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Sense and Nonsense About Crime,

Drugs, and Communities 8th Edition,

(Ebook PDF)
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Contents

PROPOSITIONS xviii
FOREWORD xxi
PREFACE xxiii

PART I THINKING CLEARLY ABOUT CRIME 1

1 Crime and Policy: A Complex Problem 2

Crime Trends: Conflicting, Confusing 2
The Great American Crime Drop 3
Is the Crime Drop Genuine? 5
Explaining the Crime Drop 5
The Purpose of This Book 6
Problem-Oriented Crime Policy 7
Contextual versus Policy Factors 10
The New Standard: Evidence-Based Crime Policy 12
Understanding Crime and Justice in the United States 14
Crime Problems in the United States 15
Waging War on Crime 16
The Racial Dimensions of the War on Crime 18
Waging “War” Is the Wrong Way to Deal with Crime 20
A “Social Ledger” of Crime Policy 21
Crime Policy: A Plague of Nonsense 22
The Ground Rules 23
What Do We Mean by Crime Prevention? 24

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viii CONTENTS

The Question of Reasonable Goals 24

Guilty: Liberals and Conservatives 26
Crime Control Theology 26
Conservative Theology 27
Liberal Theology 29
A Word about Rules 30
Ideological Confusion: Switching Sides 31
Conclusion 32
Notes 32

2 Models of Criminal Justice 38

The Crime Commission’s Model 41
The Criminal Justice Wedding Cake 43
“Celebrated Cases”: The Top Layer 44
Serious Felonies: The Second and Third Layers 47
An Example of the Complexity of the System: “Back-End
Sentencing” in California 48
The Impact of Prior Record 49
The Impact of the Victim–Offender Relationship 49
Prior Relationship: A Policy Dilemma 51
Hard or Soft on Crime? Unraveling the Paradox 52
The Lower Depths: The Fourth Layer 53
Conclusion 54
Notes 54

3 The Going Rate 58

Evaluating the System 58
The Criminal Justice Funnel 59
A Closer Look Inside the Funnel 62
Weeding out the Weak Cases: Rejections and Dismissals 63
Sentencing: The Going Rate Gets Tougher 66
How Do We Compare? An International Perspective on the Going
Rate 67
The Courtroom Work Group 69
An Administrative System of Justice 69
The Limits of Reform 71
The Dynamics of Reform 73
Justice Thermodynamics 73

Wrongful Convictions: How Common Are Mistakes? 75

Conclusion 77
Notes 78

4 The Prediction Problem 81

The Risk Assessment Tradition 82
Searching for the Career Criminal 83
Wolfgang’s Birth Cohort 83
Other Cohort Studies 85
Career Criminals: Defining Our Terms and Concepts 86
From Research to Policy 87
Application Problems 88
Confronting the Prediction Problem 89
Looking for Violent Delinquents: The Wenk Study 89
The Texas Death Row Inmate Study 91
The Federal Sentencing Guidelines 91
The Rand Selective Incapacitation Study 92
How Much Crime Do They Commit? 94
Conclusion 96
Notes 96

PART II “GET TOUGH”: THE CONSERVATIVE ATTACK ON CRIME 99

5 Unleash the Cops! 100

More Cops on the Street 101
Some Basics about Police Patrol and Crime 101
The Deterrent Effect of Patrol: Lessons of the Kansas City
Experiment 103
Understanding Police Patrol and Deterrence 104
The All-Seeing Eye: CCTV 105
Police “Crackdowns” on Crime 106
Crackdowns 106
A Different Kind of Crackdown? The NYPD Stop-and-Frisk
Controversy 107
Faster Response Time 109
Smart Policing: Promising Futures 110
Problem-Oriented Policing 111
Compstat: Data-Driven Policing 113

Focused Deterrence, or “Pulling Levers”: The Most Effective

Response? 115
Operation Ceasefire: The Boston Gun Project 115
Cincinnati Initiative to Reduce Violence 116
A Few Words of Caution about Police Innovations 117
Predictive Policing: Science or Just the Latest Fad? 117
Drones: The Police Patrol of the Future? 118
More Detectives and Better Detective Work 119
Myths and Realities of Detective Work 119
The Science of Crime Detection: Fingerprints and Other Popular
Myths 121
Eliminate the “Technicalities” 122
Repeal the Exclusionary Rule? 122
Abolish the Miranda Warning 125
Conclusion 127
Notes 127

6 Deter the Criminals 133

Deterrence Theory 133
Assumptions Underlying Deterrence 134
From Theory to Practice: Deterrence in the Real Word of
Criminal Justice 136
Communicating the Message 136
Understanding the “Costs” of Crime 138
The Perceived vs. the Real Risk of Punishment 139
Choosing Crime: The Rational Criminal? 140
Scare the *%!#@ out of Them! 141
A Famous but Failed Program 141
Deterrence and the Death Penalty 142
Sorting out the Issues 142
Executions and Crime: The Debate Continues 143
Deterring the Drunk Driver 144
The “Killer Drunk” and Other Myths 145
Deterrence and Drunk Driving 147
Drunk Drivers in Court 149
A Multipronged Strategy for Dealing with Traffic Fatalities 151
Ignition Interlock Systems: Focused Incapacitation? 154
Specialized DUI Courts 155

Conclusion 156
Notes 157

7 Lock ’Em Up 161

Getting Criminals off the Street 161
Jail Not Bail: Preventive Detention 162
Crime on Bail: Myths and Reality 165
The Prediction Problem Revisited 166
A Comment on Preventive Detention and Mass Incarceration 168
Speedy Trial: A Better Way 168
Incapacitation as a Crime Policy 169
Selective Incapacitation: The Rand Formula 169
Gross Incapacitation: Zedlewski’s New Math 172
Incapacitation: A Sober Estimate 173
Selective Incapacitation Reborn 175
Mandatory Sentencing 176
“The Nation’s Toughest Drug Law” 177
The Real Impact of the Rockefeller Drug Law 179
The Special Case of the Federal Mandatory Minimums 180
The Growth of Life without Parole 181
Mandatory Sentencing and Crime 182
Three Strikes—We Are All Out 183
Implementation and Impact of Three-Strikes Laws 184
Summary: Striking Out 185
Just Keep Them Away from Us: Sex Registration and Notification
Laws 186
Enforcement Problems 188
Summary 190
Conclusion 190
Notes 191

8 Close the Loopholes 196

Prosecute the Career Criminal 196
Does a Special Prosecutorial Unit Make a
Difference? 197
The San Diego Major Violator Unit 197
Abolish the Insanity Defense 199
An Insanity Defense Loophole? 200

Sorting out the Issues 200

The Reality of the Insanity Defense 200
Aftermath of Acquittal 202
Danger to the Community 203
Abolish the Insanity Defense? 203
Abolish or Reform Bargaining? 207
Day-in, Day-out Plea Bargaining 208
Abolishing Plea Bargaining: Alaska Tries 209
Reforming Plea Bargaining in King County, Washington 211
Plea Bargaining and Crime 213
Evading Harsh Mandatory Sentences: Two Case Studies 214
The Case of Sex Offender Notification Laws 214
The Supreme Court Rules on Plea Bargains: New Day or Business
as Usual? 215
Restrict Appeals 217
Limiting Appeals 218
The Reality of Postconviction Appeals 218
Two Limits on Appeals 219
Conclusion 220
Notes 221

PART III THE MIDDLE GROUND: GUNS AND VICTIMS 225

9 Protect Crime Victims 226

Victims in the Criminal Justice System 226
The Crime Victims’ Rights Movement 226
The Historical Background 227
The Goals of This Chapter 228
Victims’ Rights Today: Laws and Programs 228
Constitutional and Statutory Guarantees of Victims’ Rights 228
Victims’ Services 229
Evaluating the Impact of Crime Victims’ Laws and Programs 230
Victims’ Rights and Crime 230
Serving Special Populations of Crime Victims 231
Women 232
People with Disabilities 235
Juvenile Runaways and Thrown-aways 236

People Who Are Elderly 236

Native Americans 238
Victims’ Programs and Services 238
Victim Notification 238
Victim/Witness Assistance Programs 240
Protecting Victims from Harm 241
Expanding the Victim’s Voice 241
Post-Conviction Services 243
Victim Compensation Programs 243
Ensuring Professionalism in Victim Services 244
Evaluating the Impact of Victim Programs and Services 245
“Getting Tough” on Crime: Does It Help Crime Victims? 246
Conclusion 247
Notes 247

10 Control Gun Crimes 252

The Problem with Guns—and Gun Policy 252
Gun Violence in Perspective 253
Sorting out the Issues 255
Policy Options 255
Which Firearms Are We Talking About? 256
The Political Context: Public Attitudes about Guns and Gun
Violence 256
Gun Ownership and Gun-Related Violence 257
Gun Ownership 257
Gun-Related Laws 258
The Supreme Court and Gun Ownership 258
Gun-Related Laws and Regulations 259
The Policy Options 259
Ban Handguns 259
Ban Assault Weapons 262
Summary on Banning Firearms 263
Regulate the Sale and Possession of Handguns 263
Regulate Gun Dealers 263
Background Checks: The Brady Law 264
The Gun Show Exception: A Loophole? 266
State-by-State Variations in Laws and Enforcement 266
Summary on Regulating the Sale of Firearms 267

Keeping Guns Away from Special Locations: Airports and

Schools 268
Airports 268
Schools 268
More Guns? Less Crime? 269
The “Stand-Your-Ground” Law Controversy 271
Get Tough on Guns and Gun-Related Offenses 272
Tough Sentencing in Detroit: An Early Experiment 272
Promising Approaches to Reducing Gun Violence 273
The Kansas City Gun Experiment 273
The Boston Gun Project: A National Model 274
Conclusion 276
Notes 276

PART IV REFORM: THE LIBERAL PRESCRIPTION 281

11 Treat ’Em! 282

Rehabilitation or Correcting Criminals 282
The Philosophy of Rehabilitation 282
Old and New Programs 283
New Developments in the Field 283
The “Nothing Works” Controversy 283
The Prediction Problem Revisited 285
Traditional Rehabilitation Programs 285
Probation 286
The Effectiveness of Probation 286
Parole 288
Does Parole Work? 289
Does More Make It Better? 291
Perverting Parole: Crisis in California 292
Diversion 293
The Original Model: The Manhattan Court Employment
Project 294
The Net-Widening Problem 295
Do Diversion Programs Rehabilitate? 296
The New Intermediate Punishments 297
The Rise and Fall of Boot Camps 298
What Is a Boot Camp? 298

