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  3. For the past six years, crime rates have been falling all over America. In some big cities, the fall has been extraordinary. Bet

For the past six years, crime rates have been falling all over America. In some big cities, the fall has been extraordinary. Bet

admin2009-06-24  22
问题     For the past six years, crime rates have been falling all over America. In some big cities, the fall has been extraordinary. Between 1994 and 1997 in New York city violent crime fell by 39% in central Harlem and by 45% in the once-terrifying South Bronx. The latest figures released by the FBI, for 1997, show that serious crime continued to fall in all the largest cities, though a little more slowly than in 1996.
    Violent crime fell by 5% in all, and by slightly more in cities with over 250,000 people. Property crimes have fallen, too, by more than 20% since 1980, so that the rates for burglary and car-theft are lower in America than they are in supposedly more law-abiding Britain and Scandinavia. And people have noticed. In 1994, 30% of Americans told pollsters that crime was the most important challenge facing the country. In 1997, only 15% thought so. Some cities’ police departments are so impressed by these figures, it is said, that they have lately taken to exaggerating the plunge in crime.
    Why this has happened is anyone’s guess. Many factors—social, demographic, economic, and political—affect crime rate, so it is difficult to put a finger on the vital clue. In May this year, the FBI itself admitted it had "no idea" why rates were falling so fast.
    Politicians think they know, of course. Ask Rudy Giuliani, the mayor of New York, why his city has made such strides in beating crime that it accounts for fully a quarter of the national decline. He will cite his policy of "zero tolerance". This concept, which sprang from a famous article by two criminologists in Atlantic Monthly in March 1982, maintains that by refusing to tolerate tiny infractions of the law—dropping litter, spray-painting walls—the authorities can create a climate in which crime of more dangerous kinds finds it impossible to flourish. The Atlantic article was called "Broken Windows"; if one window in a building was left broken, it argued, all the others would soon be gone. The answer: mend the window, fast.
    The metro system in Washington D.C., was the first place where zero tolerance drew public attention, especially when one passenger was arrested for eating a banana. The policy seemed absurdly pernickety, yet it worked: in a better environment, people’s behavior improved, and crime dropped. Mr. Giuliani, taking this theme to heart, has gone further. He has cracked down on windscreen-cleaners, public urinators graffiti, and even jaywalkers. He has excoriated New York’s famously sullen cabdrivers, and wants all New Yorkers to be nicer to each other. Tony Blair, visiting from London, has been hugely impressed.
    But is this cleanliness and civility the main reason why crime has fallen? It seems unlikely. "Zero tolerance" can also be a distraction, making too many policemen spend too much time handing out littering tickets and parking fines while, some streets away, young men are being murdered for their trainers. It is localized, too: though lower Manhattan or the Washington metro can show the uncanny orderliness of a communist regime, other parts of the city—the areas of highest crime maybe left largely untreated.
    William Bratton, New York’s police commissioner until Mr. Giuliani fired him for stealing his thunder, has a different explanation for the fall in crime. It came about mainly, he believes, because he reorganized the police department and restored its morale: giving his officers better guns, letting them take more decisions for themselves, and moving them away from desk jobs and out into the streets. Mr. Bratton made his precinct commanders personally responsible for reducing crimes on their own beats. There was no passing the buck, and those who failed were fired. Within a year, he had replaced half of them.
选项 A、Its crime rates have been falling only in big cities.
B、Violent crime falls by 39%.
C、The rates for burglary and car-theft are lower in America than that in Britain.
D、Violent crime falls by more than 20%.
答案C
解析
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