How to solve crimes before they happen
In the Financial Year 2019/2020, the Uganda Police Force was allocated aboutShs820b. And whereas there was a decline in the volume of reported crimes from 238,746 cases in 2018 to 215,224 in 2019, Uganda continues to grapple with high rates of criminal activity.
Crime risks such as homicides, cyber-crimes, defilement and corruption-related cases remain prominently high and continue to pose major challenges to the Country.
In a country of scarce resources like Uganda, too much funds are being spent every year to fix crimes yet it is possible to incur lesser costs by way of preventing these crimes.
We seem to be stuck in a response cycle where we prefer to deal with emergencies instead of fixing systems that cause the problems.
Rather than investing huge sums of money in security systems to prevent theft and other crimes, why don’t we instead ensure that if thieves are arrested, they are enrolled in certain kinds of behavioural therapy in order to break the cycle of re-offending?
It is important to create a community environment where crime seems pointless because of the plentiful opportunities available. Take an example of Iceland.
In 1997, researchers and politicians launched an anti-substance abuse movement called ‘Drug-free Iceland’ that aimed at eliminating teenage drug and alcohol abuse.
Instead of concentrating on the traditional behavioural change approaches (telling teenagers to abstain from alcohol and drugs), the campaign leaders focused on promoting alternative recreational activities, strengthening family ties, improving self-efficacy, and building social competencies.
Today, Iceland is considered to be the world’s most progressive country at reducing teenage substance abuse. From 1998 to 2016, the rate of drunkenness among the Icelandic youth, declined from 42 per cent to 5 per cent; daily cigarette smoking dropped from 23 per cent to 3 per cent; and the use of marijuana fell from 17 per cent to 5 per cent.
American psychologist Richard Tremblay argues that the best time to prevent aggressive behaviour is when the criminal is still in their mother’s tummy.
Tremblay points to a cluster of risk factors involving the mother that could predict the child’s chronic physical aggression such as poverty, smoking, depression, poor marital relations, and low education.
In some situations, what starts as relatively minor crimes such as pick-pocketing or snatch-and-grab quickly, can graduate into serious crimes because the perpetrators are not effectively apprehended.
In one of my all-time favourite classic songs, Kampala Mu Kkooti, the late Paul Kafeero sarcastically sings about how ‘pick-pockets’ in Kampala complain of being tired of harming people, but whenever arrested by Police, they are normally just released without any charges pressed against them.
Crime is the inevitable result of disorder and its cause could further be described by the ‘Broken Windows Theory’. This theory suggests that if a window is broken and left unrepaired, people walking-by will conclude that no one cares and no one is in charge.
Soon, more windows will be broken, and the sense of anarchy will spread from the building to the streets and homes.
What we need is government together with social entrepreneurs - to figure out how to flip the current policing models to reflect a more preventive criminal approach.
Otherwise, we may be headed for the ‘Cobra effect’ where an attempted solution to a problem instead makes it worse.
Mr Mukalazi is the country director of Every Child Ministries Uganda.
