Broken Windows Theory And The Prevention Of Corruptive Crimes

Many aliving practice indicates that there is an inseparable relationship between the exterior environment and certain kinds of crimes. Such relationship has been recognized from long time ago and used into the control of crimes. Numerous scholars have carried out a series of fruitful empirical research on the relationship between the crime and the environment. In1982, American scholars James Q. Wilson and Geo rge L. Kelling, hence proposed the concept of broken windows theory for the first time, which illustrated the important connection between minor offenses and serious crimes. The core issue of the broken windows theory extends around two aspects:1) whether there is a correlation between disorder and crime,2) if there is, can crimes be controlled by intervening the occurrence of such disorder? Broken windows theory was earlier applied to the practice of crime control in the US. Based on this theory, many a system and measure was developed, which have effectively reduced the crime rate and improve the environment security.As a Chinese ancient idiom says:if the minor courtesy lost, the major one will not remain; if a small offense unrectified, a huge disaster will happen, the broken window theory enlightens us that the initial minor bad behavior should be resolutely punished and the bad state should be timely corrected, so as to avoid more serious behavior. The broken window effect is clearly reflected in the corruption phenomenon, i.e. people would have a psychological implication that corruption is applicable if tiny corruptive acts were connived and unpunished, thus causing more originally uncorrupt people to emulate, then making the small greed into a big corruption and eventually leading to disastrous consequences. Singapore and Hong Kong are the two samples who have continuously remained higher positions on the uncorrupt index list. They have successfully implied the broken windows theory to the prevention, control and punishment of corruption with "zero tolerance" approach, that is, even tiny acts of corruption, once found, will be severely punished, and the behavior will pay a bloody price.China has always attached great importance to the issue of corruption, and a variety of laws and decrees have been made from ancient times, but corruption has always existed in a large number. The data show that in recent years the quantity of corruption crimes still take on a slow growth trend. Why has corruption not diminished with the gradual improvement of laws and regulations? I believe that there are historical, social, economic and many other reasons, last but not least the degree of tolerance of corruption.had a huge impact on this phenomenon. For example, according to the current law, the conviction amount for bribery behavior need reach5,000yuan, less than this amount can only be penalized by the party or government discipline. In practice, due to the impact of various reasons, some of the perpetrators are only punished by minimal party and government discipline or even some disciplinary education. In some economically developed districts, local judiciary sections secretly increased the conviction standard, put aside small cases and centralized processing big ones. Such phenomenon may partly attribute to the lack of capacity of case-handling, and the mentality that investigating and handling major cases can better reflect the level of anti-corruption efforts. However, such practice would lead to the bystanders’ cognation that "minor acts of corruption will not be punished", and even incur some people to imitate, which would cause corruption consequences spread accordingly.This thesis elaborates on the origin and proposing of the broken windows theory, takes the United States, Singapore, Hong Kong and other countries and regions as examples, introduces their successful experience of applying the broken windows theory to crime control. By exploring the current status and characteristics of corruption crime in China, this thesis discussed the course of development of the concept of corruption prevention, the status of punishing and preventing corruption crime from two aspects, i.e. the criminal rule of law and social control. Starting with finding out the common ground for the "broken windows" and corruption, this thesis put forward the point of view on the implementation of the "zero tolerance" anti-corruption policies, analyzed and discussed the feasibility of "zero tolerance" anti-corruption and the existing difficulties in their implementation in China from various aspects. By studying "zero tolerance" anti-corruption experience of other countries and regions, absorbing useful ones which could be utilized by this country, the author put forward her own strategy on how to improve the mode,and enhance the level and efficiency of anti-corruption work, in order to expel the career of punishing and preventing corruption in our country.