crime prevention and exclusion: from walls to opera music

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Crime Prevention and Exclusion: fromWalls to Opera MusicElen Midtveita , Stavanger, Norwayb Magnus Lagabøtersgate 47 , N‐7010 Stavanger, Norway Phone:+47 92835453 E-mail:Published online: 18 Feb 2007.

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Crime Prevention and Exclusion:from Walls to Opera MusicELEN MIDTVEIT

Stavanger, Norway

Traditionally, crime-preventing architec-

ture protected buildings or other prop-

erty by the design of physical obstacles.

In the middle ages, inhabitants in cities

were protected from outside danger by

walls. Today in the US nearly 9 million

people live in ‘gated communities’, or

guarded living areas which are, to

varying degrees, separated from the

overall community. In the 1970s a move-

ment called Crime Prevention through

Environmental Design (CPTED) was

organized to contest this development.

This movement is sceptical towards the

use of fences and walls as crime preven-

tion measures as this is thought to create

fortress-like cities. Instead, advocates of

the CPTED hold that planners and

architects should use so called ‘soft’

measures for the prevention of crime.

Such soft measures range from particular

designs of benches to symbolic marking

of territory. It is argued that the CPTED

principles improve the organization of

social space in the city. What is more,

the measures are inclusive and as such

contrast sharply with the use of physical

barriers, which are exclusionary and

deny citizens access to some spaces.

The idea is that through good urban

planning strategies, architects and city

planners will contribute to constructing

social communities and preventing

isolation in the cities. Meeting places

are constructed in order to impose

informal control mechanisms.

In this article I will discuss the idea

and use of territoriality as a measure to

prevent crime. I will look at the ways in

which this idea is explored, from ‘gated

communities’ to the symbolic marking of

territory with the use of opera music.

CPTED and the Scandinavian tradition

of crime prevention through environ-

mental design have been critical of the

kind of planning which, by emphasizing

security, becomes exclusionary. They

have traditionally advocated the use of

Abstract

This article is about

Scandinavian crime-preventing

urban planning. At the beginning

of the 1970s, a new urban plan-

ning movement called Crime

Prevention trough Environmen-

tal Design emerged (CPTED).

The basic idea behind CPTED

as well as Scandinavian crime

prevention is to prevent crime

with inclusive measures. Instead

of building walls and fences one

should rather mark territories

with symbolic measures. This

article questions whether physi-

cal (hard) delineation of territory

is really different from symbolic

(soft) delineation. It discusses

the ideas informing crime pre-

vention planning and argues that

both soft and hard measures

share a similar objective: to

protect us against someone or

prevent someone from accessing

an area.

key words: Urban planning,

Territoriality, Gentrification,

Crime prevention, Exclusion

Journal of Scandinavian Studies in Criminology and Crime Prevention 23ISSN 1404-3858 Vol 6, pp 23–38, 2005

# Taylor & Francis DOI: 10.1080/14043850510035137

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soft measures which has been regarded

as a more inclusive way of constructing

urban societies. Many architects portray

the use of soft measures as positive and

unproblematic. In some ways it is a more

politically accepted way of crime pre-

vention because one avoids dual or

divided cities.

However, are soft measures inclusive?

This article questions whether physical

(hard) delineation of territory is really

different from symbolic (soft) delinea-

tion. I will discuss the ideas behind

crime-preventing planning and argue

that both soft and hard measures seem

to share a similar objective: to protect us

against someone or prevent someone

from accessing an area. Furthermore, I

will ask whether soft and hard measures

have the same effect on the urban

population. The article looks at soft

measures that have been initiated in

Scandinavia and discusses whether both

delineations of territory are exclusionary

practises. If, indeed, soft measures are

exclusionary then an ethical dilemma is

introduced, as soft measures tend to blur

the fact that social exclusion continues in

city landscapes. This prevents users of a

particular area to consider critically the

practise of discouraging access for some

but not others.

This article builds on original and

empirical research.1 In order to under-

stand the logic behind Scandinavian

crime-preventing planning, I chose to

conduct several qualitative interviews.

The emphasis was put on doing in-depth

interviews with leading experts in

Scandinavia, rather than having a

broad sample of interviews with many

planners. I had lengthy discussions and,

in some cases, follow-up conversations,

with my interview objects. This allowed

me insights into the complex ideas

underlying their everyday practice of

devising crime prevention strategies. I

interviewed both private architects and

public planners. Interestingly, I found no

major difference in the way these two

groups of experts relate to the issue of

physical planning in order to prevent

crime.