Home Confinement and Electronic Monitoring 300

Lessons of the Intermediate Punishment Movement 301
Confused Goals 302
A Conservative Alternative: Faith-Based Treatment 303
Sorting out the Issues 303
Are Faith-Based Programs Effective? 304
Drug Courts: A New Approach 305
What Are Drug Courts? 306
Are Drug Courts Effective? 306
The Dangers of Over-Expansion 307
New Directions: Evidence-Based Policy in Probation and
Parole 308
Conclusion 310
Notes 310

12 Gain Compliance with the Law 315

The Basis of an Orderly Society 315
Compliance with the Law 315
Legitimacy and Compliance 316
Sources of Legitimacy 316
Justice versus Punishment 317
The Evidence on Procedural Justice in the Criminal Justice
System 318
The Evidence from Policing 318
The Evidence from Drug Courts 320
The Evidence from Criminal Courts 321
The Evidence from Victims’ Services Programs 321
Does Procedural Justice Work? A Meta-Analysis 322
Building Legitimacy 322
Reducing Police Misconduct and Building Fair and Respectful
Policing 323
Procedural Justice in the Courts 327
Prisons and Imprisonment 327
The Criminal Law and Legitimacy: Decriminalization 328
Conclusion 330
Notes 331

PART V THE DRUG PROBLEM 335

13 Sense and Nonsense about Drugs and Crime 336

Drugs and Drug-Related Crime 336
Myths and Realities about Drug Use and Drug-Related
Crime 337
The Drug Hysteria Problem 337
The Extent of Illegal Drug Use 337
The Drug–Crime Connection 339
The Drug Policy Choices 342
The War on Drugs: Policy and Consequences 342
Drug Supply–Reduction Efforts 344
Street-Level Police Drug Enforcement Efforts 344
Interdiction and Eradication 345
Tougher Sentencing 346
Limits of the Criminal Law: The Lessons of History 347
The Lessons of History 348
When Social Control Does Work 349
Demand Reduction: Drug Abuse Education 350
“Just Say No” 350
DARE: Success or Failure? 352
But Some Education Programs Do Work 353
Drug Treatment 354
Varieties of Treatment 354
The Promise of Drug Courts 357
Legalize Drugs? 358
Varieties of Legalization 359
The Impact of Legalization 359
A Specific Legalization Proposal 360
Conclusion 362
Notes 362

PART VI PUTTING IT ALL TOGETHER: CRIME

AND COMMUNITY 369

14 Crime and Community: Putting It All Together 370

The New Community Focus on Crime Control 370
The New Operating Principles 371

The Theoretical Background 373

The Empirical Basis 374
The Evidence of Effective Crime Policies 375
The Evidence from Policing 375
The Evidence from Community Courts 376
Offender Reentry Programs 380
The Challenge of Returning Offenders 380
Reentry and Legitimacy 384
The Way Forward? The Justice Reinvestment Initiative 386
The Alternative of Restorative Justice 388
Conclusion 390
Notes 391
Index 395

1. Most current crime control proposals are nonsense. 14

2. Waging “war” is the wrong way to fight crime. 20
3. Both liberals and conservatives are guilty of peddling nonsense
about crime. 26
4. Most crime control ideas are based on false assumptions about
how the criminal justice system works. 39
5. It is not possible to precisely predict future criminal behavior in
a way that will significantly reduce crime. 94
6. Simply putting more cops on the street will not reduce crime. 105
7. Faster response time will not produce more arrests or lower the
crime rate. 110
8. Carefully planned and focused problem-oriented policing strategies
can be successful in reducing crime and disorder. 116
9. More detectives, or other changes in detective work, will not
raise clearance rates or lower the crime rate. 122
10. The Supreme Court rulings in Mapp and Miranda are not
significant barriers to effective crime control by the police. 127
11. Deterrence-oriented crime policies are not likely to reduce
serious crime. 141
12. The death penalty does not deter homicides. 144
13. Enforcement crackdowns do not deter drunk driving over the
long term. 151
14. A multipronged strategy, including using noncriminal justice
programs, have proven effective in reducing traffic-related fatalities. 156
15. Preventive detention will not reduce serious crime. 168

xviii
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eBook and/or eChapter(s). Editorial review has deemed that any suppressed content does not materially affect the overall learning experience. Cengage Learning reserves the right to remove additional
content at any time if subsequent rights restrictions require it.
PROPOSITIONS xix

16. Incapacitation, whether selective or gross, is not a realistic strategy

for reducing serious crime. 175
17. Mandatory sentencing, in all of its forms, is not an effective means of
reducing serious crime. 186
18. Sex offender registration, notification, and residency restriction
laws are not effective in preventing repeat sex crimes and in certain
respects inhibit effective control and treatment of offenders. 190
19. Special prosecution units do not produce either higher conviction
rates or lower crime rates. 199
20. Abolishing or limiting the insanity defense will have no impact
on serious crime. 206
21. Abolishing or even significantly reforming plea bargaining will not
reduce serious crime. 217
22. Limiting habeas corpus appeals of criminal convictions will have no
effect on serious crime. 220
23. Most victims’ rights laws and programs are worthy ideas that were
long overdue. Only a few, however, provide the kind of direct
services that are likely to reduce crime. 247
24. Attempts to ban the possession of handguns, or certain kinds of
guns, are not a viable option for reducing crime. 263
25. Laws that seek to keep guns out of the hands of criminals and
the mentally ill have at best some limited effect but are easily evaded
by the black market in guns. 267
26. Laws designed to allow more people to carry guns and laws that
allow them to use their guns in a greater range of circumstances are
more likely to increase rather than reduce homicides. 272
27. Carefully designed and focused programs directed toward a small
group of known offenders have been found to be effective in reducing
gun violence. 276
28. Probation and parole have their proper places in the criminal justice
system, but there is no evidence of any programs likely to make them
more effective in reducing crime. 293
29. Traditional diversion programs do not reduce serious crime. 297
30. Home confinement and electronic monitoring do not reduce crime. 301
31. There is little persuasive evidence that faith-based treatment
programs are any more or any less effective in reducing crime than
are secular treatment programs. 305
32. Carefully designed and well-managed drug courts are a promising
treatment program that have demonstrated their effectiveness in
reducing crime. 308

33. The evidence-based corrections movement is an important

development, but at this point, the jury is still out on whether it
will help reduce crime. 310
34. Enhancing legitimacy is an important, and indeed necessary, strategy
for reducing crime. 330
35. Drug courts are a promising approach to reducing both drug use
and crime among criminal offenders. 358
36. The impact of legalizing drugs on serious crime is not known
at this time. 361

S
hortly after its initial publication, Samuel Walker’s Sense and Nonsense
about Crime was recognized as an important new book, a substantive con-
tribution to the literature on crime and justice. Over the years, he has
reworked its themes and developed its arguments in five more editions
(updating the title to reflect an expanded discussion of drugs and drug policy
in the third edition), and the field’s appreciation of this book has only
increased. Today, it is a major text in the study of crime and justice; some
call it a nascent classic work in its field. It is a respected argument about our
knowledge base for crime and justice, and it is one of those rare books that
are deeply respected by scholars and policymakers alike.
It is, therefore, with extraordinary pleasure that I welcome the eighth edi-
tion to the Wadsworth Contemporary Issues in Crime and Justice Series. The
series is devoted to giving detailed and effective exposure to important or emerg-
ing issues and problems that ordinarily receive insufficient attention in traditional
textbooks. The series also publishes books meant to provoke thought and change
perspectives by challenging readers to become more sophisticated consumers of
crime and justice knowledge. If you are looking for a book that will make you
an informed student of crime and justice policy and practice, you could not do
better than the one you are now holding.
Why is this book so important? There are two reasons. First, so much of
what is commonly believed about crime—and so much of what shapes public
policy on crime—is nonsense. Second, Walker’s book was the first (and is
still the most effective) book written to point that out. The book provides
a masterful critique of the U.S. penchant for short-sighted, metaphorical
strategies to prevent crime (boot camps are a good example) or feel-good
rhetoric about crime priorities (end poverty, end crime) that have, over the
years, not gotten us far in our pursuit of a safer society. Today, we are
enjoying a welcome, sustained national drop in crime rates. But this drop
still leaves us with higher rates of crime than we want, and (perhaps more
xxi
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eBook and/or eChapter(s). Editorial review has deemed that any suppressed content does not materially affect the overall learning experience. Cengage Learning reserves the right to remove additional
content at any time if subsequent rights restrictions require it.
xxii FOREWORD

to the point) the source of the drop is more of a mystery to us than a lesson
in crime prevention policy.
The contribution of this book—what makes this book special—is its willing-
ness to show evenhandedly how favorite strategies of diverse political agendas
have as their foundation some degree of “nonsense.” If there is a lesson that
this book brings to us repeatedly, it is that cherished images of crime and justice
are flawed, inaccurate, and doomed to fail for particular reasons of the more or
less well-known facts that we so often want to ignore to sustain our favorite
ideologies. This book challenges us where we need to be challenged: in our will-
ingness to ignore reality to nurture our frequently inadvisable pet ideas about
crime and crime fighting.
You want your police to be tough, to chase dangerous criminals, to make
life-saving arrests? Well, Professor Walker points out that you have to contend
with the fact that police spend little of their time acting in this way, and even
when they do, not much in the way of crime control seems to result. You want
your judges to lock’em up and throw away the key? Walker shows all the ways
that this belief is expensive and ineffective, even counterproductive. You think
we need to save money through closer surveillance of the people convicted of
crime? Make our lives safer by treating juveniles as though they were adults? End
drug abuse through an all-out war on drugs? Here again, the book sheds cool
light on hot emotions, showing how such strategies can backfire.
This book is not, however, just about nonsense in crime and justice. Perhaps
nonsense gets the majority of the attention because so much of what we do is
based on faulty thinking. But Walker is willing to tell us what makes “sense” as
well. Big proposals lack much support, and politically popular proposals may be
downright silly. But there are smaller, less ambitious ways in which we can con-
tribute to a safer society, and we can do so without suspending our constitutional
rights or giving up our public freedoms. One way we have learned to be smarter
about crime is through the philosophy of evidence-based practice. This approach
asks hard questions about criminal policy, seeking to base crime strategies on
established studies that show those policies will work. Professor Walker applies
the evidence-based criterion to his review of crime and justice policy: what
emerges is a powerfully dispassionate analysis that gives us a carefully crafted chal-
lenge to start “making sense” in the way in which we talk about crime and
develop policies to cope with it.
If you are getting ready to read this book, chances are you are contemplating
a career in the field of criminal justice. At the very least, you have an informed
citizen’s interest in the problems of crime and justice. In either case, you have
come to the right place to become more knowledgeable in your pursuits. After
you read this book, you will join a large number of its alumni, dedicated to
crime policies that make sense. I commend you.
Todd R. Clear
Series Editor

