ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of key concepts covered in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book examines what community is or is not and more about how the state uses the term 'community' to confer rights upon some groups and to exclude others from exercising those rights. The book concerns with how the problem of crime has come to predominate and to persist as one of the most significant organising problems of national governments in the West, even at a time when recorded crime figures have steadily dropped year upon year. The term 'community' can be (mis)applied to particular neighbourhoods and geographical localities or in a very sweeping way to denote social groupings where the user of the term believes they do or should share common interests or attachments. Indeed, political and social policy interventions throughout the twentieth century are littered with such misappropriations of the term 'community'. The chapter finally presents the organisation of the book.