CPTED—a background

The architectural journalist Jane Jacobs

was one of the first to discuss the relation-

ship between the physical environment

and crime. Jacobs’ book Death and Life

of American Cities (1969), first published

in 1961, was a sharp critique of moder-

nistic urban planning. This tradition,

which had held sway from after World

War II and up to the 1970s, is character-

ized by functional divisions of cities,

where different areas of the cities were

to serve separate, but complementary

functions. Architecture was used as a

tool in the construction of the new

welfare state. New, functional buildings

were to improve the health of the

population. By moving buildings out of

the city to greener areas with more light

and fresh air, the health and lifestyles of

citizens would be improved (Østerberg

1998). Jacobs insisted that the traditional

city, which had streets filled with people,

was a safe city. She argued that the

modernistic planners, such as Ebenezer

Howard and Le Corbusier, destroyed the

cities and made them unsafe by choosing

to ignore the living, organic aspects of city

life. The planning had failed because the

1The research was done for my dissertation on ‘hoved-

fag’ level entitled ‘Planning for excluding societies’.The thesis was submitted to The Institute of Crimi-nology and Social Legal Studies in Oslo 2004.

midtveit: crime prevention and exclusion

24 Journal of Scandinavian Studies in Criminology and Crime Prevention

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ideal had been villages, suburbs or fantasy

cities. Instead, one should observe what

elements really worked in cities. To

Jacobs, it was precisely the experience

of the unfamiliar, diversity and variation

that made the big city. The planners

should therefore not aim to eliminate this

diversity, because the social control

would occur where there were people.

Through regular use of the neighbour-

hood, going to or from work or leisure

activities, we surveil people and actions.

The control should happen by people

correcting each other’s actions, instead of

through formal control mechanisms,

Jacobs argued. One of Jacobs’ key

points was that people did not need to

know each other in order to execute

social control. Although the people in the

big city were anonymous to each other,

they could still create a feeling of safety.

Public places should therefore be popu-

lated and continuously used in order for

crime to be prevented. Jacobs introduced

the concept ‘eyes on the street’ and

through this launched new principles for

urban planning.

Jane Jacobs has been of great impor-

tance for the New Urban trend in

planning—which holds sway in much

of Scandinavian crime prevention plan-

ning initiatives. New urbanism or the

post-modern urbanism is presented as

the antithesis to modernism and is seen

as an alternative to alienation and

anomie (Robin 1997). A proponent of

these perspectives claims, as does Jacobs,

that modern planning creates empty,

unsafe cities. Therefore, one needs to

re-introduce street activities and plan

cities so as to accommodate human

activities. The movement is critical of

the dominance of cars in development of

cities and wants to return to designing

streets for people (Schneider and Kitchen

2002). The traditional forms of construc-

tion are characterized by narrow streets

and alleyways, because these are areas

built for human activity. The idea of

multipurpose areas is one of the over-

arching principles in this movement.2

Oscar Newman, Professor of Archi-

tecture, published in 1973 the book

Defensible space: crime prevention

through urban design. The key argument

of the book is that many of the physical

environments in modern living areas/

housing areas that were created in

the 1960s prevented inhabitants from

exercising social control (Newman

1973). Newman did empirical studies

on the housing projects from the post-

war period, with particular focus on

high-rise buildings for low-income

groups. These areas fitted an assessment

of the connection between physical

environment and crime level, since the

social features of the inhabitants in these

housing projects were the same, while

the architecture varied. Based on the

findings from his comparative study,

Newman described how the physical

design of the housing projects could

improve the inhabitants’ control over

their local environment, and how the

‘defensible space’ model could be put

into practice and work to reduce crime

levels. Newman tried in some ways to

eliminate problems in those areas Jacobs

had described as alienating and crime

conducive. By making ownership and

responsibility more explicit, Newman

hoped the tenants would get a defensible

space and then also be better able to

2The New Urbanism movement has been criticized of

being a nostalgic attempt at recreating traditional(gemeninschaft) communities (Midtveit 2004).


Journal of Scandinavian Studies in Criminology and Crime Prevention 25

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discover strangers. The most important

planning principle should be to strive to

enhance a sense of control and respon-

sibility over an area. But this element in

itself is not enough to prevent crime,

Newman argued. Physical and technical

barriers as well as surveillance mechan-

isms should be implemented and used as

measures in crime prevention. Further-

more, the physical environment should,

in the greatest possible way, enhance

informal control. In this manner one

could easily distinguish between those

who belong and those who do not

belong in an area. At the same time,

the informal control should regulate

behaviour within an area. In this way

both theft and vandalism are prevented.