T
he eighth edition marks the thirtieth anniversary of Sense and Nonsense
about Crime. Much has changed over those thirty years in U.S. society
and in criminal justice. It has been an exciting challenge to keep pace
with those changes and make sure that this edition is relevant to current
developments.
When the first edition appeared, crack was just beginning to appear on the
streets of the United States. One result was an epidemic of gun violence among
young men. Some criminologists predicted that youth homicides would con-
tinue to soar. They didn’t. Instead, serious crime, including homicide, began a
completely surprising decline that is unprecedented in the United States. In
New York City and other cities, violent crime has dropped to levels not seen
since the early 1960s. Keeping track of these changes, and attempting to explain
them, has been an important but necessary task. When the first edition of this
book appeared, policymakers and criminologists were in the midst of a fierce
debate over “career criminals.” The questions of the day were how to identify
that small group of offenders and what would be the impact of different policies
that targeted them. You don’t hear much about career criminals today, however.
Policies that were hot new ideas twenty-five years ago did not work out, crimi-
nological research undermined most of the underlying assumptions, and the pol-
icy debate has moved on.
The eighth edition of Sense and Nonsense continues the expanded title Crime,
Drugs, and Communities, which is the second change in the subtitle since the first
edition. These changes reflect my efforts to keep the book relevant to the chang-
ing world of crime and criminal justice. The focus on communities began with
the sixth edition and is now incorporated into the expanded title, Crime, Drugs,
and Communities. As various chapters explain, some of the most important inno-
vations in crime policy have a community focus: problem-oriented policing,
community policing, community prosecution, focused deterrence programs,

xxiii
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content at any time if subsequent rights restrictions require it.
xxiv PREFACE

and now a new emphasis on community reinvestment as a strategy for better

dealing with offenders released from prison.
The new edition continues the “nonsense” theme of the first edition. We
continue to have crime policies that are not supported by empirical evidence
and which, in many cases, only make matters worse. Chapter 7, for example,
covers sex offender registration and notification laws, which often include restric-
tions on where sex offenders can live. As you will learn, these requirements
cover many offenders who are not going to be dangerous predators. As a result,
law enforcement and corrections officers carry huge caseloads and struggle to
focus on the few offenders who really do pose a possible risk to the community.
Other new policies that seem to have little empirical support continue to appear.
This is the latest in “predictive policing.” Our discussion is highly critical of it.
Time will tell whether it proves to have some value or whether it is simply one
more item in the long list of nonsense policies.
At the same time, this edition puts a greater emphasis on the “sense” theme.
There is growing evidence that some programs actually do work, because they are
solidly rooted in the best criminological research. People often ask if academic
research ever makes a practical contribution to crime policy. The answer is that
yes, some of it does. As you will learn, there is an emerging consensus that some
—but not all—problem-oriented policing programs, drug courts, and community
prosecution programs can be effective. Most interesting, as you will learn in Chap-
ter 6, is that focused deterrence programs have been found to be effective because
they differ significantly from traditional deterrence-oriented programs.
The emergence of crime policies that have been found to be effective
through rigorous evaluation is an extremely exciting development. If nothing
else, it demonstrates the maturity of the field of criminology, and the new stan-
dards for effectiveness that have developed. Future editions of this book will
assess whether this promise is fulfilled in practice.
New elements in the Eighth edition include the following:
Chapter 1 includes up-to-date information about gun violence, including
mass shootings and the gun violence crisis in Chicago; a new Sidebar on
“fads” in crime policy, citing issues that were current in older editions of the
book but have since faded away; an expanded discussion of evidence-based
crime policy; a provocative new sidebar on the argument that lead in the
environment explains long-term crime trends.
Chapter 2 contains discussions of both the Sandy Hook School shooting and
the George Zimmerman trial to illustrate the celebrated case syndrome; the
most recent data on school safety to illustrate the gap between public per-
ceptions of violent crime and the empirical reality.
Chapter 3 has been substantially revised to provide a better discussion of
long-term imprisonment trends, with a discussion of “mass incarceration,” as
well as the new developments that indicate a change in the public mood.
Chapter 4 replaces the outdated emphasis on career criminals with a more
relevant focus on the prediction problem in criminal justice.

Chapter 5 has been reorganized to put all of the various “smart policing”
efforts in a broader perspective; additional information of focused deterrence
programs; new material on the Boston Marathon bombing in the discussion
of closed-circuit television (CCTV) systems as a deterrent to crime; brand-
new discussions of both “predictive policing” and the potential role of
drones as a form of police patrol; a critical discussion of the recent “rein-
vestment” proposal to shift public funding from imprisonment to innovative
police programs.
Chapter 6 has an important discussion the recent National Academy of
Sciences report on deterrence and the death penalty and its implications for
the entire theory of deterrence. This chapter also has an important new
section of special DUI courts that are modeled after drug courts, which have
proven to be effective.
Chapter 7 has been completely revised to provide a more coherent discussion
of trends in sentencing over the past few decades and the evidence of a new
turn in state sentencing laws against the overuse of incarceration.
Chapter 8 has a new critical discussion of the two 2012 Supreme Court
decisions on plea bargaining, which some people believe will have a radical
effect on the practice, whereas others disagree.
Chapter 9 has been completely rewritten and reorganized, with a new
emphasis on “special populations” of crime victims: women, the elderly, and
juvenile runaways and thrown-aways.
Chapter 10 has been updated with discussions of the important recent mass
shooting cases and the George Zimmerman trial. There is a new sidebar on
“Stand-Your-Ground” laws and the evidence on their impact. There is also
a new discussion of guns and the mentally ill.
Chapter 11 has a greatly expanded examination of drug courts and a dis-
cussion of why they are often more effective than other treatment programs.
Chapter 12 has been completely reorganized and rewritten to focus on pro-
cedural justice and the prospects for securing greater compliance with the law.
Chapter 13 includes new material on the impact of the Mexican drug cartels
on crime and violence in the United States.
Chapter 14 continues and expands the discussion begun in the seventh edi-
tion that draws on the promising new developments discussed in the book
that have demonstrated effectiveness, including focused deterrence, drug
courts, and procedural justice.

Ancillaries
eBank Instructor’s Resource Manual with Test Bank. The manual includes
learning objectives, key terms, a detailed chapter outline, discussion topics, and a
test bank. Each chapter’s test bank contains questions in multiple-choice, true–
false, fill-in-the-blank, and essay formats, with a full answer key. The test bank is

coded to the learning objectives that appear in the main text, and includes the
page numbers in the main text where the answers can be found. Finally, each
question in the test bank has been carefully reviewed by experienced criminal
justice instructors for quality, accuracy, and content coverage. The manual is
available for download on the password-protected web site and can also be
obtained by e-mailing your local Cengage Learning representative.

Dedication
I would like to dedicate this book to Mary Ann Lamanna, who has been a won-
derful companion over thirty years. But despite the demands of her own publish-
ing deadlines over the years, she knows that there is always time for a movie.

About the Author

Samuel Walker is Professor Emeitus of Criminal Justice at the University of
Nebraska–Omaha, where he taught for thirty-one years. He is the author of
fourteen books on policing, criminal justice history and policy, and civil liberties.
His most recent books include Presidents and Civil Liberties from Wilson to Obama
(2012) and The New World of Police Accountability, 2nd. ed. (Sage, 2014). He con-
tinues to write and consult on issues of police accountability, focusing primarily
on citizen oversight of the police and police early intervention systems.
Samuel Walker

Thinking Clearly about Crime

Copyright 2015 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part. Due to electronic rights, some third party content may be suppressed from the
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1
Crime and Policy:
A Complex Problem
CRIME TRENDS: CONFLICTING, CONFUSING
Crime trends in the United States are conflicting, confusing, and seemingly con-
tradictory. Murders in Chicago soared to 513 in 2012, which was up from 448
in 2010, and the dramatic increase in violent gun deaths made national news.
But in New York City, murders (and all crime) fell to a level not seen since
the 1960s. Violent crime was up in Baltimore but down in Washington, DC
just sixty miles away.1
Other contradictions are easy to find. Mass shooting incidents such as the
2012 Sandy Hook School massacre in which twenty-six people died seem to
be on upsurge. Earlier in the 2012 movie multiplex shooting in Aurora, Color-
ado, James Holmes shot and killed twelve people and wounded fifty-eight
others. His weapons included a shotgun, a semi-automatic rifle, and a Glock
22 handgun. In 2011, Congresswoman Gabby Giffords was seriously wounded,
six people died, and eleven others were wounded in a shooting in Tucson,
Arizona. These horrific shooting incidents, however, occurred in the context
of a long-term decline in violent crime, including homicides. One part of
that decline was a dramatic reduction in domestic violence. Between 1994
and 2010 the rate of intimate partner violence fell from 9.8 to 3.6 per 1,000,
which is a decline of 63.6 percent.2
The decline in domestic violence is only one part of a broader decline in
both violent and property crimes that began in 1993. According to Uniform
Crime Reports (UCR), the robbery rate fell from a peak of 272.7 per 100,000
in 1991 to 112.9 in 2012. The burglary rate also fell by half from its peak in
1974 to 2010. It is true that the National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS),
an alternative measure of crime, reported a 15.4 percent increase in violent crime
in 2012 compared to 2011, and this is cause for concern that should be

Rate per 1,000 persons age 12 or older

100

80
Total violent crime

60 Not reported
to police

20
Reported to police

0
'93 '94 '95 '96 '97 '98 '99 '00 '01 '02 '03 '04 '05 '06* '07 '08 '09 '10 '11 '12

F I G U R E 1.1 Violent victimization reported and not reported to police, 1993–2012.

