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Evidence that curtailing proactive policing can reduce major crime

Author

Listed:
  • Christopher M. Sullivan

    (Louisiana State University)

  • Zachary P. O’Keeffe

    (University of Michigan)

Abstract

Governments employ police to prevent criminal acts. But it remains in dispute whether high rates of police stops, criminal summonses and aggressive low-level arrests reduce serious crime 1–7 . Police officers target their efforts at areas where crime is anticipated and/or where they expect enforcement will be most effective. Simultaneously, citizens decide to comply with the law or commit crime partly on the basis of police deployment and enforcement strategies. In other words, policing and crime are endogenous to unobservable strategic interaction, which frustrates causal analysis. Here, we resolve these challenges and present evidence that proactive policing—which involves systematic and aggressive enforcement of low-level violations—is positively related to reports of major crime. We examine a political shock that caused the New York Police Department (NYPD) to effectively halt proactive policing in late 2014 and early 2015. Analysing several years of unique data obtained from the NYPD, we find that civilian complaints of major crimes (such as burglary, felony assault and grand larceny) decreased during and shortly after sharp reductions in proactive policing. The results challenge prevailing scholarship as well as conventional wisdom on authority and legal compliance, as they imply that aggressively enforcing minor legal statutes incites more severe criminal acts.

Suggested Citation

  • Christopher M. Sullivan & Zachary P. O’Keeffe, 2017. "Evidence that curtailing proactive policing can reduce major crime," Nature Human Behaviour, Nature, vol. 1(10), pages 730-737, October.
    • Handle: RePEc:nat:nathum:v:1:y:2017:i:10:d:10.1038_s41562-017-0211-5
    DOI: 10.1038/s41562-017-0211-5
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Hinkle, Joshua C. & Weisburd, David, 2008. "The irony of broken windows policing: A micro-place study of the relationship between disorder, focused police crackdowns and fear of crime," Journal of Criminal Justice, Elsevier, vol. 36(6), pages 503-512, November.
    2. Tom R. Tyler & Jonathan Jackson & Avital Mentovich, 2015. "The Consequences of Being an Object of Suspicion: Potential Pitfalls of Proactive Police Contact," Journal of Empirical Legal Studies, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 12(4), pages 602-636, December.
    3. Pyrooz, David C. & Decker, Scott H. & Wolfe, Scott E. & Shjarback, John A., 2016. "Was there a Ferguson Effect on crime rates in large U.S. cities?," Journal of Criminal Justice, Elsevier, vol. 46(C), pages 1-8.
    4. Puhani, Patrick A., 2012. "The treatment effect, the cross difference, and the interaction term in nonlinear “difference-in-differences” models," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 115(1), pages 85-87.
    5. repec:oup:alecon:v:18:y:2016:i:2:p:385-437. is not listed on IDEAS
    6. Andrea Cann Chandrasekher, 2016. "The Effect of Police Slowdowns on Crime," American Law and Economics Review, American Law and Economics Association, vol. 18(2), pages 385-437.
    7. Ai, Chunrong & Norton, Edward C., 2003. "Interaction terms in logit and probit models," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 80(1), pages 123-129, July.
    8. Geller, A. & Fagan, J. & Tyler, T. & Link, B.G., 2014. "Aggressive policing and the mental health of young urban men," American Journal of Public Health, American Public Health Association, vol. 104(12), pages 2321-2327.
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    Cited by:

    1. Chalfin, Aaron & Mitre-Becerril, David & Williams, Morgan C., 2024. "Does Proactive Policing Really Increase Major Crime? A Replication Study of Sullivan and O'Keeffe (Nature Human Behaviour, 2017)," Journal of Comments and Replications in Economics (JCRE), ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 3(2024-6), pages 1-34.
    2. Cho, Sungwoo & Gonçalves, Felipe & Weisburst, Emily, 2021. "Do Police Make Too Many Arrests? The Effect of Enforcement Pullbacks on Crime," IZA Discussion Papers 14907, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    3. Jackson, Dylan B. & Testa, Alexander & Semenza, Daniel C. & Skinner, Rebecca & Vaughn, Michael G., 2022. "Police stops and youths’ educational expectations: Findings from the UK Millennium Cohort Study," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 143(C).
    4. Aaron Chalfin & Michael LaForest & Jacob Kaplan, 2021. "Can Precision Policing Reduce Gun Violence? Evidence from “Gang Takedowns” in New York City," Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 40(4), pages 1047-1082, September.
    5. Webb, Lindsey & Jackson, Dylan B. & Jindal, Monique & Alang, Sirry & Mendelson, Tamar & Clary, Laura K., 2022. "Anticipation of racially motivated police brutality and youth mental health," Journal of Criminal Justice, Elsevier, vol. 83(C).

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