Newman differs from Jacobs in that

he stresses that informal surveillance

should discover people who do not

belong. While Newman stressed that

the inhabitants should have knowledge

of each other within the area, Jacobs

held that control could come about even

when people did not know each other.

Jacobs’ theories were directed towards

crime prevention in city centres, while

Newman focused more on reducing

crime in residential/housing areas.

Newman had a strong influence on

American crime prevention planning

and has, according to Schneider and

Kitchen (2002), stimulated the prolifera-

tion of ‘gated communities’ in the US.

Newman’s writing has affected the

debate on crime prevention and has

served as a basis for the further devel-

opment of urban planning for crime

prevention purposes.

CPTED and ‘the Scandinavian way’

The CPTED movement developed in

the early 1970s on the backdrop of

Newman’s and Jacobs’ works. While

Newman’s and Jacobs’ works were first

and foremost of a theoretical nature,

CPTED is primarily practical and

oriented towards the physical immediate

planning of the city environment. Stanley

Cohen (1985) defines CPTED:

Urban environments can be designed

or redesigned to reduce the opportu-

nities to crime (or fear of crime), but

without resorting to the building of

fortress and the resulting deteriora-

tion of urban life. This is not just law

enforcement and punishment and not

just armed guards and big-brother

surveillance, but the ‘restoration’ of

informal social control and the way

of helping ordinary citizens ‘regain’

control and take responsibility of their

immediate environment (Cohen

1985:215).

Civil architect and crime prevention

expert Bo Gronlund (2002) claims that

the crime-preventing planning in

Scandinavia is comparable to CPTED.

He names it ‘the Scandinavian way’.

Since the 1980s, Denmark has been the

leading country in Scandinavia on crime-

preventing ‘checklists’ intended for urban

planners.3 Academics and the Swedish

crime prevention council (BRA) were

hesitant to accept this way of crime

prevention, but seem now to have fully

endorsed the method. The handbook Bo

Tryggt 01 has had particular success, and

also seems to have been endorsed by

academics. In Norway a checklist for

crime prevention has been developed,

called Bedre planlegging, færre farer,

3Most known housing projects are Egebjerggard and

Sebeliusparken (Gronlund and Schock 1999).



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which is issued by the Norwegian crime

prevention council (KRAD).4 All the

Scandinavian checklists embody the

CPTED principles. The guidelines have

some variations, but there are four main

principles which surface in this checklist:

Natural surveillance (as introduced by

Jacobs), territoriality (see Newman),

building for communities and avoidance

of social isolation, and order main-

tenance.5 In this article I will concentrate

on the principles of territoriality.

Physical delineations of territory andaccess control

There is a trend in contemporary archi-

tecture to create territoriality in one

form or another through physical limita-

tion on access. Zygmundt Bauman

(2001) claims that, in an insecure world

people tend to seek safety trough the

marking of territories. This is likely to be

even more relevant after September 11th.

Assessments show that architect firms in

the US are increasing the cost by an

average of 5% per new building due to

new guidelines for security. Today most

major US architectural firms have

employees charged with the task of

developing anti-terror measures, such as

bullet-proof windows, air-filters which

should protect against chemical and

biological attack, as well as access-

limiting landscape architecture (Busi-

nessweek 2003). Many embassies and

public buildings have strengthened their

facades in the struggle against terrorism.

The American Embassy in Oslo has

introduced comprehensive security mea-

sures including fences, extra police and,

in addition to American security guards,

they have closed the streets around the

embassy to traffic.

Mike Davis (1992) has described how

the development of gated communities

has manifested itself in Los Angeles. He

claims that municipal policies have been

governed by the security offensive and

the demands posed by the middle classes

for increased spatial and social segrega-

tion from the rest of the population. Tax

money which was used for traditional

public spaces and recreational facilities,

has been redirected in order to support

the ‘sanitary projects’ of big capital,

Davis claims. These security areas are

only accessible to a minority of the

population. Davis’ key argument is that

social demarcations are controlled and

surveilled by the use of architecture. The

economic and social differences in the

population have increased, which has

come to entail that those with enough

money can remove/protect themselves

from other groups with, among other

means, architectural strategies. The stra-

tegic fortification of the city against

the poor and the pariah groups (i.e. the

homeless and drug addicts) tears at the

public and democratic space. The desire

on the part of the middle classes as well

as big capital for spatial and social

segregation is partially responsible for a

militarization of city spaces, Davis

claims.