*See original report for cautions about using 2006 data.
SOURCE: Bureau of Justice Statistics, Criminal Victimization, 2012 (Washington, DC: Department of Justice, 2013).

monitored closely, but the important story is the broader 18.7 percent decline in
violent crime between 2003 and 2012, a trend that reflects the all-important
Great American Crime Drop.3
The contradictions in crime trends have an important racial dimension. In
the Chicago homicides, young African American men are both the primary
offenders and the victims. But by contrast, in virtually all of the mass shooting
cases, the perpetrators were young white males, and all but a few of the victims
were white. At the same time, however, for domestic violence homicides,
African Americans enjoyed the same significant decline in vicitimzations as
white Americans, and enjoyed an even greater reduction in that violence than
whites. As we begin our search for sensible and effective crime policies in this
book we must continually be aware of the often surprising contradictions regard-
ing crime and victimization in the United States.4

THE GREAT AMERICAN CRIME DROP

The dramatic decline in crime since the early 1990s is a historic event, the lon-
gest and largest since we began keeping national statistics on crime. We call this
event The Great American Crime Drop. With the exception of some cities, and
certain parts of many cities, Americans are much safer today than they were
twenty years ago. In New York City, murders fell from an astonishing 2,260 in
199 to only 416 in 2012. The number of murders was the lowest since the
1960s. On the west coast, there were only 38 murders in 2011 in San Diego,
compared with 167 in 1991.5

The crime drop seems like a miracle to many Americans. For the first time
in a generation, there is good news about crime and violence. When crime rates
began to soar around 1963, crime ripped the social fabric of the United States
and became a major issue in U.S. politics. In addition to the harm inflicted by
particular crimes—murder, robbery, and rape—crime devastates our communi-
ties, instilling fear and causing people to move out of their neighborhoods. In the
political realm, moreover, the issue of “crime” became intertwined with race,
aggravating the racial polarization of U.S. society.6

Is the Crime Drop Genuine?

Some skeptics question whether the crime drop is genuine, suggesting that it
might be a fluke, a temporary blip, or statistical manipulation. These doubts are
no longer valid. All of the evidence indicates that the crime drop is indeed real.
First, the NCVS is regarded as a reliable measure of criminal activity. No crimi-
nologist has ever suggested that the data are manipulated or methodologically
flawed. Second, the NCVS trends have continued for twenty years and cannot
be dismissed as a temporary phenomenon. Third, even though the FBI’s UCR
uses a different methodology, and does not measure all crimes committed, it too
has reported significant declines in crime over the past five to twenty years.7

Explaining the Crime Drop

How do we explain the Great American Crime Drop? What are the causes?
Criminologists and policy analysts have hotly debated these questions. The advo-
cates of particular policies all argue that it was their favored approach: increased
incarceration, community policing, a decline in the use of crack cocaine, a stron-
ger economy, and so on. Franklin Zimring offered a fresh perspective on this
debate with the simple idea of comparing crime trends in the United Sates to
other countries. What he found puts the Great American Crime Drop in a useful
perspective.
Zimring found that in the decade of the 1990s, several countries experienced
declines in crime. The most important example is Canada, where crime went
down in six of the seven UCR categories. Canada is a particularly useful com-
parison for us because it is contiguous to the United States, shares a common
language (with the partial exception of French-speaking Quebec) and culture,
and the two countries have close economic relations. If crime trends in the two
countries are so similar, the changes in the United States cannot be readily
explained by unique U.S. factors such as police strategies or imprisonment
trends. Let’s take a closer look at this issue.8
The United States and Canada began the decade of the 1990s with different
levels of crime, especially violent crime. The murder and robbery rates in the
United States were far higher than in Canada. That is a basic fact about crime
in the United States: it has high levels of violent crime compared with other
industrialized countries. Nonetheless, it is the similarity in the declines in the
two countries that commands our attention.
The most important issue involves imprisonment. The prison population in
the United States soared in the 1990s, increasing 57 percent, while it dropped 6
percent in Canada.9 Although this hardly settles the debate, it calls into question
the role of incarceration on the Great American Crime Drop. How could
Canada get roughly the same results by moving in the opposite direction on
imprisonment? A similar problem arises with regard to the number of police.
The Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) program provided federal
funds to increase the number of police officers in the United States by something
like sixty to seventy-five thousand. Some analysts estimate that this represented a

14 percent increase in the police-to-population ratio. In Canada, meanwhile, the

ratio fell by an estimated 10 percent. These data make it difficult to argue that
increasing the number of police officers contributed to the Great American
Crime Drop. A similar problem exists with regard to economic factors. While
the Canadian economy improved, just as it did in the United States, unemploy-
ment was consistently higher than in the United States throughout the period.
Yet, crime went down just as it did in the United States despite an indicator that
suggests it should not.10
In the end, how then do we explain the “extraordinary parallels” in crime
trends in the two countries? The “central puzzle,” Zimring argues, lies in the fact
that Canada experienced a greater decline “than could be explained by any visi-
ble causes.” He concludes that it might involve broad changes in behavior that
are beyond the reach of social science to explain. In short, there are no “easy
explanations.”
The absence of easy explanations is extremely important and is a theme that
runs through this book. Criminal behavior is extremely complex, and so is the
administration of justice that has at least some effect on crime. The basic lesson is
that we should always be on guard against simple answers; and also be careful
about jumping to conclusions based on short-term data, and be wary of anyone
claiming that their favorite crime policy is responsible for some recent good
news.
In a collection of articles in The Crime Drop in America, Al Blumstein and Joel
Wallman reach a conclusion roughly similar to Zimring’s, arguing that “no single
factor can be invoked as the cause of the crime decline in the 1990s.”11
It is too early for us to throw up our hands and say we can’t explain any-
thing. We should not give up just because there are no easy, immediate answers.
One of the major goals of this book, after all, is to clear away the nonsense about
crime policy. Consequently, we have to look more closely at the various expla-
nations that have been offered for the crime drop. We will find some plausible
reasons to explain at least part of the crime drop in some of these arguments.
There is fairly persuasive evidence, for example, that the dramatic decline in
the use of crack had a major impact on crime trends. We will look at this
in detail in Chapter 13. At the same time, there is some promising evidence
regarding the impact of recent innovations in policing—particularly focused
deterrence—although we should not exaggerate their impact on national crime
rates.

THE PURPOSE OF THIS BOOK

This book is a search for effective crime policies. It attempts to answer one basic
question: what works? What criminal justice policies are effective in reducing seri-
ous crime? We will review some of the major crime control proposals and eval-
uate their effectiveness in light of what we know about crime and justice.
Previous editions of this book, written when crime rates were high, sought to

BOX 1.1 DID CRIME FALL BECAUSE OF LEGALIZED ABORTION?

Some economists made the controversial argument that the legalization of abortion by the 1973 Roe
v. Wade decision played a major role in the crime drop. Abortion, they argued, resulted in a cohort
of 1.5 million “unborn offenders,” which would have entered its high crime years (fifteen to
twenty-four years) in the early 1990s, and its absence accounted for part of the crime drop that
began in 1993. Additionally, they argued, abortions were disproportionately high among women
whose children would be most at risk for criminal behavior (poor, single mothers, etc.).12
Many criminologists stayed away from this controversial idea, but Franklin Zimring examined
it closely and found that the evidence does not support it. He found that despite 1.5 million annual
abortions, the annual number of live births actually increased slowly but steadily after Roe v. Wade.
In short, there was no reduction of the number of youths in their high crime years in the early
1990s. Additionally, the percentage of births to single mothers increased significantly in the period.
Finally, there is the matter of timing. The number of abortions began to increase beginning in
1974. The first wave of unborn offenders would have been fifteen in 1989 and crime did not begin
to fall until 1993. Thus, the expected crime drop because of abortion did not begin when the
economists argued it should have.13
There is an important lesson in the argument that “abortion caused the crime drop.” We
should always be skeptical of provocative, single-explanations theories for any change in crime pat-
terns. If nothing else, this book is designed to foster a healthy skepticism and critical thinking about
crime and crime policy.

determine what might work. Now, in the face of the great crime drop, we have
to turn the question around: What has worked? Did certain crime policies con-
tribute to the reduction in crime? If so, which ones? Why exactly were they
effective? And can the lessons from one success story be transferred to other pro-
grams in other parts of the criminal justice system?
Our examination will also tell us a lot about what does not work. In fact, we
will spend more time on unsuccessful policies (the nonsense) than successful
ones. We begin in this section by discussing some threshold issues that will help
clarify our thinking. First we discuss a problem-oriented approach to crime pol-
icy and the importance of thinking about particular crimes rather than crime as
an undifferentiated phenomenon. Second, we discuss the distinction between
contextual factors that affect crime and criminal justice policies. This book
focuses on policies, but we should not forget the importance of the broader
social context. Third, we discuss evidence-based crime policy, which has become
the new standard for evaluating the effectiveness of crime policies.

Problem-Oriented Crime Policy

We can begin to make sense of crime in the United States by taking a problem-
oriented crime policy (POCP) approach. More than thirty years ago Professor
Herman Goldstein developed the idea of problem-oriented policing (POP),
and POP eventually became a widely used approach in policing.14 POP holds
that the police should quit thinking about crime as a single undifferentiated phe-
nomenon and instead break it down into specific components: commercial rob-
beries, household burglaries, graffiti, open-air drug dealing, nuisance disorders,
and so on. Each one is different, with different degrees of seriousness, different

Newala, too, suffers from the distance of its water-supply—at least

the Newala of to-day does; there was once another Newala in a lovely
valley at the foot of the plateau. I visited it and found scarcely a trace
of houses, only a Christian cemetery, with the graves of several
missionaries and their converts, remaining as a monument of its
former glories. But the surroundings are wonderfully beautiful. A
thick grove of splendid mango-trees closes in the weather-worn
crosses and headstones; behind them, combining the useful and the
agreeable, is a whole plantation of lemon-trees covered with ripe
fruit; not the small African kind, but a much larger and also juicier
imported variety, which drops into the hands of the passing traveller,
without calling for any exertion on his part. Old Newala is now under
the jurisdiction of the native pastor, Daudi, at Chingulungulu, who,
as I am on very friendly terms with him, allows me, as a matter of
course, the use of this lemon-grove during my stay at Newala.
FEET MUTILATED BY THE RAVAGES OF THE “JIGGER”
(Sarcopsylla penetrans)

