L'illusion De L'ordre: Incivilités Et Violences Urbaines: Tolérance Zéro?

This is the first book to challenge the "broken-windows" theory of crime, which argues that permitting minor misdemeanors, such as loitering and vagrancy, to go unpunished only encourages more serious crime. The theory has revolutionized policing in the United States and abroad, with its emphasis on policies that crack down on disorderly conduct and aggressively enforce misdemeanor laws. The problem, argues Bernard Harcourt, is that although the broken-windows theory has been around for thirty years, it has never been empirically verified. Indeed, existing data suggest that it is false.