Gated communities are by and large

an American phenomenon, and Davis’

description of Los Angeles is admittedly

far removed from most Scandinavian

cities. Arguably, however, there are

5This principle has grown to be an important crime

prevention principle after Wilson and Kelling revealedtheir broken window theory in 1982. The theory isbased on an idea that lack of physical order andmaintenance leads to crime.

4My research (Midtveit 2004) showed that—although

this checklist containing ten pages was distributed toall governmental planning offices—public plannersfound it difficult to follow because of its inconsistence.



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traces of this kind of thinking behind

gated communities in Scandinavia, too.

Davis puts forward a Marxist argument

which stresses social stratification and

the upper class need to remove them-

selves from other groups. However, I

hold that the increasing focus on security

in the city is not necessarily tied to class

segregation, but rather the increase in

the number of people seeking to live in

urban areas. Focus on aesthetics and

safety in public spaces may also be

linked to the increasing ‘gentrification’

in city centres (Zukin 1997). Briefly put,

this is a process of social renewal in

former low income/status areas. City

areas that were characterized by the

presence of the working class are gradu-

ally being taken over by the consumer

oriented middle class. Some of the

characteristics of these new types of

areas are that new groups are moving

in, while at the same time ousting the

‘local population’. At the same time one

can see a regeneration of leisure oppor-

tunities with new cafes, restaurants,

galleries, designer stores, etc. As such,

these city areas have gained increased

statues and popularity.

In some ways we are experiencing a

reinvention of the city, which Jacobs felt

would decrease the fear of crime in the

city areas. However, people living in

urban areas gradually find it important

to shield these apartments from public

spaces by the use of physical barriers.

Thus, it is not so much a question of

reducing crime or disliked acts, as

redistributing space. Oslo’s urban

renewal project can serve as one example

on how the revitalization of the city can

lead to increased need for security

measures and marking of territory. As

an extension of the renewal initiative the

municipality of Oslo wants to create

stable living environments and accom-

modate families with children in inner-

city Oslo. The Property and Renewal

Section6 of the city administration gives

benefits to property owners who wish to

upgrade apartments and outdoor areas

of low standards. The department gives

free advice on ways of improving out-

door spaces and gives benefits to pre-

projects on living quarters. The Internet

pages of the renewal department say

that:

The renewal work is there to create

friendly playing and leisure areas for

the city population. This is particu-

larly important in order to bring

about stable living environments and

in order to accommodate families

with small children so that they may

remain in the inner-city areas. The

property and city renewal department

distributes benefits from the munici-

pality of Oslo and ‘Husbanken’ for

the improvements of outdoor areas in

run-down apartment blocks in the

inner city (Tilskudd til byfornyelse

2003).7

The apartment block owners who are

applying for benefits must accommodate

certain minimum standards. One of the

standards is that the outdoor area should

be for the tenants of apartment block

only:

In order that the outdoor area should

be reserved for the tenants of the

block, there should be provisions in

7The quotations are translated by the author of this

article.

6Eiendoms- og byfornyelsesetaten.



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place for the closing of the entrances

from the street. All doorways/gate-

ways should have a lockable door/

gate. One should consider whether

some of the entrances should be

completely shut (Tilskudd til byfor-

nyelse 2003).

The statement indicates that the

defence of territory is often something

more than just reduction of crime. It is

also about avoiding other people and

about denying others access. Such initia-

tives frequently have hidden objectives,

one of my informants pointed out. In

this case the objective is to protect the

outdoor areas so that they are only for

the use of the occupants of the house.

The reinvention of the city as Jacobs

and the New Urbanism request may

therefore just be safe for some people.

Bauman (1988) argues that crime-

preventing measures are either seductive

or excluding. I will argue that crime

prevention trough environmental design

may have both these effects at the same

time. The idea and use of territory as a

measure to prevent crime is seductive

for those people these communities

are planned for and excluding for

people who do not live in or do not

commercially use these crime-prevented

communities.

A common principle in crime-

preventing planning is multifunctional

areas, to prevent urban areas from being

unpopulated during some parts of the

day (Jacobs 1969, Krad 1998, Bo Tryggt

2001). One way of doing this is to build

apartments over stores or shopping

centres. Instead of using fences and

walls, there is an increasing trend for

using facades as barriers against intru-

ders. Such barriers can be everything

from walls to glass windows. Often

shops and other facilities will be situated

on ground level, usually well protected

with surveillance cameras, security

guards and people using the facilities.

Outdoor or backyard areas are often

integrated in the building complex so

that these areas are only accessible for

tenants with keys or key cards. Aker

Brygge in Oslo is one example of such

design. Here, shop windows or facades

are used as barriers against intruders.

