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Local governance of safety and the normalization of behavior

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Abstract

In almost all West-European countries and large parts of the world the governance of public safety tops political priorities at both national and local level. We can observe a growing attention for public safety issues in our cities and streets, resulting in local communities and authorities that increasingly have the possibility to deal with these issues in a rather autonomous way. In this contribution, I discuss the local governance of safety through a critical analysis and reflection of inherent, new regulatory tools within an administrative or civil framework. In doing so, I focus on the precarious position of three specific categories, i.e., minors and youth, panhandlers and ‘potential’ drug users. This analysis starts off with and draws a parallel to broader social and political trends, which criminologists have described as the shift from a ‘post-crime’ to a ‘pre-crime’ society where pre-emptive logics, mechanisms of exclusion and the criminalization of behavior tend to prevail.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. KU Leuven, Leuven Institute of Criminology (LINC), Herbert Hooverplein 10, 3000, Leuven, Belgium

    Stefaan Pleysier

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  1. Stefaan Pleysier
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Correspondence to Stefaan Pleysier.

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Pleysier, S. Local governance of safety and the normalization of behavior. Crime Law Soc Change 64, 305–317 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10611-015-9592-4

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10611-015-9592-4

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