Index
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IMMIGRATION
AND CRIMINALITY
The first monographic study on the relations between immigration
and criminality (Immigracion y Delincuencia en Espana: Analisis
Criminologico, Tirant lo Blanch, Valencia 2001) was accomplished
by Elisa Garcia Espana, a young researcher of the Malaga section
of the Istituto Andaluz Interuniversitario de Criminologia.
One of the most important results of her work is to prove that
the most significant criminality risk factor is an immigrant’s
illegal condition. Her conclusions can be explained starting
from her acceptance of the so-called “social stability”
theory, formulated by an American criminologist at the end of
the sixties (T. Hirschi), who said that individuals abstain
from crime for fear of losing the social position they have
acquired, so people living with social ties that provide them
with self-esteem, safety and social recognition tend much less
to crime than people who do not have such ties.
The causes of criminality are never the same. The figures quoted
in the survey show that illegal immigrants commit offences more
easily that legals, since they are not afraid of losing the
social achievements the latter have attained through many efforts.
Furthermore, if we consider that the social tie that inhibits
the most a criminal behaviour is a person’s family, then
we understand why, among illegal immigrants, the ones who commit
most offences are the ones who have less family ties in Spain,
which happens more often to African immigrants and less to Asians
and Latin-Americans. |
