The fear-increasing and fear-decreasing effects of a pilot policy to reduce fear of crime.

ABSTRACT: Fear of crime has been rising persistently in Chile, even in periods where actual crime rates have decreased, making the perception of crime an important policy issue. This paper presents the results of the impact evaluation of a pilot public policy designed to reduce fear of crime around a shopping centre in Santiago, Chile. The pilot policy consisted of installing a team including police officers and local government officials that handed out information leaflets and talked to passers-by about crime prevention. Pre-intervention and post-intervention surveys were conducted in the shopping centre where the programme was implemented and in a control shopping centre nearby to identify the causal effects of the policy using a difference-in-differences empirical strategy. The results indicate

SUBMITTER: Benavente JM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9987788 | biostudies-literature | 2023

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature