The reported rate of violent crime tops the agenda on the mind of South Africans. It remains the main contending problem facing the current administration and the general populace. Its effect cut across race, class, sectors, provinces, cities, or locations. With violent crime against the individual and property continually escalating the very survival of the civil populace and the institution of democracy would remain undermined. Consequently, the effects of a high crime rate are presently affecting the image of the country abroad, as it is threatening other vital sectors of the economy such as: tourism, transport, construction and building projects and other domestic sectors of the economy. It leads to problems such as the brain drain and has a high cost associated with sustaining the criminal justice system. In the light of the above, the central thrust of this thesis is to identify the role and functions of organized criminal organizations that have proliferated and are greatly entrenched in South Africa. Although this thesis acknowledges the findings of victim surveys, which have shown that more than 50% of murders, assaults and sexual assaults in South Africa occur between people who know each other, the fact is that illicit and criminal activities such as thefts and smuggling extend beyond the shores of the country in an organized fashion. There seem to be no doubt that the activities of organized crime operate in a democratic dispensation that has adopted a broad range of rights including the right of privacy. The Government response through social policy documents has clearly failed to combat organized crime or reduce the levels of violent crime. The reason is that since organized crime is complex to observe, criminals have become more daring in their exploits. In addition this thesis would examine major policies starting with the South Africa National Crime Prevention Strategy (NCPS) and the White Paper for Safety and Security, recent budget increases to fight crime as well as a range of policies under the present ANC-led government. While not assuming that this research has a permanent solution to solving violent crime, it is a fact that income inequality, drug abuse, and poor socio economic conditions remain core problems facing the government. One is hopeful that the solution of South Africa crime problem may lie within the political leadership. That is if the political will power can be exercised and the leadership of the country and the security apparatuses become decisive in their relentless fight against crime. / Thesis (M.A)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, 2004.

Thesis (MTech (Public Management)) --Cape Peninsula University of Technology, 2009 / There is mounting dissatisfaction among South African communities concerning the state of housing and safety and security in South Africa. This, coupled with intentions of government, which have not always been as successful as anticipated, has led to situations where communities that were promised development, embark on uprisings against poor service delivery, which they receive. This study investigates involvement of all stakeholders, specifically the community, in community development projects, in order to determine what effect this has on the end result of community development projects. The main focus of this study comprises involvement of the community and the impact that it could have on the initiation and planning steps of the project management process. The study uses both a qualitative and quantitative approach. The quantitative survey was administered through use of two closed ended questionnaires; one was directed at residents of the N2 Gateway, as the beneficiaries of the N2 Gateway Housing Project, and the other at residents of Langa on four subdivisions of Langa, namely northern, southern, eastern and western Langa. The qualitative survey was administered in the form of interviews that were held with managers in the Provincial Government of the Western Cape who are responsible for implementation of the Bambanani Against Crime Project and the N2 Gateway Housing Project. The study reveals that both projects made little use of community engagement during the initiation and implementation stages, which had a visible effect on results of the project, as confirmed by results of the survey. However, the project had a different approach owing to the nature of the project. The Bambanani Against Crime Project solely relied on volunteers from the community for implementation and this aspect had a big impact on the end result of the project. The N2 Gateway Housing Project did not accommodate community involvement at any stage of the project, which ultimately led to dissatisfactory results in respect of views of the community, and the department that implemented the project.

Community-oriented policing implementation has been examined under the context of large agencies whereas the literature on smaller agencies has ultimately been lagging behind The purpose of this study is therefore to examine the degree of community policing implementation within these smaller agencies, controlling for characteristics derived from the theory of social disorganization, to gather further insight into what variables may be impacting crimes rates Pearson correlation and OLS regression analysis is employed to obtain the necessary results The findings indicate that although community-policing implementation does not significantly impact or explain the variation of crime rates in small cities, the statistically significant results of particular social disorganization characteristics should be an indicator of the need to incorporate theory with practice / Includes bibliography / Thesis (MS)--Florida Atlantic University, 2016 / FAU Electronic Theses and Dissertations Collection

The purpose of this study was to consolidate the myriad theories of crime and create a comprehensive list of reasons a person may violate the law. This thesis aimed to accurately identify and categorize the general criminal motivations of sentenced inmates at Glen Helen Rehabilitation Center (GHRC). By administering a survey to sentenced inmates this study supported the research hypothesis that all of the participants would agree that they had committed their illegal act due exclusively to one or more of the nine reasons discussed.

No description available.

Crime in South Africa has been escalating over the past few years. Crime affects all societies in South Africa. It occurs amongst the rich and the poor, in the suburbs as well as in the townships. Serious and violent crimes are reported in most of the national newspapers almost on daily basis. There is no single satisfactory answer as to the causes of crimes and its impact on the economy of South Africa. The aim of this research report is to assess the impact of crime in the South African economy. In order to formulate a conceptual and theoretical framework of the study, growth theories, namely neoclassical growth theory, Harrod-Domar growth model classical growth theory and endogenous growth theory were presented. Although all these growth theories relate to this study as crime cuts-across all sectors of the economy the endogenous growth theory was chosen as a theoretical framework on which to base this study. Endogenous growth theory deals with domestic absorption. Crime interferes with this absorption as it constitutes a cost to the economy. Firms lose profits whilst the opportunity cost of running prisons using a tax payers’ money continues to grow. This study is based on a quantitative research technique, using a vector error correction model (VECM) on a quarterly time series data over a period 2003 to 2011. The variables used to explain variations in economic growth over this period are crime, real interest rates, real exchange rates, unemployment and poverty. The findings of this study suggest that crime exerts a negative impact on economic growth in a long run in South Africa. However, this relationship is not statistically significant both in a short run and a long run. . However, no evidence of short run adjustments between crime and economic growth were found. There is a long run negative relationship between real interest rates and economic growth. This relationship is also statistically significant in a long run but not in a short run. However, the relationship between real interest rates and economic growth is positive in a short run. This can be explained by the fact that high interest rates attract foreign investments causing a rise in economic growth but in a long run high interest rates dampen domestic investments thereby aggravating the unemployment problem. Rising unemployment is likely to lead to increase levels of crime in South Africa. The results also show that unemployment has a negative relationship with economic growth both in the short run and a long run. However this relationship is not statistically significant in a short run but in a long run. Poverty has a negative relationship with economic growth in a short run but a positive relationship in a long run. However, in both instances the relationship between poverty and economic growth is not statistically significant. Real exchange rate has a positive relationship with economic growth in a long run but a negative relationship in a short run. This relationship is statistically significant in a long run but not in a short run. This means that the benefits of a weak currency in South Africa are realised in a long run. The implications of this study with regard to the variable of interest namely crime, is that crime constitutes a cost to the economy of South Africa. The econometric modelling used in this study suggests a negative relationship between crime and economic growth. This means that the problem of crime in South Africa goes beyond just simple counts on a number of offenses. Based on the findings of this study it is recommended that crime prevention is better than cure. Crime prevention should use a wide range of ideas and abilities found throughout the society. Community planning, neighbourhood action, juvenile advocacy, security planning, education and training are some of the ways in which crime actions can be mitigated in South Africa.

In 2007, juveniles were involved in a minimum of 1,063 murders in the United States (Federal Bureau of Investigation, 2008), and a concern over juvenile homicide offenders remains. While increasingly more macrolevel research on juvenile homicide offending has been accumulated, particularly since the 1980s, research focusing on macrolevel correlates of juvenile homicides is still relatively scarce (MacDonald & Gover, 2005; Ousey & Campbell Augustine, 2001). In the first part of this study, several variables relating to the offender, victim, setting, and precursors to the homicide by race and gender were examined in order to provide details on the context of youth homicides between 1965 and 1995 in Chicago. The Homicides in Chicago, 1965-1995 data set and Census data for 1970, 1980, and 1990 were used in this study. The results indicate that changes in youth homicides over the 31-year time period involved increases in lethal gang altercations, particularly among Latinos, and increases in the use of automatic weapons. Young females had very little impact on homicide rates in Chicago. The second part of the study examined whether measures of social disorganization can aid in the prediction of homicides committed by youths, and a total of ten negative binomial models were run. The results of the analyses in the three time periods indicate that racial/ethnic heterogeneity, educational deprivation, unemployment, and family disruption are significantly and positively related to homicides. Foreign-born population and median household income were found to be significantly and negatively related to homicides. The significant indicators of social disorganization varied in the seven models for the disaggregated groups. Overall, the results reflect support for social disorganization theory. Limitations, suggestion for future research, and policy implications are also addressed.

The purpose of this study was to ascertain if formal early childhood education was related to the likelihood of later criminal activity. The secondary data analysis within this study did support inferences for four specific crime factors. This study found that preschool attendance lessened the incurrence of future criminal activity in crime categories of total numbers of damage offenses, total numbers of theft offenses, total numbers of damage alone offenses, and total numbers of injury and theft offenses.

This thesis provides a comprehensive review of the evolution of Robert Agnew’s General Strain Theory of Delinquency, and tests his 2002 extension using two subsamples from the 2013 National Survey on Drug Use and Health: Juveniles between 12 and 17, and “emerging” adults that are 18 years old. Including an “emerging” adult subsample makes this analysis one of the first full tests of adults. Additionally, this analysis is the first partial test of Agnew’s 2013 extension of General Strain Theory. Overall, the results of the analysis lend support to Agnew’s 2002 extension. Measures of strain are revealed to significantly effect measures of negative emotionality and low selfconstraint, and measures of negative emotionality and low self-constraint significantly affect delinquency/deviance and illicit substance use. A major limitation to the thesis is that there is no negative emotionality measure of anger, which is Agnew’s (1985; 1992) key measures of negative emotionality. / Includes bibliography. / Thesis (M.S.)--Florida Atlantic University, 2017. / FAU Electronic Theses and Dissertations Collection

This thesis is the first dedicated sociological attempt to offer a critical response to cultural studies and allied discourses that concern themselves with the relationship between technology and violence. A critical reconstruction is necessary because these cultural theorists have failed to adequately contextualize their arguments in relation to both the globally ascendant neoliberal policy outlook and its associated social Darwinian technoculture: the combined pernicious effects of which could be described as the logic of ???social constructionism as social psychosis???. The most prominent manifestation of this theoretical psychosis has to do with an interest in biotechnology in particular. The problem I identify in the treatment of this theme is how easily it can be used to support a technologically determinist position. One undesirable side effect is that these determinists are able to project from present trends a dystopian exhaustion of all critique through their focus on violence. In the thesis of ???bioglobalism??? this state of affairs is also deployed to take sociologists to task for insufficient recognition of processual ???network??? forms of distributed agency in technological processes. At stake therefore is the recovery of sociological critique. It follows that the core of my thesis is the radical reworking of two related heuristic devices: seriality and contingency. Seriality is taken to refer to social practices as diverse as the possible relationships between the social problem of rationality, case studies of individuals who have run amok, and the functioning of network characteristics. I use contingency to eschew seriality???s deterministic accounting of the social. Here I propose a new conceptual relationship between creativity and action. Emphasis is accordingly placed upon two related normative projects: Raymond Williams???s cultural materialism, and three of the ???problematiques??? Peter Wagner has identified as inescapable for theorizing modernity: the continuity of the acting person, the certainty of knowledge, and the viability of the political order. I conclude with a renewed conception of the role of normative critique as a form of conceptual therapy for bioglobal projections of seriality.