Crime as a Social Cost of Poverty and Inequality: A Review Focusing on Developing Countries

Abstract

Whe roral life was still dominant in nowadays industrialized countries, cities were often seen by villagers as the domain of evil, the realm of corruption and violence. The process of accelerated ubanization and economic development was then seen as inherently wicked. The widely publicized criminality and violence observed today in several metropolises of both the developed and developing world seem to justify a posteriori this bucolic bias. The alarming surge of crime and violence in México, Rio or Sao Paulo during the last 20 years or so might indeed be the result of an excessively rapid growth of these"gigapolises". 36 p.