime by changing situational elements (i.e. more lighting, more speed bumps, etc.) have almost immediate impacts on an offender’s decision-making process.

Left realism, on the other hand, is the long game. Unfortunately, in an age of consumerism where we get what we want when we want it playing the long game is something that few of us want to do.

Impacting communities and work forces through social crime prevention takes time. It takes time to build policies and programs that include the previously excluded. And, it takes time to balance a system hell bent on causing a massive gap between those who have and those who don’t have.

But, I’m not an idealist. At least, I try not to be. This is realism. Both the left and the right sides of realism.

I think you need both. I think when you play both you don’t just play the short game or the long game. You play the infinite game.¹⁰

So what? My advice for the security professional.

Tomorrow morning, whatever your task: conduct a risk assessment, conduct a business impact analysis, patrol a facility, or design a camera layout, here is my advice:

• remember that you are not limited in how you mitigate risk to environmental factors (i.e. situational crime prevention). You have a wealth of social factors that you can use. The best part, I think, is that this allows you to help your executives make decisions about how the business is structured, how you compensate your staff, and how you develop human resources. In other words, this is your door into organizational resilience.

• don’t limit your role to cameras and guarding. Your understanding of what causes people to commit crime and the best way to respond to crime means that you have a key role to play in leading your organizations in the infinite game of resilience. Thus, speak into organizational design. Speak into fair wages. Speak into team building and learning. Go to town!

What’s next?

Next week, I’m going to look into situational crime prevention and its associated concepts like the rational choice perspective and routine activity approach.

If you are tired of the theory, next week is for you. While still theory, SCP helps you to make wise decisions about why a security measure may or may not work for a given offender.

Until next time.

Shawn

1. Walklate, S. (2007) Understanding Criminology: Current Theoretical Debates. 3rd ed. Maidenhead: McGraw-Hill Education, 38-39.

2. Case, S. et al. (2021) The Oxford textbook on criminology. Second edition. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 622

3. Case, S. et al. (2021) The Oxford textbook on criminology. Second edition. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 622-623.

4. Case, S. et al. (2021) The Oxford textbook on criminology. Second edition. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 623.

5. Case, S. et al. (2021) The Oxford textbook on criminology. Second edition. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 623.

6. McLaughlin, E. and Muncie, J. (eds.) (2019) The Sage Dictionary of Criminology. 4th edn. London: Sage Publications Ltd., 300.

7. McLaughlin, E. and Muncie, J. (eds.) (2019) The Sage Dictionary of Criminology. 4th edn. London: Sage Publications Ltd., 300.

8. Case, S. et al. (2021) The Oxford textbook on criminology. Second edition. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 636.

9. Case, S. et al. (2021) The Oxford textbook on criminology. Second edition. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 634.

10. Sinek, S. (2019) The infinite game. New York: Portfolio/Penguin.