The water-supply of New Newala is in the bottom of the valley,

some 1,600 feet lower down. The way is not only long and fatiguing,
but the water, when we get it, is thoroughly bad. We are suffering not
only from this, but from the fact that the arrangements at Newala are
nothing short of luxurious. We have a separate kitchen—a hut built
against the boma palisade on the right of the baraza, the interior of
which is not visible from our usual position. Our two cooks were not
long in finding this out, and they consequently do—or rather neglect
to do—what they please. In any case they do not seem to be very
particular about the boiling of our drinking-water—at least I can
attribute to no other cause certain attacks of a dysenteric nature,
from which both Knudsen and I have suffered for some time. If a
man like Omari has to be left unwatched for a moment, he is capable
of anything. Besides this complaint, we are inconvenienced by the
state of our nails, which have become as hard as glass, and crack on
the slightest provocation, and I have the additional infliction of
pimples all over me. As if all this were not enough, we have also, for
the last week been waging war against the jigger, who has found his
Eldorado in the hot sand of the Makonde plateau. Our men are seen
all day long—whenever their chronic colds and the dysentery likewise
raging among them permit—occupied in removing this scourge of
Africa from their feet and trying to prevent the disastrous
consequences of its presence. It is quite common to see natives of
this place with one or two toes missing; many have lost all their toes,
or even the whole front part of the foot, so that a well-formed leg
ends in a shapeless stump. These ravages are caused by the female of
Sarcopsylla penetrans, which bores its way under the skin and there
develops an egg-sac the size of a pea. In all books on the subject, it is
stated that one’s attention is called to the presence of this parasite by
an intolerable itching. This agrees very well with my experience, so
far as the softer parts of the sole, the spaces between and under the
toes, and the side of the foot are concerned, but if the creature
penetrates through the harder parts of the heel or ball of the foot, it
may escape even the most careful search till it has reached maturity.
Then there is no time to be lost, if the horrible ulceration, of which
we see cases by the dozen every day, is to be prevented. It is much
easier, by the way, to discover the insect on the white skin of a
European than on that of a native, on which the dark speck scarcely
shows. The four or five jiggers which, in spite of the fact that I
constantly wore high laced boots, chose my feet to settle in, were
taken out for me by the all-accomplished Knudsen, after which I
thought it advisable to wash out the cavities with corrosive
sublimate. The natives have a different sort of disinfectant—they fill
the hole with scraped roots. In a tiny Makua village on the slope of
the plateau south of Newala, we saw an old woman who had filled all
the spaces under her toe-nails with powdered roots by way of
prophylactic treatment. What will be the result, if any, who can say?
The rest of the many trifling ills which trouble our existence are
really more comic than serious. In the absence of anything else to
smoke, Knudsen and I at last opened a box of cigars procured from
the Indian store-keeper at Lindi, and tried them, with the most
distressing results. Whether they contain opium or some other
narcotic, neither of us can say, but after the tenth puff we were both
“off,” three-quarters stupefied and unspeakably wretched. Slowly we
recovered—and what happened next? Half-an-hour later we were
once more smoking these poisonous concoctions—so insatiable is the
craving for tobacco in the tropics.
Even my present attacks of fever scarcely deserve to be taken
seriously. I have had no less than three here at Newala, all of which
have run their course in an incredibly short time. In the early
afternoon, I am busy with my old natives, asking questions and
making notes. The strong midday coffee has stimulated my spirits to
an extraordinary degree, the brain is active and vigorous, and work
progresses rapidly, while a pleasant warmth pervades the whole
body. Suddenly this gives place to a violent chill, forcing me to put on
my overcoat, though it is only half-past three and the afternoon sun
is at its hottest. Now the brain no longer works with such acuteness
and logical precision; more especially does it fail me in trying to
establish the syntax of the difficult Makua language on which I have
ventured, as if I had not enough to do without it. Under the
circumstances it seems advisable to take my temperature, and I do
so, to save trouble, without leaving my seat, and while going on with
my work. On examination, I find it to be 101·48°. My tutors are
abruptly dismissed and my bed set up in the baraza; a few minutes
later I am in it and treating myself internally with hot water and
lemon-juice.
Three hours later, the thermometer marks nearly 104°, and I make
them carry me back into the tent, bed and all, as I am now perspiring
heavily, and exposure to the cold wind just beginning to blow might
mean a fatal chill. I lie still for a little while, and then find, to my
great relief, that the temperature is not rising, but rather falling. This
is about 7.30 p.m. At 8 p.m. I find, to my unbounded astonishment,
that it has fallen below 98·6°, and I feel perfectly well. I read for an
hour or two, and could very well enjoy a smoke, if I had the
wherewithal—Indian cigars being out of the question.
Having no medical training, I am at a loss to account for this state
of things. It is impossible that these transitory attacks of high fever
should be malarial; it seems more probable that they are due to a
kind of sunstroke. On consulting my note-book, I become more and
more inclined to think this is the case, for these attacks regularly
follow extreme fatigue and long exposure to strong sunshine. They at
least have the advantage of being only short interruptions to my
work, as on the following morning I am always quite fresh and fit.
My treasure of a cook is suffering from an enormous hydrocele which
makes it difficult for him to get up, and Moritz is obliged to keep in
the dark on account of his inflamed eyes. Knudsen’s cook, a raw boy
from somewhere in the bush, knows still less of cooking than Omari;
consequently Nils Knudsen himself has been promoted to the vacant
post. Finding that we had come to the end of our supplies, he began
by sending to Chingulungulu for the four sucking-pigs which we had
bought from Matola and temporarily left in his charge; and when
they came up, neatly packed in a large crate, he callously slaughtered
the biggest of them. The first joint we were thoughtless enough to
entrust for roasting to Knudsen’s mshenzi cook, and it was
consequently uneatable; but we made the rest of the animal into a
jelly which we ate with great relish after weeks of underfeeding,
consuming incredible helpings of it at both midday and evening
meals. The only drawback is a certain want of variety in the tinned
vegetables. Dr. Jäger, to whom the Geographical Commission
entrusted the provisioning of the expeditions—mine as well as his
own—because he had more time on his hands than the rest of us,
seems to have laid in a huge stock of Teltow turnips,[46] an article of
food which is all very well for occasional use, but which quickly palls
when set before one every day; and we seem to have no other tins
left. There is no help for it—we must put up with the turnips; but I
am certain that, once I am home again, I shall not touch them for ten
years to come.
Amid all these minor evils, which, after all, go to make up the
genuine flavour of Africa, there is at least one cheering touch:
Knudsen has, with the dexterity of a skilled mechanic, repaired my 9
× 12 cm. camera, at least so far that I can use it with a little care.
How, in the absence of finger-nails, he was able to accomplish such a
ticklish piece of work, having no tool but a clumsy screw-driver for
taking to pieces and putting together again the complicated
mechanism of the instantaneous shutter, is still a mystery to me; but
he did it successfully. The loss of his finger-nails shows him in a light
contrasting curiously enough with the intelligence evinced by the
above operation; though, after all, it is scarcely surprising after his
ten years’ residence in the bush. One day, at Lindi, he had occasion
to wash a dog, which must have been in need of very thorough
cleansing, for the bottle handed to our friend for the purpose had an
extremely strong smell. Having performed his task in the most
conscientious manner, he perceived with some surprise that the dog
did not appear much the better for it, and was further surprised by
finding his own nails ulcerating away in the course of the next few
days. “How was I to know that carbolic acid has to be diluted?” he
mutters indignantly, from time to time, with a troubled gaze at his
mutilated finger-tips.
Since we came to Newala we have been making excursions in all
directions through the surrounding country, in accordance with old
habit, and also because the akida Sefu did not get together the tribal
elders from whom I wanted information so speedily as he had
promised. There is, however, no harm done, as, even if seen only
from the outside, the country and people are interesting enough.
The Makonde plateau is like a large rectangular table rounded off
at the corners. Measured from the Indian Ocean to Newala, it is
about seventy-five miles long, and between the Rovuma and the
Lukuledi it averages fifty miles in breadth, so that its superficial area
is about two-thirds of that of the kingdom of Saxony. The surface,
however, is not level, but uniformly inclined from its south-western
edge to the ocean. From the upper edge, on which Newala lies, the
eye ranges for many miles east and north-east, without encountering
any obstacle, over the Makonde bush. It is a green sea, from which
here and there thick clouds of smoke rise, to show that it, too, is
inhabited by men who carry on their tillage like so many other
primitive peoples, by cutting down and burning the bush, and
manuring with the ashes. Even in the radiant light of a tropical day
such a fire is a grand sight.
Much less effective is the impression produced just now by the
great western plain as seen from the edge of the plateau. As often as
time permits, I stroll along this edge, sometimes in one direction,
sometimes in another, in the hope of finding the air clear enough to
let me enjoy the view; but I have always been disappointed.
Wherever one looks, clouds of smoke rise from the burning bush,
and the air is full of smoke and vapour. It is a pity, for under more
favourable circumstances the panorama of the whole country up to
the distant Majeje hills must be truly magnificent. It is of little use
taking photographs now, and an outline sketch gives a very poor idea
of the scenery. In one of these excursions I went out of my way to
make a personal attempt on the Makonde bush. The present edge of
the plateau is the result of a far-reaching process of destruction
through erosion and denudation. The Makonde strata are
everywhere cut into by ravines, which, though short, are hundreds of
yards in depth. In consequence of the loose stratification of these
beds, not only are the walls of these ravines nearly vertical, but their
upper end is closed by an equally steep escarpment, so that the
western edge of the Makonde plateau is hemmed in by a series of
deep, basin-like valleys. In order to get from one side of such a ravine
to the other, I cut my way through the bush with a dozen of my men.
It was a very open part, with more grass than scrub, but even so the
short stretch of less than two hundred yards was very hard work; at
the end of it the men’s calicoes were in rags and they themselves
bleeding from hundreds of scratches, while even our strong khaki
suits had not escaped scatheless.

