Fear of crime within non-gated residential communities in the urban context

Abstract

Since more than 30 years ago, the fear of crime (FOC) has become one of the major concern not only among the scholars in the field of criminal theories but the field of psychology and architecture too. It is not only related to the emotional; FOC has made communities become more isolated and built selfishness among the individuals. Other than that, it widens the gap between communities within an area, makes public places desolated, and increase punitive rates among the local community. Based on criticism on first generation CPTED (1stGenCPTED), the crime rate did not show any signs of abatement, in fact it has becomes worst. The purpose of this dissertation is to identify methods of crime prevention in non-gated residential communities (NGRC) in urban areas that can reduce the level of FOC. There is a research on FOC that has proven that the level of FOC in NGRC is lower compared to within gated residential communities (GRC). This dissertation is conducted to review other related studies and to propose architectural-based guidelines that is supported by relevant arguments. The findings show that CPTED strategies that have been implemented are more on the second generation CPTED (2ndGenCPTED) which are more community-oriented. It concludes that the level of FOC within NGRC do not only depend on social or psychological matters, but is still influenced by architectural design solution.