The following is the first part of an excerpt from the 2009 GraceKennedy Foundation Public Lecture Series presented by Anthony Harriott, professor of political sociology in the Department of Government at UWI, Mona.

For sometime now I have been a student of the problems of insecurity and related phenomena - their manifestations, how they are constructed, their sources, and the reactions and responses of the responsible institutions of the state and the society to these problems. I started off with a concern that public policy and the behaviour of some of the State institutions were complicating the problems.

Bad crime control policy is but one of the ways that public policy is implicated in the crime problem. For example, a liberal use of incarceration as simply the separation of convicts from the society without much thought to the conditions of the incarceration may reinforce criminality by facilitating the transmission of the patterns of moral thinking that neutralise any societal disapprobation of their criminal careers. It may also facilitate the transfer of technical know-how and expertise in crime.

Excessive punishment and illegal crime control methods may affirm already existing views of the unjust nature of the criminal justice system and justify non-cooperation with it as well as self-help alternatives to it.

negative impact

Another more indirect way in which policy may have a negative impact is by deepening the 'root' and proximate causes of crime. For example, policies that result in increased youth unemployment and inequality may make worse the structural conditions that are associated with some categories of crime.

High inflation rates tend to increase inequality and a protracted period of high inflation rates and economic instability may alter people's time horizons for achieving key life goals. People lose confidence in the economic future. They believe that tomorrow will be worse. Material acquisitions thus become 'now or never' predicaments. Shorter time horizons for achieving major life goals may give an impulse to criminality and the use of corrupt methods. High customs duties on select commodities may encourage the smuggling of these commodities (for example, rum and cigarettes) and the formation of corrupt networks that include customs officials. These networks may later be used to traffic drugs and illegal firearms. Policy becomes a proximate cause of high-end and violent crimes. There are no necessary associations and inevitabilities here. Much more work is needed if we are to better understand these processes. My purpose is simply to alert you to the possibilities.

UNINTENDED CONSEQUENCES

The second type, those that reinforce the primary causes of crime, are the unintended and perhaps difficult to foresee consequences of public policy.

The first category, that is, bad crime control policies, may, however, be anticipated and more easily avoided.

Twenty years later, despite the improvements in policy documentation (the National Security Policy (2007), the Jamaica Constabulary Force Corporate Strategy 2005 - 2008 (2005), and the Jamaican Justice System Reform Task Force - Final Report (2007) and recent advances in the policy-making capabilities of the Ministry of National Security, I remain even more concerned and convinced that public policy is implicated in our crime problem.

The point that I wish to make is that we should be more conscious about the possible consequences of public policy and the trade-offs that are made. The more important issue that arises from this is, however, that of responsibility.

Governments tend to blame the previous administration for creating the difficulties. Parties just out of government may even blame new governments. The police blame the citizens for non-cooperation with them and for giving support to criminals and the citizens blame the police for their heavy-handed tactics and corrupt practices.

There is some truth in all of these claims, but these truths should not be used to deflect responsibility. Ownership of the crime problem is the first step that any political administration, state institution and citizen must take toward finding solutions to the problem.

primary motivation

My concern with the crime problem is not simply an 'academic' one. While I am deeply interested in knowing, my primary motivation is to contribute to making the society better by making it safer and more just. Doing should be informed by knowing and by values.

I believe that public policy is best when it is informed by systematically acquired and valid evidence, distilled experience and morally acceptable, explicitly stated political values. When evidence is adduced it may be critically evaluated. When experience is distilled in the form of lessons, the validity and applicability of these lessons may be judged by others who have also shared in these experiences.

When values are explicitly acknowledged, they may be scrutinised by all. These things foster public education, rational, deliberative policy-making and consensus-building. This is an ideal. I am not suggesting that commentary on the subject that is not based on systematic research should be disregarded; I simply wish that we were closer to the ideal. Policy is, however, not always based on rationality. It tends to be informed by ideology and driven by interests. This is understandable.

no monopoly

Moreover, in a democracy, experts of all types (consultants, law enforcement officials and academic researchers) should not have a monopoly on policy-making. Disinterested research should, however, have a place in policy-making.

In our conditions, public safety and social justice are twinned. When there is equality of opportunity and people are treated fairly and believe that they are treated fairly, they tend to comply with the rules that guarantee them fair treatment, and support the institutions that enforce these rules. When they are treated unfairly there is alienation from rules, law and institutions.

Law and law enforcement become and are seen as oppressive tools. In most societies, the law and law enforcement tend to be downward directed. This was certainly true of Jamaica. The vagrancy laws were seen as such. And I believe that the ganja laws and laws regulating vending are also regarded by many as anti-poor and oppressive.

These, we suspect, are not consensus laws. Their enforcement therefore cannot be based on consensus and is thus likely to be ineffective. In the colonial period, law was viewed as a tool for controlling the 'dangerous classes'.

Despite the changes since Independence, these are the lenses through which the present laws and law enforcement are still viewed by many. History generates considerable inertia and, in addition, the current practices of the system provide experiential reinforcement of these views. This generates conflict within the society that at times takes the form of demands for justice in response to injustices meted out by the criminal justice system.

impact of bias

This is likely to continue until law enforcement becomes more universally applied and consensus based on common values develops. Bias may be an excuse for poor law abidance in general or it may be an impulse to remove bias and have the laws applied without exception to both the poor and the powerful. We may all seek individual and group exemptions or call for universal application. Jamaicans are yet to make up their minds about this.

Jamaica has a full-spectrum crime problem with American-type Ponzi schemes, Nigerian-like 419 confidence rackets, Italian Mafia-style entrepreneurship and the full range of street crimes, but most of all we have a problem of violence. We have a problem of violence on steroids. Elsewhere, I have described this condition as a subculture of violence.

This is a way of saying that the use of violence, especially to settle conflicts, is becoming institutionalised. Associated with this, but distinct from it, I would argue that we have a system of violence. By a system of violence I mean that there are many inter-connected, vested interests in the various forms of violence. Violence makes money. It may make money as simple, predatory activity such as robbery, and it may make money in more systematic and complex predatory ways such as protection rackets, the corrupt acquisition of state contracts and their execution without the hindrances of labour problems and the inspection of work done.