Broken Windows, Fractured Hope?

Batchgeo / Google Maps

Dilapidated houses surround schools in much of Jackson. Click for detail: http://www.jfp.ms/crime/broken.

by Latasha Willis
October 19, 2011

View a close-up of the Jackson map indicating abandoned houses and schools.
Read the JFP's crime blog here: http://www.jfp.ms/crime

Imagine two scenarios. The first scenario is a child walking to school and admiring the homes on his block. He may say to himself: "Hmm, I would like to have a nice house like one of these when I grow up. I'm going to do what it takes to get one." The second scenario is a child walking to school and observing the abandoned, run-down properties on his block. He may say to himself: "Is this what life is about? If so, why should I care about my future? In fact, since that window over there is already broken, I'll smash the rest. No one lives there, anyway."

Is there truth to either scenario? Can something as simple as a broken window drive a minor to commit vandalism or other crimes?

In 1982, George L. Kelling and James Q. Wilson wrote an article for The Atlantic entitled "Broken Windows." The authors claimed that if a building has a broken window, the rest of the windows will eventually be broken. They based this idea on an experiment psychologist Philip Zimbardo did in 1969 in which he abandoned an unlicensed car in a low-income neighborhood in the Bronx and a more affluent neighborhood in Palo Alto, Calif. Vandals in the Bronx stripped the car in 10 minutes. On the other hand, no one touched the car in Palo Alto for a week, but vandals eventually destroyed it after the psychiatrist took to it with a sledgehammer.

In both neighborhoods, most of the vandals were white, so assuming that only other ethnic groups would commit these acts would be a mistake. Also, if such vandalism can happen to an abandoned car, what effect does an abandoned house have on a citizen, and how more so does it affect juveniles? This is not to say that the broken-window theory is infallible, but could living near unkempt properties have a negative effect on the psyche?

In addition to actual broken windows, Kelling and Wilson go on to say that situations in a neighborhood such as a drunk person sleeping on the sidewalk, panhandling or teenagers hanging out on a street corner could also be considered societal versions of broken windows. However, such situations are symptoms of bigger problems that communities should handle humanely.

Is there a direct relationship between dilapidated housing and juvenile crime in Jackson? You decide: There certainly sure are a lot of abandoned houses near our schools.

View the map in more detail here. Want to help identify who owns the property with the crumbling houses? Use this landroll list and this ]url=http://gisweb.co.hinds.ms.us/hindsdashboard/]Hinds County GIS map[/url]. Post results below; include address and owner information, and we will add it to the map.

Further reading:
Corman, Hope and Naci Mocan. "Carrots, Sticks, and Broken Windows." Journal of Law and Economics. April 2005, pp. 235-266.
Sampson, Robert J. and Stephen W. Raudenbush. "Seeing Disorder: Neighborhood Stigma and the Social Construction of 'Broken Windows'" Social Psychology Quarterly. December 2004.
Wikipedia. "Broken windows theory." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broken_windows

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