NATIVE PATH THROUGH THE MAKONDE BUSH, NEAR

MAHUTA

I see increasing reason to believe that the view formed some time
back as to the origin of the Makonde bush is the correct one. I have
no doubt that it is not a natural product, but the result of human
occupation. Those parts of the high country where man—as a very
slight amount of practice enables the eye to perceive at once—has not
yet penetrated with axe and hoe, are still occupied by a splendid
timber forest quite able to sustain a comparison with our mixed
forests in Germany. But wherever man has once built his hut or tilled
his field, this horrible bush springs up. Every phase of this process
may be seen in the course of a couple of hours’ walk along the main
road. From the bush to right or left, one hears the sound of the axe—
not from one spot only, but from several directions at once. A few
steps further on, we can see what is taking place. The brush has been
cut down and piled up in heaps to the height of a yard or more,
between which the trunks of the large trees stand up like the last
pillars of a magnificent ruined building. These, too, present a
melancholy spectacle: the destructive Makonde have ringed them—
cut a broad strip of bark all round to ensure their dying off—and also
piled up pyramids of brush round them. Father and son, mother and
son-in-law, are chopping away perseveringly in the background—too
busy, almost, to look round at the white stranger, who usually excites
so much interest. If you pass by the same place a week later, the piles
of brushwood have disappeared and a thick layer of ashes has taken
the place of the green forest. The large trees stretch their
smouldering trunks and branches in dumb accusation to heaven—if
they have not already fallen and been more or less reduced to ashes,
perhaps only showing as a white stripe on the dark ground.
This work of destruction is carried out by the Makonde alike on the
virgin forest and on the bush which has sprung up on sites already
cultivated and deserted. In the second case they are saved the trouble
of burning the large trees, these being entirely absent in the
secondary bush.
After burning this piece of forest ground and loosening it with the
hoe, the native sows his corn and plants his vegetables. All over the
country, he goes in for bed-culture, which requires, and, in fact,
receives, the most careful attention. Weeds are nowhere tolerated in
the south of German East Africa. The crops may fail on the plains,
where droughts are frequent, but never on the plateau with its
abundant rains and heavy dews. Its fortunate inhabitants even have
the satisfaction of seeing the proud Wayao and Wamakua working
for them as labourers, driven by hunger to serve where they were
accustomed to rule.
But the light, sandy soil is soon exhausted, and would yield no
harvest the second year if cultivated twice running. This fact has
been familiar to the native for ages; consequently he provides in
time, and, while his crop is growing, prepares the next plot with axe
and firebrand. Next year he plants this with his various crops and
lets the first piece lie fallow. For a short time it remains waste and
desolate; then nature steps in to repair the destruction wrought by
man; a thousand new growths spring out of the exhausted soil, and
even the old stumps put forth fresh shoots. Next year the new growth
is up to one’s knees, and in a few years more it is that terrible,
impenetrable bush, which maintains its position till the black
occupier of the land has made the round of all the available sites and
come back to his starting point.
The Makonde are, body and soul, so to speak, one with this bush.
According to my Yao informants, indeed, their name means nothing
else but “bush people.” Their own tradition says that they have been
settled up here for a very long time, but to my surprise they laid great
stress on an original immigration. Their old homes were in the
south-east, near Mikindani and the mouth of the Rovuma, whence
their peaceful forefathers were driven by the continual raids of the
Sakalavas from Madagascar and the warlike Shirazis[47] of the coast,
to take refuge on the almost inaccessible plateau. I have studied
African ethnology for twenty years, but the fact that changes of
population in this apparently quiet and peaceable corner of the earth
could have been occasioned by outside enterprises taking place on
the high seas, was completely new to me. It is, no doubt, however,
correct.
The charming tribal legend of the Makonde—besides informing us
of other interesting matters—explains why they have to live in the
thickest of the bush and a long way from the edge of the plateau,
instead of making their permanent homes beside the purling brooks
and springs of the low country.
“The place where the tribe originated is Mahuta, on the southern
side of the plateau towards the Rovuma, where of old time there was
nothing but thick bush. Out of this bush came a man who never
washed himself or shaved his head, and who ate and drank but little.
He went out and made a human figure from the wood of a tree
growing in the open country, which he took home to his abode in the
bush and there set it upright. In the night this image came to life and
was a woman. The man and woman went down together to the
Rovuma to wash themselves. Here the woman gave birth to a still-
born child. They left that place and passed over the high land into the
valley of the Mbemkuru, where the woman had another child, which
was also born dead. Then they returned to the high bush country of
Mahuta, where the third child was born, which lived and grew up. In
course of time, the couple had many more children, and called
themselves Wamatanda. These were the ancestral stock of the
Makonde, also called Wamakonde,[48] i.e., aborigines. Their
forefather, the man from the bush, gave his children the command to
bury their dead upright, in memory of the mother of their race who
was cut out of wood and awoke to life when standing upright. He also
warned them against settling in the valleys and near large streams,
for sickness and death dwelt there. They were to make it a rule to
have their huts at least an hour’s walk from the nearest watering-
place; then their children would thrive and escape illness.”
The explanation of the name Makonde given by my informants is
somewhat different from that contained in the above legend, which I
extract from a little book (small, but packed with information), by
Pater Adams, entitled Lindi und sein Hinterland. Otherwise, my
results agree exactly with the statements of the legend. Washing?
Hapana—there is no such thing. Why should they do so? As it is, the
supply of water scarcely suffices for cooking and drinking; other
people do not wash, so why should the Makonde distinguish himself
by such needless eccentricity? As for shaving the head, the short,
woolly crop scarcely needs it,[49] so the second ancestral precept is
likewise easy enough to follow. Beyond this, however, there is
nothing ridiculous in the ancestor’s advice. I have obtained from
various local artists a fairly large number of figures carved in wood,
ranging from fifteen to twenty-three inches in height, and
representing women belonging to the great group of the Mavia,
Makonde, and Matambwe tribes. The carving is remarkably well
done and renders the female type with great accuracy, especially the
keloid ornamentation, to be described later on. As to the object and
meaning of their works the sculptors either could or (more probably)
would tell me nothing, and I was forced to content myself with the
scanty information vouchsafed by one man, who said that the figures
were merely intended to represent the nembo—the artificial
deformations of pelele, ear-discs, and keloids. The legend recorded
by Pater Adams places these figures in a new light. They must surely
be more than mere dolls; and we may even venture to assume that
they are—though the majority of present-day Makonde are probably
unaware of the fact—representations of the tribal ancestress.
The references in the legend to the descent from Mahuta to the
Rovuma, and to a journey across the highlands into the Mbekuru
valley, undoubtedly indicate the previous history of the tribe, the
travels of the ancestral pair typifying the migrations of their
descendants. The descent to the neighbouring Rovuma valley, with
its extraordinary fertility and great abundance of game, is intelligible
at a glance—but the crossing of the Lukuledi depression, the ascent
to the Rondo Plateau and the descent to the Mbemkuru, also lie
within the bounds of probability, for all these districts have exactly
the same character as the extreme south. Now, however, comes a
point of especial interest for our bacteriological age. The primitive
Makonde did not enjoy their lives in the marshy river-valleys.
Disease raged among them, and many died. It was only after they
had returned to their original home near Mahuta, that the health
conditions of these people improved. We are very apt to think of the
African as a stupid person whose ignorance of nature is only equalled
by his fear of it, and who looks on all mishaps as caused by evil
spirits and malignant natural powers. It is much more correct to
assume in this case that the people very early learnt to distinguish
districts infested with malaria from those where it is absent.
This knowledge is crystallized in the
ancestral warning against settling in the
valleys and near the great waters, the
dwelling-places of disease and death. At the
same time, for security against the hostile
Mavia south of the Rovuma, it was enacted
that every settlement must be not less than a
certain distance from the southern edge of the
plateau. Such in fact is their mode of life at the
present day. It is not such a bad one, and
certainly they are both safer and more
comfortable than the Makua, the recent
intruders from the south, who have made USUAL METHOD OF
good their footing on the western edge of the CLOSING HUT-DOOR
plateau, extending over a fairly wide belt of
country. Neither Makua nor Makonde show in their dwellings
anything of the size and comeliness of the Yao houses in the plain,
especially at Masasi, Chingulungulu and Zuza’s. Jumbe Chauro, a
Makonde hamlet not far from Newala, on the road to Mahuta, is the
most important settlement of the tribe I have yet seen, and has fairly
spacious huts. But how slovenly is their construction compared with
the palatial residences of the elephant-hunters living in the plain.
The roofs are still more untidy than in the general run of huts during
the dry season, the walls show here and there the scanty beginnings
or the lamentable remains of the mud plastering, and the interior is a
veritable dog-kennel; dirt, dust and disorder everywhere. A few huts
only show any attempt at division into rooms, and this consists
merely of very roughly-made bamboo partitions. In one point alone
have I noticed any indication of progress—in the method of fastening
the door. Houses all over the south are secured in a simple but
ingenious manner. The door consists of a set of stout pieces of wood
or bamboo, tied with bark-string to two cross-pieces, and moving in
two grooves round one of the door-posts, so as to open inwards. If
the owner wishes to leave home, he takes two logs as thick as a man’s
upper arm and about a yard long. One of these is placed obliquely
against the middle of the door from the inside, so as to form an angle
of from 60° to 75° with the ground. He then places the second piece
horizontally across the first, pressing it downward with all his might.
It is kept in place by two strong posts planted in the ground a few
inches inside the door. This fastening is absolutely safe, but of course
cannot be applied to both doors at once, otherwise how could the
owner leave or enter his house? I have not yet succeeded in finding
out how the back door is fastened.

MAKONDE LOCK AND KEY AT JUMBE CHAURO

This is the general way of closing a house. The Makonde at Jumbe
Chauro, however, have a much more complicated, solid and original
one. Here, too, the door is as already described, except that there is
only one post on the inside, standing by itself about six inches from
one side of the doorway. Opposite this post is a hole in the wall just
large enough to admit a man’s arm. The door is closed inside by a
large wooden bolt passing through a hole in this post and pressing
with its free end against the door. The other end has three holes into
which fit three pegs running in vertical grooves inside the post. The
door is opened with a wooden key about a foot long, somewhat
curved and sloped off at the butt; the other end has three pegs
corresponding to the holes, in the bolt, so that, when it is thrust
through the hole in the wall and inserted into the rectangular
opening in the post, the pegs can be lifted and the bolt drawn out.[50]