The 320 luxury flats are well shielded

from the outside world by the use of

security and access control systems such

as video surveillance, card readers and

security guards (Aspen 1997). An archi-

tect who works on the development

of crime-preventing principles calls

this way of constructing buildings ‘shell

protection’ (‘skallsikring’). He sees this

as an unfortunate development in urban

planning:

Shell protection ... that we today

build houses where one needs codes

for entering apartment blocks creates

a stronger sense of division between

inside and outside. Before one could

speak with the neighbour while enter-

ing the door; this does not happen

now in the same way. The most

common development in the direc-

tion towards gated communities in

Scandinavia is these entrance codes

one is getting everywhere, also where

it is not necessary.

By limiting the access to apartments

many occupants will feel they have some

degree of control over who is staying

in the apartment block at any given

time. This may give a sense of security.

But this notion of safety might have a



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self-enforcing effect. If one is living in a

closed society with little contact with the

outside, then reality may come to appear

even more unsafe. Studies show that fear

of violent criminality has a correlation

with city living and low social integra-

tion (Olaussen 1995). If we put this

finding in the context of segregated ways

of living one might argue that while

closed societies have high levels of

internal integration, the anxieties

towards the outside world may never-

theless increase. Richard Sennett (1996)

holds that the ideal of creating a safe city

in many ways is incompatible with the

idea of a city as such. The city is chaotic,

varied and uncontrollable. Parts of the

city are unknown and will therefore also

be experienced as unknown to many.

Attempts at controlling the incoherent or

incontrollable will often only remind us

of our own inadequateness. Urban plan-

ning is, according to Sennett, only

purification mechanisms developed in

an effort to gain control over fear and

prevent the unexpected. Planning strate-

gies are, therefore, aiming to gain con-

trol over social life. This is evident in the

quadrangle layout of many cities, such as

Oslo, also called architecture of disci-

pline, with its straight, easily surveilled

streets. Sennett (1997) claims that this

paradigm is an anti-urban spirit which

negates differences and neutralizes the

environment. If one chooses to adopt

Sennett’s perspective, then one might

wish for greater acceptance of the

uncontrollable and unpredictable—and

in this way the city might feel less unsafe

for each individual citizen.

The fear of crime experienced by

many is mostly linked to public spaces.

When the architects and planners I

interviewed talk about fear of crime

and crime problems it is often in the

context of those criminal acts we are

exposed to in public spaces. Neverthe-

less, is there a logical flaw in defending

territory (i.e. Newman) and working for

crime prevention for the public spaces in

the city? The problem is that territori-

ality is often limited to specific living

areas. That which is on the outside will

always be public space, unless all public

spaces are privatized. I think it is

problematic to continue using crime

prevention principles like defence of

territory in city areas, whether they are

soft or hard measures, if one wants to

avoid a privatization of public spaces

and an increase in physical and symbolic

barriers on access to these spaces.

‘You will not find one architect who

likes wrapping houses in steel fences’8

When I interviewed architects and plan-

ners in connection with my thesis, all

exposed a strong dislike of measures

such as fences or other physical barriers.

They stressed the dangers associated

with creating a society with fortress-

like features. An architect owning a firm

of architects noted:

We are observing that the American

Embassy is experiencing protests

against closing off the area by the

use of fences, because it is experienced

as a rejection. And I strongly sym-

pathize with that. That does not

mean we may not use walls so as

to avoid onlookers gaining insight,

but the principle has a strong aspect

of denial. As an architect one tries

in a way to make a more inclusive

environment.

8Quotation from an informants’ statement.



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The architect pointed out that the

American Embassy in Oslo is exclusion-

ary and that architects want to construct

houses that are as inclusive as possible.

Fences and barriers are unviable:

Fences are a bad measure. Because we

think we send the wrong signals when

we are using fences. We are trying to

use other methods to keep people

within four walls. It may be that, for

example, we build the house around a

yard. Then the house is just as much a

fence as any other fence, but it is not

perceived like that in the same way. It

will not be considered in the same

degree as a denial of liberty as a fence

would.

The informant stresses the use of

symbolic measures instead of fences or

walls. According to Newman (1973),

territoriality is a combination of physi-

cal, psychological, psychobiological and

cultural dimensions which our physical

environments will have to strive to

maintain. Design techniques such as

variation on the choice of colour, land-

scape signposts and the construction of

meeting places are regarded as softer

prevention techniques. One example of a

soft prevention technique is to slightly

lift the entrance area of a building.

