Protest and property crime: political use of police resources and the deterrence of crime

Jaewook Byeon (), Iljoong Kim () and Dongwon Lee ()
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Jaewook Byeon: Sungkyunkwan University (SKKU)
Iljoong Kim: Sungkyunkwan University (SKKU)
Dongwon Lee: Sungkyunkwan University (SKKU)

Public Choice, 2018, vol. 175, issue 1, No 9, 196 pages

Abstract: Abstract This article investigates the claim that the political use of police resources promotes crime. Using a panel of South Korean metropolitan areas, we show that (1) the reallocation of police resources toward the control of political protests reduces arrest rates for crime and (2) the resulting reduction in criminal arrests significantly increases the incidence of crime. Overall, the impact of the reallocation of police resources works mainly through tradeoffs with arrest rates. Our findings imply that it is not the size of the police per se, but the allocation of police resources toward crime control that deters crime.

Keywords: Police resource allocation; Protest control; Strategic defection; Probability of arrest; Deterrence of crime (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: H39 K42 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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DOI: 10.1007/s11127-018-0525-5

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