Crime rates provide an insight about the society and the deviance going in and around it. There has been a steady decline in crime rates since the year 1990 in North America. The significance of the study of declining rates of crime is essential to criminology as it highlights the efforts done by people to reduce crime and make the society safer for all civilians. It is also a clear depiction of the changing morals and values revolving in the society. Although there are a number of reasons for the decline in crime rate, some of which are complicated. This paper will analyze some of those reasons. It has been noticed that immigration has played an integral role in reducing crime rates since 1990. The arrival of immigrants decreases the crime …show more content…
Crime rates are more often than not influenced by how they are reported and in most cases, they are not reported, which leads to decline in the rate of crime. The third is the use and evolution of technology which is used by cops to prevent crime and prosecute criminals, for example, the use of CCTV cameras has helped in reduction of crime significantly as the criminals are caught red handed with video evidence. Population aging is another factor that leads to the decline of crime rate in a given society, it refers to the aging of generations. Last but not the least, the essay will be discussing the decline of the sale of drugs, laying most emphasis on cocaine and its impact on the behavior of humans, specifically in North America. The decline in crime rates is basically because of the factors stated above and their simultaneous contribution. There is no one factor which is responsible for the decline, according to the general …show more content…
It is a common myth among people that accurate images are depicted by crime rate. Various interpretations take place before a crime is recorded, this is an issue. Everyone related to the crime whether it is the victim, criminal, police or even the person who records it, everyone has a different perception of what happened. Bigger problem is that there is a lack of crimes reported. In an article called Dimensions of the Dark Figure of Unreported Crime, Wesley Skogan describes that there are a majority of crimes that go unreported. In fact, only 28% of crimes were reported in the late 1970s in the United States of America (Skogan, 1977). According to a study the reporting of crime peaked in1990s and has reduced ever since (StatsCanada, 2014). The prime reason for this is that people are unaware that they are committing a crime or they just overlook their deed as they feel it is not severe enough to catch ant attention. It is either people are afraid of the consequences which might occur or there is simply lack of time. The correlation is evident and exists between crimes reported and crime rates. Crime rates are influenced by the information given by crime reporters which means even if there is crime occurring at a higher rate, the crime rate will be less as enough crimes aren’t reported. Therefore, the decline in crimes reported is partially the reason for the decline in crime