The effect of informal social control on the presence and geographic distribution of graffiti on city streets

Graffiti has become a widespread phenomena in the urban landscape in recent years. While it may be described as an art form or a unique type of communication, it is also considered to be a quality of life crime which may have serious impacts on our every day lives, creating fear in the average citizen who may come to believe that lawlessness has descended upon their community. Yet little systematic study has been done on this type of neighborhood incivility. This research explores three aspects of graffiti in Portland, Oregon, how well an inner city graffiti removal program works, how informal social control affects graffiti and whether there is a specific geography to the location of graffiti on city streets. The first question specifically addresses issues in the broken windows theory. This theory implies that rapid responses to crime can eventually lead to an extinguishing of that behavior.; The second and third questions relate to the idea of informal social control and routine activity theory. Informal social control is that control exercised by average citizens in their neighborhood spaces and work places to prevent inappropriate behaviors. Routine activity theory posits that for criminal behavior to occur in a particular place there must be suitable targets, a lack of protectors, the presence of motivated offenders and no one to control the behavior of those offenders.; Data from this research was gained through direct field observations and later data processing with the SPSS statistical program. This research has found that graffiti removal does not appear to prevent the return of more graffiti, which contradicts the broken windows theory. However, there may be a link between informal social control and the incidence of graffiti on city streets. It appears that the more informal social control there is on a street block, the less graffiti will be painted on that block. Informal social control is reduced when there are more public and commercially zoned streets as such landscapes inhibit local monitoring and intervention in inappropriate behavior. More study is suggested in order to confirm the validity of the current research project.