Inter-American Development Bank
facebook
twitter
youtube
linkedin
instagram
Abierto al públicoBeyond BordersCaribbean Development TrendsCiudades SosteniblesEnergía para el FuturoEnfoque EducaciónFactor TrabajoGente SaludableGestión fiscalGobernarteIdeas MatterIdeas que CuentanIdeaçãoImpactoIndustrias CreativasLa Maleta AbiertaMoviliblogMás Allá de las FronterasNegocios SosteniblesPrimeros PasosPuntos sobre la iSeguridad CiudadanaSostenibilidadVolvamos a la fuente¿Y si hablamos de igualdad?Home
Citizen Security and Justice Creative Industries Development Effectiveness Early Childhood Development Education Energy Envirnment. Climate Change and Safeguards Fiscal policy and management Gender and Diversity Health Labor and pensions Open Knowledge Public management Science, Technology and Innovation  Trade and Regional Integration Urban Development and Housing Water and Sanitation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to secondary menu
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer

Caribbean Development Trends

  • HOME
  • CATEGORIES
    • Agribusiness
    • Antigua and Barbuda
    • Barbados
    • BehaviorChange
    • Belize
    • Bermuda
    • biodiversity
    • Blockchain
    • Caribbean
    • Caribbean Culture and Media
    • Climate Change
    • Creative Economy
    • Crime Prevention and Citizen Security
    • Data and Knowledge
    • De-risking
    • Dominica
    • Dutch
    • Early Childhood Development
    • Economic Growth
    • Education Policy
    • energy
    • entrepreneurship
    • Environmental and Climate Change
    • Events
    • Extractives
    • Finance
    • Fiscal Rules
    • gender
    • Governance and Regulatory Policy Reforms
    • Grenada
    • Guyana
    • Haiti
    • Health
    • Health Policy
    • Hurricane
    • Hurricane Irma
    • infrastructure
    • Innovation and change
    • Intellectual Property
    • IWD
    • Jamaica
    • JumpCaribbean
    • Labor
    • Labour Markets
    • MOOC
    • Music
    • Natural Disasters
    • Nurturing Institutions
    • OECS
    • Podcast
    • Poverty
    • Private Sector and Entrepreneurship
    • Saint Kitts and Nevis
    • Saint Lucia
    • Saint Vincent and Grenadines
    • skills
    • Sports for Development
    • Suriname
    • Technology
    • The Bahamas
    • The Blue Economy
    • Transportation
    • Tourism
    • Trinidad and Tobago
    • Uncategorized
    • VAWG
    • Webinar
    • women
    • Women for Change
    • youth
  • Country Offices
    • Bahamas
    • Barbados
    • Guyana
    • Jamaica
    • Suriname
    • Trinidad and Tobago
  • Press Releases
    • Bahamas
    • Barbados
    • Guyana
    • Jamaica
    • Suriname
    • Trinidad and Tobago
  • Authors

Without Fears: The Philadelphia Experiment, Step by Step.

March 13, 2015 by Pablo Bachelet Leave a Comment


It’s a common question in the fight against crime: Is it better for police to patrol in cars or on motorcycles, so they can cover more ground and respond faster to emergency calls, or walk their beats so they can interact more closely with their communities.

The answer lies in the “Philadelphia Experiment.” That’s got nothing to do with the 1984 movie by the same name about an effort to build an invisible warship. On the contrary, the idea here is to maximize the visibility of the police.

A few years back, the level of crime in Philadelphia reached epidemic levels. Between 2002 and 2008, more than 100 incidents with firearms were reported per month. The violence grew worse during summer months, and the overwhelmed citizens demanded that the police do something.

The police reply was a campaign of intensive foot patrols, but with smart assignments. Officers were deployed in micro-areas that reported the most crime, known as hotspots and a topic we addressed previously in this blog.  That made sense because investigations have shown that 50 percent of urban crime usually takes place in 5 percent of a city’s streets.

Police officers were trained on their assigned areas, and each officer hit the streets accompanied by a more experienced colleague. Before going out, they reviewed a folder with information about crime in their area produced by a special intelligence unit.

Some officers worked on community tasks, chatting with residents or visiting areas frequented by youths. Others carried out more traditional police work, such as checking vehicles or pedestrians.

How did the program perform in Philadelphia?

According to one study in 2011, violent crime indicators dropped by 23 percent in the areas where the “intelligent patrols” took place, compared to the other areas. The study also found an increase in proactive police work against activities such as drug trafficking and public disorder.

All of this is beneficial for those who live or pass through the hotspots, but can have negative results if the criminal activity merely moves on to other neighborhoods. The study in fact found that a reduction of 90 criminal incidents in a hot zone led to an increase of 37 criminal incidents in neighboring areas. Crime did indeed move to other areas, but there was a net reduction of 53 criminal incidents.

The program crimesolutions.gov compiles practices and reviews of justice programs that meet its strict methodological standards and rates them as “effective,” “promising” or “no effect.” Its reviews and its executive summary are written in simple language that can be easily understood. It awarded its best grade, “effective,” to the Philadelphia program.

Of course it’s not a matter of just doing away with police vehicles and sending officers to walk the streets of Latin America and Caribbean cities. The officers must know the areas where crime is more likely to take place. For this, the systems of Geo-referencing crimes by quadrants that Chile and Colombia are implementing are a good first step.

 


Filed Under: Social Systems Tagged With: Caribbean development, crime, crime solutions, developing the Caribbean, Philadelphia Experiment, violence

Reader Interactions

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Primary Sidebar

Follow Us

Subscribe

Search

Caribbean Dev Trends

We provide unique and timely insights on the Caribbean and its political, social, and economic development. At the IDB, we strive to improve lives in the Caribbean by creating vibrant and resilient economies where people are safe, productive and happy.

Similar posts

  • Without Fears
  • What makes Neighbourhoods Safer in the Caribbean?  
  • Does Big Data = Big Brother?
  • How effective is community-based policing? The case of Nicaragua.
  • In Bogotá, fear does not match the numbers

Footer

Banco Interamericano de Desarrollo
facebook
twitter
youtube
youtube
youtube

    Blog posts written by Bank employees:

    Copyright © Inter-American Development Bank ("IDB"). This work is licensed under a Creative Commons IGO 3.0 Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives. (CC-IGO 3.0 BY-NC-ND) license and may be reproduced with attribution to the IDB and for any non-commercial purpose. No derivative work is allowed. Any dispute related to the use of the works of the IDB that cannot be settled amicably shall be submitted to arbitration pursuant to the UNCITRAL rules. The use of the IDB's name for any purpose other than for attribution, and the use of IDB's logo shall be subject to a separate written license agreement between the IDB and the user and is not authorized as part of this CC- IGO license. Note that link provided above includes additional terms and conditions of the license.


    For blogs written by external parties:

    For questions concerning copyright for authors that are not IADB employees please complete the contact form for this blog.

    The opinions expressed in this blog are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the IDB, its Board of Directors, or the countries they represent.

    Attribution: in addition to giving attribution to the respective author and copyright owner, as appropriate, we would appreciate if you could include a link that remits back the IDB Blogs website.



    Privacy Policy

    Copyright © 2025 · Magazine Pro on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in

    Banco Interamericano de Desarrollo

    Aviso Legal

    Las opiniones expresadas en estos blogs son las de los autores y no necesariamente reflejan las opiniones del Banco Interamericano de Desarrollo, sus directivas, la Asamblea de Gobernadores o sus países miembros.

    facebook
    twitter
    youtube