ABSTRACT
For many years, crime prevention has been one of the most relevant subjects in international criminological debate and in the literature about crime control policies in many Western democracies. It has also become a current political issue and a key topic on the political agenda of many European governments, which over recent decades have focused on the development of discourses and practices that clearly show the “need to shi resources and focus towards crime prevention, rather than focusing on more reactive and coercive forms of policing and criminal justice” [Stenson and Edwards, 2004:209]. is process has occurred in slightly di erent ways, and at di erent times, almost everywehere in Western, and now also Eastern, European countries since the late 1970s, with some di erencies mainly related to local cultural traditions and di erent social, legal, and political contexts.
