Mrs Thatcher’s Criminological Legacy: An ESRC-funded Scoping Project

1. Mrs Thatcher’s Criminological Legacy: An ESRC-funded Scoping Project Stephen Farrall ‘Thinking Aloud’ 9th April 2008

2. My point of departure … “I tried to stand up and fly straight, but it wasn't easy with that son-of-a-bitch Reagan in the White House ... I dunno, they say he's a decent man, so ... maybe his advisers are confused”. H.I. McDunnough, Raising Arizona, Coen Brothers, 1988.

3. What I’ll do today • Outline project • Raise some problems with it • Provide some solutions to these • Outline future work

4. Mrs Thatcher’s Impact • Not only Mrs T – Major too (1979-1997 + ?). • Change in style of Govt. • Neo-conservative (neo-liberal) policies. • Huge change in citizen-state relationship. • Change in social policies (“biggest break since 1945”, Glennester). • Change in economic policies. • Enduring social/economic changes.

5. Research Questions • What did these changes do to crime? • What did these changes do to people’s experiences of crime? • What did these changes do to people’s attitudes towards crime/offenders (anxiety, punitiveness, confidence in CJS)? • What have been the long term consequences of almost two decades of neo-conservative social and economic policies for the UK’s CJS?

6. ESRC-funded project • Summer will be spent accessing the UK’s existing data sets (LFS, GHS, BEPS etc) for a possible longitudinal study of the impacts of neo-con policies on crime. • No research as such, but a scoping exercise. • Will also develop ideas about how to analyse these data sets.

7. Problems? • Focuses too much on Mrs T./Major, of course. Can one/Govt individual create that much change? • Ignores wider causes of changes in crime rates.

8. What are the aggregate level causes of ordinary crime/anxiety about? • Social change and Govt social policies. • Demographic change/factors. • Economic forces and Govt econ. policies. • CJS policies. • Cultural factors. • Ideological definitions of crime. • Critical events/situations. • Technological change.

9. Solution • De-focus slightly from neo-con policies and look at the fore-mentioned causes. • Allows for more context to be brought into the study. • Also allows for comparative studies of other countries which went through neo-conservative policies in the 1980s too.

10. Future Work (Summer 08) • ESRC Grant to explore the possibility of using repeated cross-section surveys from 1970s onwards to assess impact of Neo-liberal policies on crime. • Develop methodology of exploration as well as to assess data sets.

11. Surveys to be Explored British Crime Survey 1982 - 2000 Scottish Crime Survey 1982 - 2000 British Election Panel Study 1964 - 2001 British Social Attitudes Survey 1983 - 2000 Eurobarometer surveys 1970 - 2002 Family Expenditure Survey 1970 - 1998/99 Family Resources Survey 1993 - 2001/02 General Household Survey 1971 - 2000 Labour Force Survey 1975 - 2001 National Child Development Study 1958 - 2005 Scottish Young Peoples Survey 1984 - 1990 Survey of English Housing 1993 - 2001-02 World Values Survey 1981 - 2001 European Values Survey 1981 - 1999/2000 British Cohort Study 1970 1970 - 2005 United Nations World Crime Surveys 1970 - 1994 NOP Political Polls Surveys 1963 - 1971 Youth Cohort Study 1985 - 2000 International Social Survey Programme 1985 - 2002 MORI Omnibus Polls 1993 - 1996 ONS Longitudinal Study 1971 - 2001