MODE OF INSERTING THE KEY

With no small pride first one householder and then a second

showed me on the spot the action of this greatest invention of the
Makonde Highlands. To both with an admiring exclamation of
“Vizuri sana!” (“Very fine!”). I expressed the wish to take back these
marvels with me to Ulaya, to show the Wazungu what clever fellows
the Makonde are. Scarcely five minutes after my return to camp at
Newala, the two men came up sweating under the weight of two
heavy logs which they laid down at my feet, handing over at the same
time the keys of the fallen fortress. Arguing, logically enough, that if
the key was wanted, the lock would be wanted with it, they had taken
their axes and chopped down the posts—as it never occurred to them
to dig them out of the ground and so bring them intact. Thus I have
two badly damaged specimens, and the owners, instead of praise,
come in for a blowing-up.
The Makua huts in the environs of Newala are especially
miserable; their more than slovenly construction reminds one of the
temporary erections of the Makua at Hatia’s, though the people here
have not been concerned in a war. It must therefore be due to
congenital idleness, or else to the absence of a powerful chief. Even
the baraza at Mlipa’s, a short hour’s walk south-east of Newala,
shares in this general neglect. While public buildings in this country
are usually looked after more or less carefully, this is in evident
danger of being blown over by the first strong easterly gale. The only
attractive object in this whole district is the grave of the late chief
Mlipa. I visited it in the morning, while the sun was still trying with
partial success to break through the rolling mists, and the circular
grove of tall euphorbias, which, with a broken pot, is all that marks
the old king’s resting-place, impressed one with a touch of pathos.
Even my very materially-minded carriers seemed to feel something
of the sort, for instead of their usual ribald songs, they chanted
solemnly, as we marched on through the dense green of the Makonde
bush:—
“We shall arrive with the great master; we stand in a row and have
no fear about getting our food and our money from the Serkali (the
Government). We are not afraid; we are going along with the great
master, the lion; we are going down to the coast and back.”
With regard to the characteristic features of the various tribes here
on the western edge of the plateau, I can arrive at no other
conclusion than the one already come to in the plain, viz., that it is
impossible for anyone but a trained anthropologist to assign any
given individual at once to his proper tribe. In fact, I think that even
an anthropological specialist, after the most careful examination,
might find it a difficult task to decide. The whole congeries of peoples
collected in the region bounded on the west by the great Central
African rift, Tanganyika and Nyasa, and on the east by the Indian
Ocean, are closely related to each other—some of their languages are
only distinguished from one another as dialects of the same speech,
and no doubt all the tribes present the same shape of skull and
structure of skeleton. Thus, surely, there can be no very striking
differences in outward appearance.
Even did such exist, I should have no time
to concern myself with them, for day after day,
I have to see or hear, as the case may be—in
any case to grasp and record—an
extraordinary number of ethnographic
phenomena. I am almost disposed to think it
fortunate that some departments of inquiry, at
least, are barred by external circumstances.
Chief among these is the subject of iron-
working. We are apt to think of Africa as a
country where iron ore is everywhere, so to
speak, to be picked up by the roadside, and
where it would be quite surprising if the
inhabitants had not learnt to smelt the
material ready to their hand. In fact, the
knowledge of this art ranges all over the
continent, from the Kabyles in the north to the
Kafirs in the south. Here between the Rovuma
and the Lukuledi the conditions are not so
favourable. According to the statements of the
Makonde, neither ironstone nor any other
form of iron ore is known to them. They have
not therefore advanced to the art of smelting
the metal, but have hitherto bought all their
THE ANCESTRESS OF
THE MAKONDE
iron implements from neighbouring tribes.
Even in the plain the inhabitants are not much
better off. Only one man now living is said to
understand the art of smelting iron. This old fundi lives close to
Huwe, that isolated, steep-sided block of granite which rises out of
the green solitude between Masasi and Chingulungulu, and whose
jagged and splintered top meets the traveller’s eye everywhere. While
still at Masasi I wished to see this man at work, but was told that,
frightened by the rising, he had retired across the Rovuma, though
he would soon return. All subsequent inquiries as to whether the
fundi had come back met with the genuine African answer, “Bado”
(“Not yet”).
BRAZIER

Some consolation was afforded me by a brassfounder, whom I

came across in the bush near Akundonde’s. This man is the favourite
of women, and therefore no doubt of the gods; he welds the glittering
brass rods purchased at the coast into those massive, heavy rings
which, on the wrists and ankles of the local fair ones, continually give
me fresh food for admiration. Like every decent master-craftsman he
had all his tools with him, consisting of a pair of bellows, three
crucibles and a hammer—nothing more, apparently. He was quite
willing to show his skill, and in a twinkling had fixed his bellows on
the ground. They are simply two goat-skins, taken off whole, the four
legs being closed by knots, while the upper opening, intended to
admit the air, is kept stretched by two pieces of wood. At the lower
end of the skin a smaller opening is left into which a wooden tube is
stuck. The fundi has quickly borrowed a heap of wood-embers from
the nearest hut; he then fixes the free ends of the two tubes into an
earthen pipe, and clamps them to the ground by means of a bent
piece of wood. Now he fills one of his small clay crucibles, the dross
on which shows that they have been long in use, with the yellow
material, places it in the midst of the embers, which, at present are
only faintly glimmering, and begins his work. In quick alternation
the smith’s two hands move up and down with the open ends of the
bellows; as he raises his hand he holds the slit wide open, so as to let
the air enter the skin bag unhindered. In pressing it down he closes
the bag, and the air puffs through the bamboo tube and clay pipe into
the fire, which quickly burns up. The smith, however, does not keep
on with this work, but beckons to another man, who relieves him at
the bellows, while he takes some more tools out of a large skin pouch
carried on his back. I look on in wonder as, with a smooth round
stick about the thickness of a finger, he bores a few vertical holes into
the clean sand of the soil. This should not be difficult, yet the man
seems to be taking great pains over it. Then he fastens down to the
ground, with a couple of wooden clamps, a neat little trough made by
splitting a joint of bamboo in half, so that the ends are closed by the
two knots. At last the yellow metal has attained the right consistency,
and the fundi lifts the crucible from the fire by means of two sticks
split at the end to serve as tongs. A short swift turn to the left—a
tilting of the crucible—and the molten brass, hissing and giving forth
clouds of smoke, flows first into the bamboo mould and then into the
holes in the ground.
The technique of this backwoods craftsman may not be very far
advanced, but it cannot be denied that he knows how to obtain an
adequate result by the simplest means. The ladies of highest rank in
this country—that is to say, those who can afford it, wear two kinds
of these massive brass rings, one cylindrical, the other semicircular
in section. The latter are cast in the most ingenious way in the
bamboo mould, the former in the circular hole in the sand. It is quite
a simple matter for the fundi to fit these bars to the limbs of his fair
customers; with a few light strokes of his hammer he bends the
pliable brass round arm or ankle without further inconvenience to
the wearer.
SHAPING THE POT

SMOOTHING WITH MAIZE-COB

CUTTING THE EDGE

FINISHING THE BOTTOM

LAST SMOOTHING BEFORE

BURNING

FIRING THE BRUSH-PILE

LIGHTING THE FARTHER SIDE OF
THE PILE

TURNING THE RED-HOT VESSEL

NYASA WOMAN MAKING POTS AT MASASI

Pottery is an art which must always and everywhere excite the
interest of the student, just because it is so intimately connected with
the development of human culture, and because its relics are one of
the principal factors in the reconstruction of our own condition in
prehistoric times. I shall always remember with pleasure the two or
three afternoons at Masasi when Salim Matola’s mother, a slightly-
built, graceful, pleasant-looking woman, explained to me with
touching patience, by means of concrete illustrations, the ceramic art
of her people. The only implements for this primitive process were a
lump of clay in her left hand, and in the right a calabash containing
the following valuables: the fragment of a maize-cob stripped of all
its grains, a smooth, oval pebble, about the size of a pigeon’s egg, a
few chips of gourd-shell, a bamboo splinter about the length of one’s
hand, a small shell, and a bunch of some herb resembling spinach.
Nothing more. The woman scraped with the
shell a round, shallow hole in the soft, fine
sand of the soil, and, when an active young
girl had filled the calabash with water for her,
she began to knead the clay. As if by magic it
gradually assumed the shape of a rough but
already well-shaped vessel, which only wanted
a little touching up with the instruments
before mentioned. I looked out with the
MAKUA WOMAN closest attention for any indication of the use
MAKING A POT. of the potter’s wheel, in however rudimentary
SHOWS THE a form, but no—hapana (there is none). The
BEGINNINGS OF THE embryo pot stood firmly in its little
POTTER’S WHEEL
depression, and the woman walked round it in
a stooping posture, whether she was removing
small stones or similar foreign bodies with the maize-cob, smoothing
the inner or outer surface with the splinter of bamboo, or later, after
letting it dry for a day, pricking in the ornamentation with a pointed
bit of gourd-shell, or working out the bottom, or cutting the edge
with a sharp bamboo knife, or giving the last touches to the finished
vessel. This occupation of the women is infinitely toilsome, but it is
without doubt an accurate reproduction of the process in use among
our ancestors of the Neolithic and Bronze ages.
There is no doubt that the invention of pottery, an item in human
progress whose importance cannot be over-estimated, is due to
women. Rough, coarse and unfeeling, the men of the horde range
over the countryside. When the united cunning of the hunters has
succeeded in killing the game; not one of them thinks of carrying
home the spoil. A bright fire, kindled by a vigorous wielding of the
drill, is crackling beside them; the animal has been cleaned and cut
up secundum artem, and, after a slight singeing, will soon disappear
under their sharp teeth; no one all this time giving a single thought
to wife or child.
To what shifts, on the other hand, the primitive wife, and still more
the primitive mother, was put! Not even prehistoric stomachs could
endure an unvarying diet of raw food. Something or other suggested
the beneficial effect of hot water on the majority of approved but
indigestible dishes. Perhaps a neighbour had tried holding the hard
roots or tubers over the fire in a calabash filled with water—or maybe
an ostrich-egg-shell, or a hastily improvised vessel of bark. They
became much softer and more palatable than they had previously
been; but, unfortunately, the vessel could not stand the fire and got
charred on the outside. That can be remedied, thought our
ancestress, and plastered a layer of wet clay round a similar vessel.
This is an improvement; the cooking utensil remains uninjured, but
the heat of the fire has shrunk it, so that it is loose in its shell. The
next step is to detach it, so, with a firm grip and a jerk, shell and
kernel are separated, and pottery is invented. Perhaps, however, the
discovery which led to an intelligent use of the burnt-clay shell, was
made in a slightly different way. Ostrich-eggs and calabashes are not
to be found in every part of the world, but everywhere mankind has
arrived at the art of making baskets out of pliant materials, such as
bark, bast, strips of palm-leaf, supple twigs, etc. Our inventor has no
water-tight vessel provided by nature. “Never mind, let us line the
basket with clay.” This answers the purpose, but alas! the basket gets
burnt over the blazing fire, the woman watches the process of
cooking with increasing uneasiness, fearing a leak, but no leak
appears. The food, done to a turn, is eaten with peculiar relish; and
the cooking-vessel is examined, half in curiosity, half in satisfaction
at the result. The plastic clay is now hard as stone, and at the same
time looks exceedingly well, for the neat plaiting of the burnt basket
is traced all over it in a pretty pattern. Thus, simultaneously with
pottery, its ornamentation was invented.
Primitive woman has another claim to respect. It was the man,
roving abroad, who invented the art of producing fire at will, but the
woman, unable to imitate him in this, has been a Vestal from the
earliest times. Nothing gives so much trouble as the keeping alight of
the smouldering brand, and, above all, when all the men are absent
from the camp. Heavy rain-clouds gather, already the first large
drops are falling, the first gusts of the storm rage over the plain. The
little flame, a greater anxiety to the woman than her own children,
flickers unsteadily in the blast. What is to be done? A sudden thought
occurs to her, and in an instant she has constructed a primitive hut
out of strips of bark, to protect the flame against rain and wind.
This, or something very like it, was the way in which the principle
of the house was discovered; and even the most hardened misogynist
cannot fairly refuse a woman the credit of it. The protection of the
hearth-fire from the weather is the germ from which the human
dwelling was evolved. Men had little, if any share, in this forward
step, and that only at a late stage. Even at the present day, the
plastering of the housewall with clay and the manufacture of pottery
are exclusively the women’s business. These are two very significant
survivals. Our European kitchen-garden, too, is originally a woman’s
invention, and the hoe, the primitive instrument of agriculture, is,
characteristically enough, still used in this department. But the
noblest achievement which we owe to the other sex is unquestionably
the art of cookery. Roasting alone—the oldest process—is one for
which men took the hint (a very obvious one) from nature. It must
have been suggested by the scorched carcase of some animal
overtaken by the destructive forest-fires. But boiling—the process of
improving organic substances by the help of water heated to boiling-
point—is a much later discovery. It is so recent that it has not even
yet penetrated to all parts of the world. The Polynesians understand
how to steam food, that is, to cook it, neatly wrapped in leaves, in a
hole in the earth between hot stones, the air being excluded, and
(sometimes) a few drops of water sprinkled on the stones; but they
do not understand boiling.
To come back from this digression, we find that the slender Nyasa
woman has, after once more carefully examining the finished pot,
put it aside in the shade to dry. On the following day she sends me
word by her son, Salim Matola, who is always on hand, that she is
going to do the burning, and, on coming out of my house, I find her
already hard at work. She has spread on the ground a layer of very
dry sticks, about as thick as one’s thumb, has laid the pot (now of a
yellowish-grey colour) on them, and is piling brushwood round it.
My faithful Pesa mbili, the mnyampara, who has been standing by,
most obligingly, with a lighted stick, now hands it to her. Both of
them, blowing steadily, light the pile on the lee side, and, when the
flame begins to catch, on the weather side also. Soon the whole is in a
blaze, but the dry fuel is quickly consumed and the fire dies down, so
that we see the red-hot vessel rising from the ashes. The woman
turns it continually with a long stick, sometimes one way and
sometimes another, so that it may be evenly heated all over. In
twenty minutes she rolls it out of the ash-heap, takes up the bundle
of spinach, which has been lying for two days in a jar of water, and
sprinkles the red-hot clay with it. The places where the drops fall are
marked by black spots on the uniform reddish-brown surface. With a
sigh of relief, and with visible satisfaction, the woman rises to an
erect position; she is standing just in a line between me and the fire,
from which a cloud of smoke is just rising: I press the ball of my
camera, the shutter clicks—the apotheosis is achieved! Like a
priestess, representative of her inventive sex, the graceful woman
stands: at her feet the hearth-fire she has given us beside her the
invention she has devised for us, in the background the home she has
built for us.
At Newala, also, I have had the manufacture of pottery carried on
in my presence. Technically the process is better than that already
described, for here we find the beginnings of the potter’s wheel,
which does not seem to exist in the plains; at least I have seen
nothing of the sort. The artist, a frightfully stupid Makua woman, did
not make a depression in the ground to receive the pot she was about
to shape, but used instead a large potsherd. Otherwise, she went to
work in much the same way as Salim’s mother, except that she saved
herself the trouble of walking round and round her work by squatting
at her ease and letting the pot and potsherd rotate round her; this is
surely the first step towards a machine. But it does not follow that
the pot was improved by the process. It is true that it was beautifully
rounded and presented a very creditable appearance when finished,
but the numerous large and small vessels which I have seen, and, in
part, collected, in the “less advanced” districts, are no less so. We
moderns imagine that instruments of precision are necessary to
produce excellent results. Go to the prehistoric collections of our
museums and look at the pots, urns and bowls of our ancestors in the
dim ages of the past, and you will at once perceive your error.
MAKING LONGITUDINAL CUT IN
BARK

