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Date: November 25, 2024 Mon
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Results for violent crime (south africa and mozambique)
1 results foundAuthor: Shabangu, Themba Title: A Comparative Inquiry Into the Nature of Violence and Crime in Mozambique and South Africa Summary: The degree and type of violence that offenders use when committing crime is worrying and unexplainable. Offenders rape females during house robberies or carjacking. They shoot infants who cry during house robberies. They use guns and weapons to commit acquisitive and interpersonal crimes. The use of violence and weapons, especially in instances where the victim is neither resisting nor posing any danger to the offender, serves to increase fear of crime and insecurity. When this report was being compiled South Africans and policy-makers knew that crime is high. President Zuma and the Minister of the Police publicly stated that the government must reduce crime, violent crime in particular. This report, however, looks beyond the premise that reducing crime is the priority. Citizens are far more afraid of violence that threatens their lives, there is therefore an equally urgent need to develop interventions to reduce violence in general. This research centres on the assumption that the drivers for violence are different from those for crime. Accordingly, these phenomena, violence and crime, must be understood and managed separately. The interventions and skills required to prevent and reduce violence are different to those that must be employed to address crime. Another assumption that has driven this research is the knowledge that South Africans exposed to violence that was used to maintain the apartheid regime is being neither addressed currently nor was it managed during transitional period leading to the 1994 elections. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission provided a platform for offenders to disclose and to seek forgiveness from victims. It however did not address the effects of the apartheid violence on South Africans. The government and the South African society did not put in place public programs to assist South Africans exposed to state violence, alternatively to educate them about alternative dispute resolution mechanisms. As a result of the failure, violence has now become part of the societal culture. It manifests itself increasingly in relationships (domestic violence), crimes against privately owned property (car jacking, house robberies) and during public demonstrations (service delivery protests, xenophobia etc). Mozambicans also faced the same challenge as South Africans. Government has not put in place mechanism and institutions to assist citizens to cope with the effects of the civil war that raged for years. Unlike South Africa, where the truth and reconciliation process was put in place, Mozambicans have not gone through a similar process. The gap exists in both countries and feeds violence and crime. The primary purpose of this research is to interrogate the phenomenon of increasing levels of criminal violence in Africa, particularly during transitional period, by drawing on intellectual resources from different field such as criminology and psychology (see findings on chapter 5) and from perpetrators of violent crime serving time at Correctional Centres in South Africa and Mozambique. The specific issues that this research seeks to fulfil are: • To understand what triggers violence during the commission of crimes. • To investigate the variables that coalesce within violent perpetrators. • To clarify triggers and variables that coalesce to cause violence that can be addressed through interventions of criminal justice agencies and other agencies responsible for ensuring safety and security. • To establish areas for further in-depth research to assist decision-makers. This research was carried out in order to contribute to the body of evidence that seeks to explain the use of violence during criminal activities. It aims to explain the historical origins, motivating factors, the surrounding psychology and the use of violence when committing crime. The ultimate objective is to start debate and discussion that will lead to the review or confirmation of policies that will hopefully reduce both the general level of violence and its criminal application. South Africa and Mozambique are the foci of this study. A number of reasons such as, their geographical proximity, historical political, poverty and huge black population influenced this choice. These two countries have historical and developmental differences. They have different colonial legacies, have undergone political transition and are at different development stages. South Africa is a former British colony, achieved a peaceful transition to democracy and has the highest GDP per capita compared to Mozambique. Mozambique, on the other hand, is a former Portugal colony; the transition to democracy was violent and it experienced a protracted civil war. The colonial masters did not invest in Mozambique’s education or other infrastructure. By contrast, South Africa experienced a much larger degree of colonial investment. Some regions of South Africa have first-world infrastructure and communities benefitted (and still do) from education, albeit unequal in terms of quality. Other racial groups, specifically blacks and coloured racial groups continue to receive poor quality education as exemplified by the matriculation pass rates and school finishing rate. Some of the regions suffer from high levels of poverty. South Africa, like Mozambique, has high levels of illiteracy. By examining these contrasts and similarities, this report aims to reach a better understanding of the triggers of violence and crime-related violence in particular. One common feature between South Africa and Mozambique is that the state sponsored violence was committed in individuals’ private spaces and not in the bush. The violence was therefore intertwined with all aspects of their lives. They were not safe either walking on the street or even in their own homes. Ordinary warfare separates the “home space and the war space”. Details: Pretoria, South Africa: Institute for Democracy in South Africa (Idasa), 2011. 120p. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed April 11, 2011 at: http://www.idasa.org/media/uploads/outputs/files/comparing_crime_in_mozambique_and_south_africa.pdf Year: 2011 Country: Africa URL: http://www.idasa.org/media/uploads/outputs/files/comparing_crime_in_mozambique_and_south_africa.pdf Shelf Number: 121298 Keywords: Victims of CrimesViolenceViolent Crime (South Africa and Mozambique) |