Citation

Crawford A, Jones M. Br. J. Criminol. 1995; 35(1): 17-33.

Copyright

(Copyright © 1995, Centre for Crime and Justice Studies, Publisher Oxford University Press)

DOI

unavailable

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

The role of 'inter-agency' co-operation in the sphere of crime prevention has been promotedincreasingly by central and local government policy initiatives in recent years. In this paper we consider a number of theoretical issues raised by the examination of power relations in interorganizational contexts and the definitional processes through which local crime 'problems' are identified and translated into policies and practice. The work of Geoffrey Pearson and colleagues represents the pre-eminent contribution to criminological understanding in the field. In this paper we develop a sympathetic critique of their work. In doing so we draw on our own two-year research study of the social dynamics of inter-agency co-operation in a number of metropolitan and shire county community-based crime prevention initiatives.