DRAWING THE BARK OFF THE LOG

REMOVING THE OUTER BARK

BEATING THE BARK

WORKING THE BARK-CLOTH AFTER BEATING, TO MAKE IT

SOFT

MANUFACTURE OF BARK-CLOTH AT NEWALA

To-day, nearly the whole population of German East Africa is
clothed in imported calico. This was not always the case; even now in
some parts of the north dressed skins are still the prevailing wear,
and in the north-western districts—east and north of Lake
Tanganyika—lies a zone where bark-cloth has not yet been
superseded. Probably not many generations have passed since such
bark fabrics and kilts of skins were the only clothing even in the
south. Even to-day, large quantities of this bright-red or drab
material are still to be found; but if we wish to see it, we must look in
the granaries and on the drying stages inside the native huts, where
it serves less ambitious uses as wrappings for those seeds and fruits
which require to be packed with special care. The salt produced at
Masasi, too, is packed for transport to a distance in large sheets of
bark-cloth. Wherever I found it in any degree possible, I studied the
process of making this cloth. The native requisitioned for the
purpose arrived, carrying a log between two and three yards long and
as thick as his thigh, and nothing else except a curiously-shaped
mallet and the usual long, sharp and pointed knife which all men and
boys wear in a belt at their backs without a sheath—horribile dictu!
[51]
Silently he squats down before me, and with two rapid cuts has
drawn a couple of circles round the log some two yards apart, and
slits the bark lengthwise between them with the point of his knife.
With evident care, he then scrapes off the outer rind all round the
log, so that in a quarter of an hour the inner red layer of the bark
shows up brightly-coloured between the two untouched ends. With
some trouble and much caution, he now loosens the bark at one end,
and opens the cylinder. He then stands up, takes hold of the free
edge with both hands, and turning it inside out, slowly but steadily
pulls it off in one piece. Now comes the troublesome work of
scraping all superfluous particles of outer bark from the outside of
the long, narrow piece of material, while the inner side is carefully
scrutinised for defective spots. At last it is ready for beating. Having
signalled to a friend, who immediately places a bowl of water beside
him, the artificer damps his sheet of bark all over, seizes his mallet,
lays one end of the stuff on the smoothest spot of the log, and
hammers away slowly but continuously. “Very simple!” I think to
myself. “Why, I could do that, too!”—but I am forced to change my
opinions a little later on; for the beating is quite an art, if the fabric is
not to be beaten to pieces. To prevent the breaking of the fibres, the
stuff is several times folded across, so as to interpose several
thicknesses between the mallet and the block. At last the required
state is reached, and the fundi seizes the sheet, still folded, by both
ends, and wrings it out, or calls an assistant to take one end while he
holds the other. The cloth produced in this way is not nearly so fine
and uniform in texture as the famous Uganda bark-cloth, but it is
quite soft, and, above all, cheap.
Now, too, I examine the mallet. My craftsman has been using the
simpler but better form of this implement, a conical block of some
hard wood, its base—the striking surface—being scored across and
across with more or less deeply-cut grooves, and the handle stuck
into a hole in the middle. The other and earlier form of mallet is
shaped in the same way, but the head is fastened by an ingenious
network of bark strips into the split bamboo serving as a handle. The
observation so often made, that ancient customs persist longest in
connection with religious ceremonies and in the life of children, here
finds confirmation. As we shall soon see, bark-cloth is still worn
during the unyago,[52] having been prepared with special solemn
ceremonies; and many a mother, if she has no other garment handy,
will still put her little one into a kilt of bark-cloth, which, after all,
looks better, besides being more in keeping with its African
surroundings, than the ridiculous bit of print from Ulaya.
MAKUA WOMEN

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Document - 156 - 329download Ebook PDF Sense and Nonsense About Crime Drugs and Communities 8Th Edition Ebook PDF Full Chapter

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Sense and Nonsense About Crime,

Drugs, and Communities 8th Edition,

PART I THINKING CLEARLY ABOUT CRIME 1

1 Crime and Policy: A Complex Problem 2

The Question of Reasonable Goals 24

2 Models of Criminal Justice 38

3 The Going Rate 58

Wrongful Convictions: How Common Are Mistakes? 75

4 The Prediction Problem 81

PART II “GET TOUGH”: THE CONSERVATIVE ATTACK ON CRIME 99

5 Unleash the Cops! 100

Focused Deterrence, or “Pulling Levers”: The Most Effective

6 Deter the Criminals 133

7 Lock ’Em Up 161

8 Close the Loopholes 196

Sorting out the Issues 200

PART III THE MIDDLE GROUND: GUNS AND VICTIMS 225

9 Protect Crime Victims 226

People Who Are Elderly 236

10 Control Gun Crimes 252

Keeping Guns Away from Special Locations: Airports and

PART IV REFORM: THE LIBERAL PRESCRIPTION 281

11 Treat ’Em! 282

Home Confinement and Electronic Monitoring 300

12 Gain Compliance with the Law 315

PART V THE DRUG PROBLEM 335

13 Sense and Nonsense about Drugs and Crime 336

PART VI PUTTING IT ALL TOGETHER: CRIME

14 Crime and Community: Putting It All Together 370

The Theoretical Background 373

1. Most current crime control proposals are nonsense. 14

16. Incapacitation, whether selective or gross, is not a realistic strategy

33. The evidence-based corrections movement is an important

and now a new emphasis on community reinvestment as a strategy for better

About the Author

Thinking Clearly about Crime

Rate per 1,000 persons age 12 or older

F I G U R E 1.1 Violent victimization reported and not reported to police, 1993–2012.

THE GREAT AMERICAN CRIME DROP

Illustration by Frank Irwin, © Wadsworth, Cengage Learning.

Is the Crime Drop Genuine?

Explaining the Crime Drop

14 percent increase in the police-to-population ratio. In Canada, meanwhile, the

THE PURPOSE OF THIS BOOK

BOX 1.1 DID CRIME FALL BECAUSE OF LEGALIZED ABORTION?

Problem-Oriented Crime Policy

Newala, too, suffers from the distance of its water-supply—at least

The water-supply of New Newala is in the bottom of the valley,

NATIVE PATH THROUGH THE MAKONDE BUSH, NEAR

MAKONDE LOCK AND KEY AT JUMBE CHAURO

MODE OF INSERTING THE KEY

With no small pride first one householder and then a second

Some consolation was afforded me by a brassfounder, whom I

SMOOTHING WITH MAIZE-COB

CUTTING THE EDGE

LAST SMOOTHING BEFORE

FIRING THE BRUSH-PILE

TURNING THE RED-HOT VESSEL

NYASA WOMAN MAKING POTS AT MASASI

DRAWING THE BARK OFF THE LOG

REMOVING THE OUTER BARK

WORKING THE BARK-CLOTH AFTER BEATING, TO MAKE IT

MANUFACTURE OF BARK-CLOTH AT NEWALA

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