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Does Social Capital Reduce Crime?

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Author Info
Paolo Buonanno
Daniel Montolio
Paolo Vanin

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Abstract

We investigate the effects of civic norms and associational networks on crime rates. Civic norms may attach guilt and shame to criminal behavior, thus increasing its opportunity cost. Associational networks may increase returns to noncriminal activities and raise detection probabilities, but they may also work as communication channels for criminals and may offer official cover to criminal activities. The empirical assessment of these effects poses serious problems of endogeneity, omitted variables, measurement error, and spatial correlation. Italy's great variance in social and economic characteristics, its homogeneity in policies and institutions, and the availability of historical data on social capital in its regions allow us to minimize the first two problems. To tackle the last two problems, we use report-rate-adjusted crime rates and estimate a spatial lag model. We find that both civic norms and associational networks have a negative and significant effect on property crimes across Italian provinces. (c) 2009 by The University of Chicago. All rights reserved..

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File URL: http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/pdf/10.1086/595698
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Publisher Info
Article provided by University of Chicago Press in its journal The Journal of Law and Economics.

Volume (Year): 52 (2009)
Issue (Month): 1 (02)
Pages: 145-170
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Handle: RePEc:ucp:jlawec:v:52:y:2009:i:1:p:145-170

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Cited by:
(explanations, Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.)

  1. Paolo Buonanno & Giacomo Pasini & Paolo Vanin, 2008. "Crime and Social Sanction," "Marco Fanno" Working Papers 0071, Dipartimento di Scienze Economiche "Marco Fanno". [Downloadable!]
  2. Akcomak, Semih, 2009. "Bridges in social capital: A review of the definitions and the social capital of social capital researchers," UNU-MERIT Working Paper Series 002, United Nations University, Maastricht Economic and social Research and training centre on Innovation and Technology. [Downloadable!]
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