The Invention of Permanent Poverty

Crime is caused by poverty and unemployment: if poverty increases, then so too does crime. Such is the conclusion of the 'no-fault' theory of crime that holds sway among the social-affairs intelligentsia. In The Invention of Permanent Poverty Norman Dennis rebuts the central assumptions of 'no-fault' theory. He focuses his criticism on the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, whose Inquiry into Income and Wealth of 1995 exemplifies 'no-fault' theory at its worst. It claimed that, since 1979, poverty had been increasing and that the gap between rich and poor had grown. And it contended that, as a result, crime had increased, perpetrated largely by young men with 'no stake in society'. Norman Dennis reveals the flaws in the oft-repeated claim that 'the poor have been getting poorer'. Using the very same statistical sources as the poverty lobbies, he demolishes the claim that there has been an increase in poverty. In doing so, he reveals the statistical manoeuvres they typically deploy to substantiate their false claims. More importantly, he takes apart the theory that crime is caused by poverty and unemployment.
Poverty was decreasing in absolute and relative terms between 1961-79, but crime was increasing. Dennis also points out that earlier periods which saw high unemployment and a greater degree of absolute poverty were not characterised by social disorder, for example the 1930s and the last part of the nineteenth century. Among the chief causes of rising crime, Dennis argues, has been the decline of the family and, in particular, the abandonment of the assumption that a man should make a lifelong commitment to marriage and parenthood. Crimes are not committed by the downtrodden poor 'with no stake in society', but by young men who are being allowed to perpetuate their childhood long beyond the time when they should be taking on the responsibilities of fatherhood. By suggesting that 'more money' will reduce crime, the social-affairs intelligentsia offer the most shallow of materialistic solutions to problems which are essentially moral and cultural. "Labour sociologist Norman Dennis has identified the revolt against respectability as a prime cause of rising crime and social fracture." The Times.
"Even those of us who share the anxieties of Dennis about a society in which a fifth of all mothers are alone, while the fathers are drones, cannot imagine how to change it. But to admit honestly that some choices are morally better - because they are more responsible - than others would be a start." Financial Times.