ABSTRACT
In 1994, Derek Cornish introduced the concept of crime scripts to the field of environmental criminology with a paper entitled ‘The procedural analysis of offending and its relevance for situational prevention’ (Cornish, 1994a). This work had one clear objective: to provide academics and practitioners working in the field of crime prevention with a clear, innovative and applicable theoretical framework to the study of crime-commission processes. Drawing from cognitive psychology, Cornish retraced the origins of scripts and outlined its potential for better understanding crime-commission processes. By applying scripts to crime, Cornish developed a procedural framework to identify the complete sequence of actions adopted prior to, during and following the commission of a particular crime and thereby to offer a fuller range of intervention points to disrupt crime commission. Because offenders can learn from their mistakes when committing crimes, Cornish also discussed how crime scripts can evolve when disrupted by obstacles that prevent their completion. Finally, Cornish discussed how lifestyle and routine activities may affect scripts and how the enactment of particular scripts may depend on requirements such as the presence of co-offenders. Despite a recent increase of interest in the application of script analysis to various forms of crime, the full value of scripts has not been realized. In particular, current applications of script analysis have largely ignored the behaviours of other actors present during crime events, which limits the reach of situational crime prevention.
