ABSTRACT
Although crime surveys attempt to use categories that are meaningful to the respondent, there may still be problems of comprehension. Originally, the application of sample survey techniques to the measurement of crime was a reaction against an over-reliance on official criminal statistics. This chapter also presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in this book. The book looks at the broad social and historical context of crime and the policing of young people in Edinburgh, outlining something of the city's social and spatial divisions as well as questioning some very basic assumptions about the idea of childhood and its implications for understanding victimisation. It examines in detail the nature and extent of crimes committed against young people, by adults as well as by others of their own age. The book explores the nature of their contact with crime as offenders and at some of the popular and populist explanations of 'delinquency'.
