Firearms-related injuries and deaths represent a major public health issue in the United States. Several researchers and professionals have called for additional research about strategies to mitigate morbidity and mortality associated with firearms.1 In keeping with this recommendation, Moyer et al. (p. 140) recently evaluated the effect of remediating blighted vacant lands on shooting incidents. In this experiment, clusters of blighted vacant lands in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (n = 110), were randomly allocated to one of the following interventions: (1) a greening intervention (including mowing, trash removal, grading the land, planting new grass and trees, and installing wooden fences; n = 37); (2) a less-intensive mowing and trash removal intervention (n = 36); or (3) no intervention (n = 37). Results from difference-in-difference regression models indicated that both interventions were associated with a significant decrease in shootings per month. For instance, the greening and mowing interventions were respectively associated with declines of 6.6% and 8.1% in shootings per square kilometer.
This study not only provided evidence about the capability of place-based programs to prevent gun violence but also addressed several issues raised by experts and professionals concerned about firearms-related violence. On November 14, 2016, 82 participants from 42 public health schools and programs in 22 states and 17 leading public health and gun violence prevention advocacy organizations met in Boston, Massachusetts, to set an action agenda for academic public health around the firearm injury crisis. They identified five leading imperatives and key tactical approaches:
strengthening research and scholarship; building public health networks and cross-sector collaborations; promoting a conversation around gun safety; nurturing state-level initiatives, and developing a business plan and engaging the private sector.1(p365)
The topic of violence prevention through environmental design or place-based interventions has been extensively covered in the last 40 to 50 years. In my opinion, the topic has been overlooked in the public health field in relation to gun violence (or it should at least be revisited). In a recently published article on the regulation of high-crime places, Eck2 introduces interesting theories, evidence, and principles to further interpret the findings reported by Moyer et al. Although the definition of place can vary, Eck first recalled that crime may concentrate at places of any type. A systematic review of 41 studies showed that 63% of the crimes occur at 10% of places.3 Hence targeting places with high rates of gun violence allows concentrating efforts where they are the most needed.
In the following sections, I connect findings presented by Moyer et al. (p. 140) in this issue of AJPH to the concept of high-crime places and discuss priorities of the action agenda.
First, addressing the question of places with high rates of violence allows a shift in the debate from gun control to the prevention of firearms-related violence through place management. It opens the door for new research avenues focusing on places rather than guns. All residents generally agree with such an approach; nobody is, for instance, against greening. Such research also could attract researchers and professionals from various fields such as criminology, geography, urban planning, and mathematics. Such a shift is also required to identify promising initiatives to mitigate gun violence. The effect of gun control laws on violence is inconclusive. Findings vary from one study to another, and several methodological limitations affect their validity.4
Second, in contrast to gun control laws, several approaches such as hot-spot policing, problem-oriented policing, and situational crime prevention programs are effective to prevent violence at places. Similar to the Moyer et al. experiment, prevention programs based on such approaches can be implemented at the city or even at the community level. Such programs generally do not displace violence (when it occurs, displacement effects are lower than the beneficial ones), and evidence shows that benefits sometimes spread to the surrounding areas.2
Third, the concept of high-crime places is embedded in the environmental criminology paradigm. It is related to a vast literature providing fruitful avenues for future research aimed at understanding preventive mechanisms generated by similar programs. Studying changes in the convergence of space and time of victims and motivated offenders in the absence of capable guardians (Felson5 defines guardians as individuals whose presence lowers the probability that a crime will occur) represents one research option proposed by Moyer et al. In fact, the remediation of blighted lands could be associated with an increase in effective guardianship at several steps of the crime commission process (i.e., actions required for the shooting incident to occur—also called a crime script). We could hypothetically think that the offender needs to plan the attack (e.g., acquire a weapon, identify the place, travel to the place, and enter the place), attack the victim (e.g., approach the victim, shoot the victim), and quit the scene (e.g., run out of sight). In that hypothetical scenario, residents can act as guardians at several steps of the crime commission process, such as when they detect a suspicious person (when the offender enters the blighted land) or when they notice the incident (when the offender approaches the victim). Moyer et al.’s experiment also offers an opportunity to consider land management and guardianship. Residents first must have access to the land and have clear lines of sight to detect potential shooting incidents. Hence guardians must be available to supervise or monitor and ultimately intervene.6
Another relevant approach is the crime pattern theory. This theory posits that individuals commit crimes when processes and triggers lead to the identification of a suitable target incorporated in a crime pattern.7 Activities are generally organized around nodes (places where, for instance, leisure and professional activities are performed). Individuals generally use the same paths to travel from one node to another. There is a spatiotemporal routinization of activities. Hence crimes are more likely to take place where activities from offenders and victims cross each other. Central to the crime pattern theory are the concepts of crime generators and crime attractors. The former are generated by high volumes of people going through nodal activity points, whereas the latter are created when victims are located at nodal activity points of individuals motivated to commit crimes. Both concepts are relevant to understand reasons that blighted vacant lands had significant decreases in shooting incidents during the Moyer et al. experiment.
At last, intervening at high-crime places might be more suitable than gun control projects for research funding. Remediating blighted vacant lands also involves place managers (i.e., people in charge of taking care of the land—e.g., mowing and removing trash). Such people have an interest in keeping the place clean and safe. They also can act as guardians. Moyer et al. also reported that some blighted lands were privately owned, which opens the door for potential regulation. Violence can be conceptualized as pollution, because blighted lands generate costs for the public taxpayers such as police interventions, hospitalizations, and loss of property value. Regulations can therefore include means (e.g., obligation to maintain private lands) and ends (e.g., fines for property owners whose lands exceed the maximum number of calls to police) to prevent gun violence.2 Introducing regulations could incite landowner associations to participate and financially contribute to such citywide or local prevention projects.
See also Moyer et al., p.
CONFLICTS OF INTEREST
The author has no conflicts of interest.
