When work disappears, crime appears: a political economy analysis of urban crime in Edo State Nigeria

• Main Authors: Tunde Agara, Bonaventure Chizea, Oarhe Osumah
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: International Educational and Social Sciences Association (IESSA) 2016-12-01
• Series: Journal of Studies in Social Sciences and Humanities
• Subjects: edo state; political economy; urban crime; nigeria
• Online Access: http://www.jssshonline.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/JSSSH_Vol.2_No.4_2016-December_161_174_Sr-No.-5.pdf

This paper is a theoretical construct which used data collected from the Edo State Police crime index from 2002 to 2011 to show crime trend in the state. The paper uses the Marxist perspective to argue that rapid urbanization and the depleting of the rural areas have elevated the level of crime from petty to a level of sophistication that the present institutional security agencies have failed to match. The rise in crime and crime rates in Edo state is located at the doorsteps of the deepening liberal and capitalist economic crises, unemployment and the emergence of a crop of educated and highly literate class of graduates which the economy is unable to absorb. The data shows that crime is not only on the increase but that the level is much higher than that in the rural or suburban areas. The paper interrogates other theoretical perspectives to explain this phenomenon and opined that although crime is not the exclusive preserve of capitalist society, its increase and sophistication can be located directly at the failure of the capitalist society to provide for the emerging class of educated but alienated and unemployed elite.