Crime in Ireland

An interesting and not without its own significant impact, practically in the perception by the public regarding crime crisis is the vast explosion of media. In 1950 there were a handful of daily newspapers, a dozen or so weekly regional newspapers a couple of magazines a single radio station and no TV available in Ireland. The media was strongly controlled. Today, the numbers of news and other media sources are literally too numerous to count. There are thousands of media outlets available to the Irish audience. These sources are competing for audience market share, the object of revenues and the driving force as to what is reported. Crime sells. It would be less than realistic to believe that the over abundance of media offerings competing for audience does not have impact on the perception the public has regarding the possibility of a crime crisis. It goes without saying that media is under a moral restriction not to report falsely but there is no such restriction on what they chose to emphasize.

Consequently, media is responsible for the perception that if a crime crisis exists it may not stand up to a statistical evaluation of raw data.

If a crime crisis currently exist in Ireland or not, it requires a consideration of many elements and how they relate. Socioeconomic, historical, media and law enforcement issues are all part of the puzzle. When evaluating the various elements of crime statistics, eventually a consideration of both reporting and perception enter into the overall broad picture. Is an increase in crime statistics a result of over or under reporting of data? If you manipulate numbers enough they will eventually say whatever you want them to. The concept of a crisis is within the collective perception of the culture. If there is a perception of a crisis -there is a crisis.

It goes without saying that crime is the result of social and economic circumstances that are subject to virtually an unlimited variety of interactive possibilities. The current crime rate in Ireland is low when compared to most any criteria. That being the case, it would be difficult to call the present circumstances in Ireland a “Crime Crisis”.

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