Height creates a feeling of remoteness

and people might feel less welcome. A

different way of doing this is to use

different colours and materials so that

one distinguishes between public and

private spaces. Moreover, it is suggested

by among others Newman (1973) and

Coleman (1985) that the number of

people using common spaces should

not exceed a certain amount, and that

shared entry points should not be used

by too many families. In this way the

opportunities for exercising informal

control are increased (Katay 2002).

I asked further if the architect had any

views on why we have so many exclud-

ing buildings in the cities when the

architects wanted buildings that are as

inclusive as possible:

One can manifest power in buildings.

These big buildings are often used

as advertisements for big firms. They

want to signal what they are. One

would often include this in buildings

such as the Pentagon and Telenor at

Fornebu. It is used in a conscious

manner and many architects think

this is very funny. And it is very

funny, but there are many sides to it.

As an architect it is difficult to

prioritize principles of inclusion

because they will be very weak in

such games. They are so economically

strong (...). It is difficult to attach

architects on this because this is a

societal challenge that needs to be

solved at an entirely different level.

We do what our employer tells us to

do.

It is difficult to maintain overall

humanistic objectives in the planning

work because the architects are working

for clients who want their wishes ful-

filled. The architect further points out

that these are societal challenges that the

urban planning cannot solve:

If one uses the perspective of society

as a whole, then it is not so crime

preventive to use crime preventive

architecture. But one is trying to

protect the interests of those for

whom one has been hired to do a



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job. And in this way it is a pretty

egocentric way of doing crime pre-

vention. But in many ways this is

what one should do and it is also a

responsibility one should take on.

Simply as an architect we cannot

solve societal challenges. We can

only look at it from the bubble we

are operating in ... It would probably

have been good if there were some

communication on this with others

who work with crime-preventing

initiatives. In this way one could

gain a greater perspective in the

planning

When architects and planners do

crime prevention they have responsibility

over a limited space and are working

according to the interests of the client.

For society as a whole it is not necessa-

rily a good strategy, since the prevention

is limited to apartments or other com-

mercial areas. The planning of safe

communities is therefore directed

towards the communities of the few.

When such a strategy is used it may be

problematic to refer to this method as

having overall benefits for society as

whole. Moreover, symbolic measures

must be planned for in the project

before a building is erected. It may

often be the case that crime-related

problems arise only after the building is

finished, and then it is difficult to create

symbolic barriers. It will therefore often

be easier to use physical barriers such as

locks, fences, or remove facilities which

are pulling in crime. One of my infor-

mants noted that there was a contra-

diction between the interests of the

security industry and the urban planners

because the planners would often hinder

the use of security systems as a part of

good crime prevention strategies. The

security industry may only offer repairs,

not prevention, the informant argued. I

would argue that this contradiction is

not unambiguous. The planners want to

protect the interests of their clients (see

quotation above). It may not necessarily

be the case that the clients prefer

variation of colour to locks. Fences and

walls are also symbols of what is public

and what is private. There is, as I have

pointed out before, a long tradition for

such crime preventive planning. Further-

more, the crime prevention checklists

often contain symbolic ways of delineat-

ing territory alongside physical security

measures. Both principles will be used in

a way that denies someone access or as a

method for sheltering oneself from the

overall population.

Opera music as a crime-preventing

measure

The Copenhagen Railway Station,

Hovedbanegarden, may serve as one

example how territory can be signalled

with symbolic measures. The police had

problems with a group of drug dealers

and homeless people who occupied one

of the entrances to the station. To get rid

of these people they play unbearably

loud opera music or Christmas carols.

The choice of this music is most likely

based on the assumption that the people

occupying this entrance do not identify

themselves with opera music. Conse-

quently they comprehend that this is

not their area. One other explanation

may be that this music makes it unbear-

able to stay in this entrance. I went

trough this passage on numerous occa-

sions when I did research for my thesis in

Copenhagen. Despite the fact that this

was in December and the temperature



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showed below zero, I only observed one

person inside the entrance. All the drug

dealers or the homeless people stayed

outside the entrance. The symbolic

measure was obviously effective; the

unwanted stayed away. But the criminal

activities were still going on outside

Hovedbanegarden. Studies on situational

crime prevention confirm that this dis-

placement effect often occurs (Clark

1997). I asked one of my informants

what he thinks of this crime-preventing

attempt:

I do not mind this opera music. But it

does not improve them. If someone

wants to use it because they are cold,

are selling pot or whatever reason

they might stay there, they will not be

driven away. It is only a question of

making a signal that they do not

belong there anymore, you see? They

use music to create a feeling of safety

in a car park in a residential area in

Sweden. It is not the first time they use

music as a crime-preventing attempt.

