Crime and Media: Understanding the Connections

We live in an age of ‘media saturation’, an age in which media play an increasingly central role in everyday life. It is also an age in which high crime rates and levels of concern about crime have become accepted as ‘normal’. The rapid and relentless development of information technologies over the past 100 years has shaped the modern era, transforming the relations between space, time and identity. Where once ‘news’ used to travel by ship, it now hurtles across the globe at light speed and is available 24 hours-a-day at the push of a button. Where once cultures used to be more or less distinguishable in national or geographical terms, they now mix, intermingle and converge in a constant global exchange of information. Where once a sense of community and belonging was derived primarily from established identities and local traditions, it may now also be found, and lost, in a virtual world of shared values, meanings and interpretations. In short, media are not only inseparable from contemporary social life; they are, for many, its defining characteristic.