(A keynote speach a Seminar on Role of Local Government Institutes In Crime Prevention organized by ACPF Bangladesh）
By Mr. Asoka S. Gunawardena
International Consultant
for the Government of Bangladesh-UNDP project
on “Building Capacity for Local Government”
Order is a fundamental pre-requisite of social life. Indeed the earliest societies have had their institutional arrangements for ensuring order in society. In south Asia these institutions took the form of a council of village elders and were called panchayats. In Sri Lanka they were called gam sabhas. These bodies were also the origin of local government in south Asia. Historically the first function of these bodies were dispensing justice and ensuring social order.
Societal change from these early times has been at times evolutionary and at other times, revolutionary. It took the form of increasing institutional complexity and differentiation. Today we are talking about crime, prevention and local government institutions. The fundamental issues may be summarized as being concerns with two sets of societal interfaces. One is the law and society interface. The other is the government and society interface. Let us look at these two in turn before we move on to considering what Local Government Institutions (LGls) can do in prevention of crime today.
Crime : The Law and Society Interface
Crime has been defined as an "act determined by law to be harmful to society in general", even though the immediate victim is an individual. Crime then is a situation of breakdown of the law and society interface. The notion of crime as a threat to the whole society is crucial to understanding it as the interface between law and society. Crime then is threat to the functioning of a society in an orderly manner, i.e., to social order. What is order? Order has been defined as "the state of tranquility prevailing among members of a society".
Traditionally order has been established and maintained by a body of law. In this context law is understood as a "scheme of social control as distinct from self control, imposed and enforced by the state within its territory". Hence the notion of law and order and of law enforcement to deal with crime.
What is 'prevention'? In law, prevention would mean restraint, the objective of which is to stop, hinder or preclude probable or possible action or activity by anticipatory action. This is the institutionalized approach of law enforcement. We have from the health care paradigm an alternate concept of and an approach to prevention. This three-stage preventive model involves primary prevention, early detection and rehabilitation. What is important is that this application of this model must be community-based. Institutionalized care may become necessary only in exceptional circumstances at the rehabilitation stage.
There are different types of offences. Causes for these can be very different and situation specific. Then one cannot proceed from a uniform set of cause-crime analysis in crime prevention interventions, as in all social change programmes. We need approaches, but they should facilitate situational application of remedial
interventions. Enforcement of law in crime prevention cannot go into causes of crime. There may be mitigating circumstances. Some effort may be made for correction after conviction. But in general there can be very little causal analysis of crime in law as a scheme of social control.
Local Government : The Government Society Interface
Local government may be defined as subordinate tiers of governance undertaking functions and exercising powers within limits of self-government as defined by law made by government. Local government has been described as the cutting edge of government and governance, to convey the nature and scope of the government-society interface. The government intervenes through LGls in respect of the functions assigned to them in regulating social activities and actions. LGls are indeed established to carry out the purposes assigned to them under the law. They are therefore accountable to government. As elected bodies, LGIS are accountable to their electors. Hence the role of local government as the government-society interface. How best can the government-society interface be managed to ensure an effective law and society interface.
Law and order constitutes a function that is assigned to Union Parishads, in Bangladesh. Most LGls in the region have a general responsibility, if not a specific one, to create the conditions wherein there is rule of law and law and order. However there are central government agencies specifically mandated for law enforcement, specially the Police Department. In the case of Union Parishads, the village police are required to report to the officer-in-charge of the police stations.
The government administration is organized according to the bureaucratic model. Government agencies in undertaking functions mostly operate out of 'offices', to which people must come in order to get their needs attended. This is the "pull" model of service delivery. The alternate is where services are taken to the people, the "push" model. While in most cases a combination is needed, there is a tendency for the latter approach to get neglected in managing the interface between government operations and the society they serve.
LGls are bodies elected by people and they must interface with their electors almost on a day to day basis. Therefore they can be considered to be community organizations. This interface is then the essence of local government. Its approaches should therefore be community-based, innovative and adaptive, in taking services to the people. The question therefore arises as to whether there are conflicting demands made on LGls, in terms of approaches demanded by the government agencies on the one hand and the electors on the other. How should an LGI approach the undertaking of functions assigned in fulfilling the purposes of local government. Can they innovate and adapt according to local situations and conditions.
Some Institutional Issues in Crime Prevention
The fundamental issue in crime prevention is as to how the law can be taken to people and bring them to own it and practice it as a scheme of social control complementing the enforcement of law by the state. Any scheme of social control has a coercive and a voluntary aspect. Then how can interaction be established along the interface between law and society extending on to the area of voluntary social control.
Compliance with the law can be approached through enforcement and acceptance. The very notion of crime as an offence against public law raises the question of the extent of acceptance. What institutional options are available that could complement the deterrence effect of law enforcement in extending the area of acceptance. The search for options must look for community based approaches. The issue may be approached from both the enforcement and acceptance perspectives.
From the enforcement perspective, it is possible to think of community participation in the prevention and detection of crime, prevention here meaning the use of anticipatory action to stop hinder, preclude or render impracticable commission of offences against the law. Community participation can enhance the status of vigilance that prevails in the society and assist in preventing the occurrence of crime. From the acceptance perspective, the community could be assisted in solving their social control problems. A wide range of activities would be possible including counseling, mediation and alternate dispute resolution, sensitization to law as a scheme of social order, etc.
Such community-based approaches to crime prevention brings into the law, order and justice arena a wide range of actors, such as the community, voluntary, and non-governmental organizations. They would assist in taking the social control values embodied in the law to the society.
Further, the need for social control reflects the existence of social problems. It in turn reflects the services people need to address and overcome these problems. The availability of services that help people resolve their social problems and the accessibility to such services becomes another critical institutional issue in crime prevention.
The Role of Local Government Institutes in Crime Prevention
The institutional role of LGls in crime prevention is then twofold.
1. First, they can effectively complement the institutionalized approaches of central government operations with community based approaches in taking services to the people, i.e., to make the government-society interface more meaningful to the people.
2. Secondly, LGls can innovate and adapt in working out remedies and solutions to problems of law and order according to local situations and needs, i.e., establish a partnership between law and society. This is to create amongst the people a sense of ownership of the law that seeks to establish the basis for order in society.
They also have a substantive role in crime prevention. As LGls, they have a functional responsibility for providing human security. The scope and content of human security extends from social justice and freedom from fear to equity and equality. Indeed human security is necessary for people to take a long term view of their lives and hence to want societal stability and social order established.
In this regard a fundamental lacuna in the human security activities undertaken by LGls is that they are undertaken very much in a routine manner. There will be only few LGls that have specific crime prevention goals and objectives. In the absence of a focus, preventive activities are most likely to be missed out and the efficacy of what is done minimised.
(A paper presented by Mr. Asoka S. Gunawardena at a Seminar on "Role of Local Government Institutes in Crime Prevention", organized by the Asia Crime Prevention Foundation held in Dhaka on December 12th, 1998. Mr. Gunawardena is an International Consultant for the Government of Bangladesh-UNDP project on "Building Capacity for Local Governance". Mr Gunawardena took early retirement from the Sri Lanka Administrative Service, having last held the position of Addl. Secretary, Ministry of Public Administration, Provincial Councils and Home Affairs.)
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