The architect defends this measure

because it does not physically exclude

people, that is, people are not physically

chased. But this music is addressed

towards groups who are not wanted at

the railway station—the ‘pariah groups’,

which Mike Davis (1992) refers to. These

excluded groups are drug addicts who do

not use the trains or do not spend money

in the shops or cafes. These are people

who are scaring away the customers, or

who are making the surroundings less

safe.

I will argue that this measure used at

Hovedbanegarden is not comparable to

the music played in the car park in

Sweden (see quotation above). In the

latter case it is meant to calm the people

who feel unsafe in the car park. The

music at Hovedbanegarden is not meant

to simulate a more pleasant atmosphere.

The music is used to get rid of a group of

people who apparently are making the

surroundings less safe for other people.

This is an ethical dilemma which gets

blurred because this is a soft measure

which is not offensive to most people.

Norbert Elias (1982) describes how the

modern Western society has developed a

sense of sensibility which, among other

things, may have caused the elimination

of violence in our everyday life. Briefly,

these changes in cultural and social

conventions have led to changes in what

we tolerate of behaviour, for instance

strong feelings like aggression are often

considered as ‘inhumane’. Furthermore,

we experience that disturbing aspects of

our lives such as violence, sickness and

death are more or less absent. But Elias

claims that the violence is hiding behind

the scenes. Through the pacification of

our everyday life the members of society

will become defenceless and incapable of

developing resistance. Moreover, the use

of soft crime-preventing measures is often

presented as a social benefit, or at least as

a better alternative than hard measures

such as physical barriers which exclude

people. My informant justifies opera

music as a measure to prevent crime

because it does not exclude people

physically. I will claim that when using

these indistinct measurers one risks that

the moral discussion about the conse-

quences of crime prevention will be silent.

Crime prevention in general is a positive

word which everyone can agree on

(Giertsen 1994). Consequently, contrast-

ing and conflicting interests may be

veiled.



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Exclusion of disorderly people/behaviour

It is important to stress a further

distinction between hard and soft mea-

sures: the degree of precision in relation

to those who are being excluded and

consequences of trespassing. To climb a

wall or force a door open signify a

criminal act. Drug addicts entering

Hovedbanegarden would not be liable

to criminal charges. Walls are created in

order to protect against strangers or to

avoid burglary or vandalism. The music

at Hovedbanegarden has been intro-

duced in order to prevent disorderly

behaviour or discourage the presence of

unwanted people. In one of my inter-

views I asked whether crime prevention

not only relates to efforts of reducing

crime but also to order and clean the city

of untidy elements. My respondent

noted:

I can imagine that they talk about this

in Norway, they certainly do in

Sweden. I can’t be in any Swedish

municipality without there being men-

tion of ‘places where people hang

out’. Either it is for the alcoholics,

which are called Team A, or certain

groups of youths. And this the

Swedish normally do not want. So

the alcoholics and these youth groups

do not have a place to be at all.

And the result is that many of the

city’s spaces have become incredibly

sad.

The respondent notes here that

Norway and Sweden conducts a policy

which seeks to expel certain groups

from public spaces. I asked the same

informant if he thought there were

differing attitudes to difference in the

Scandinavian countries. He replied:

Yes, I think so, that is that the

Swedish and Norwegian attitude is

that there needs to be order in it all,

right? There should not be anybody

that lives outside of or on the edge of

society.

He thought Denmark had dealt with

this better:

Instead one needs to make the spaces

good, so that ordinary people can use

them. So that the problems with the

alcoholics and young people become

relatively minor because there are so

many of the other people around,

right?

How is this possible?

One can drown the problems [by

encouraging] ordinary people’s ordin-

ary behaviour. But if ordinary people

are not there, then only the unwanted

behaviour, or the behaviour one does

not want, prevails. And the majority

of Swedish policies are about taking

away those possibilities. In Denmark

they are trying to do the opposite:

they are tying to make the city

environments as good as possible so

that other people are there too. In

Nyhavn it does not matter that the

drunken men are sitting at the quay-

side and drinking beers that they have

brought along. That is, in Nyhavn

there is a mix between those who pay

for the beers and those who brought

them along in a bag, right? And those

who brought them in a bag are far

from as many as those who are paying

so it does not matter that much. They

can exist together.



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The architect does not want a practice

where one removes people or unwanted

actions. Instead one needs to plan the

spaces so that ordinary people mix with

‘the others’, the informant notes. The

‘ordinary behaviour’ will in this way

drown the not-so-ordinary behaviour.

The respondent thinks that one can

prevent insecurity by way of planning

good public spaces so that ordinary

people would want to use these spaces.

There is, arguably, an implicit moral

dimension in this statement. The archi-

tect does not want to exclude any groups

from public space. At the same time,

however, the architect voices the notion

that one group of people is problematic

for that space. These people and their

behaviour need to be drowned, the

respondent claims.

Mary Douglas (1997) argues that

humans are classifying beings who dis-

tinguish between order and disorder,

inside and outside, and clean and

unclean. Cultural order is, according to

Douglas, based on the differentiation of

these categories. Large parts of our

thought processes are built on such

binary oppositions. We structure our

thoughts in contrasts such as nature-

culture, man-woman, clean-dirty,

normal-abnormal. Elements that do not

fit into the system of classification are

defined as unclean. Forms of purifica-

tion, on the other hand, are meant to

create or recreate order and safety. This

notion might explain why graffiti and

urban disorder are seen to represent an

absence of safety. It is important to note

that disorder does not only concern

criminal acts. The idea of order is not

only related to physical surroundings.

Order also has to do with people and

different forms of behaviour. Much of

contemporary crime prevention policies

in Scandinavia are based on such dicho-

tomies or oppositions. In a Norwegian

government publication concerning

urban development in city centres, the

government expresses the wish for

greater presence of ‘proper people’ as a

means for creating safety in the city

centre:

Safety is important for the centres’

activities. The prerequisite for making

people active participants in public

streets and squares is that they feel

safe. When the distances are short,

they should prefer to walk, not drive

to and forth. They should want to live

in open spaces integrated into the city,

not in closed, surveilled areas—a

development observable in other

countries, which may be on its way

to us. Fear undermines a living centre.

But if more ‘proper people’ increas-

ingly use the centre, then there will be

fewer that have the possibility to

vandalize, harass or use violence.

And a virtuous circle has been initi-

ated (Sentrumsutvikling: Miljøbyen

2000).

In the above quote the same means are

argued for as the previous respondent

advocated. As a crime preventive mea-

sure more ‘proper people’ need to use the

city centre—in this way the not-so-

proper become less visible. Both state-

ments quoted above reflect the notion

that some people create order while

others create disorder. These binary

oppositions are not neutral, and contain

hidden hierarchies which may provide a

simplified understanding of society.

Young (2002:467) calls these oppositions

a ‘series of false binaries’. Disorder may



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not necessarily be criminal acts, but

rather behaviour or people in conflict

with other interests. For city centres

some of these interests tend to be

commercial interests. Shop owners

may want to discourage political

parties in shopping malls, youths hang-

ing out with friends rather than shop-

ping, and disturbing elements such as

homeless people or drug users (Lomell

1999).

Summary

This article has indicated that

Scandinavian architects and planners

are sceptical of the kind of gated

communities we se in the US. Instead

they suggest the use of symbolic mea-

sures to delineate territories. But even

though the measures are different they

have the same intention: to deny some-

one access to an area. Although these

soft measures are positive alternatives to

walls and physical access controls, they

are merely alternatives with the same

intention. I have emphasized that these

soft measures may intervene with space

in cities that we normally consider as

public. Furthermore, I asked if hard and

soft measures have the same effect on the

urban population. Hard measures such

as walls and fences make no difference

between orderly and disorderly beha-

viour, normal and abnormal people,

decent people or indecent people. Locks

exclude all strangers. Soft measures like

music may let some drug abusers in and

scare others away. They may also scare

some of the ‘good’ costumers. Such

crime-preventing strategies may possibly

make the city environment less pleasant

regardless of which people they affect. I

do not doubt that the planners are

intending to create good public spaces

for all users. Nevertheless, it is important

to stress that the ideas behind these soft

measures reflect a hierarchical outlook

that does little to alleviate the margin-

alization of some groups. In this way soft

measures, despite seemingly humanistic

benefits and proclaimed inclusion, come

to reproduce distinct power relations

in society and conform to contempo-

rary, conventional social stratification

processes.

The marginalization or removal of

certain people from public spaces poses,

in my opinion, a serious ethical dilemma.

Do socially empowered groups have the

right to organize public spaces in a way

that accords to their notion of order?

This ethical dilemma is considerably

heightened by the fact that soft measures

render the very act of exclusion nearly

unnoticeable for everyday users. Soft

measures are subtle and difficult to

discover. In this way citizens are pre-

vented from reflecting on exclusion and

the ways in which urban areas are open

to some but closed to others.

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crime prevention and exclusion: from walls to opera music

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