| Description |
1 online resource : text file, PDF |
| Contents |
Cover ; Half Title; Title Page; Copyright Page; Table of Contents; Preface; Acknowledgments; One Weapons, Crime, and Violence: An Overview of Themes and Findings; Part I: Weapons; Two How Many Guns in Private Hands?; Three Recent Trends in Weapons Ownership: I. Sport and Recreational Demand; The Trend in Weapons Supply; Household Increase; Sport and Recreation Demand; Summary; Four Recent Trends in Weapons Ownership: II. The Police Demand for Armament; The Personnel Trend; The Armaments Policy Trend |
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Five Recent Trends in Weapons Ownership: III. Fear and Loathing and the Mass Demand for Defensive WeaponsSurvey Data on the Weapons Trend; Empirical Studies of Fear and Loathing -- Six Characteristics of Private Weapons Owners; Locational Variables: Region and City Size; Social Status: Class, Religion, Race, and Sex; The Southern Subculture; Socialization; Personality Characteristics; Conclusions: The Typical Gun Owner; Seven On Crime and Private Weapons; Is Crime a Cause of Private Weaponry?; Is Private Weaponry a Cause of Crime?; Does Private Weaponry Deter Crime? |
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Part II: Crime and ViolenceEight How Much Crime? How Much Violence?; Longitudinal Trends in Violent Crime: UCR Statistics; Trends in Violent Crime from Victimization Surveys; Trends in Accidental and Self-Inflicted Death and Injury; Police Homicide and Deaths and Assaults of Police Officers; Summary and Estimates of Violence; Nine The Firearms Used in Crime; Magnitude of Crime Guns Confiscated: The NBS Survey; ATF Project Identification; ATF Project 300; ATF Project Cue; Burr's Study of Florida Citizens and Convicted Felons; Summary; Ten On the Matter of Criminal Motivations |
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Part III: Weapons and Their ControlEleven Public Opinion and Gun Control; Technical Comparisons; Comparisons of Substantive Findings; Conclusions: Weapons and Their Control; Twelve Regulating Firearms: An Overview of Federal, State, and Local Practices; Federal Legislation; State and Local Regulations; Coverage of Existing Firearms Regulations; Implementation of Gun Control Laws; Conclusion; Thirteen Weapons Control Legislation and Effects on Violent Crime; Issues in Assessing the Impact of Gun Control Legislation; Landmark Evaluations of Gun Control Effects |
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On the Effectiveness of Gun Control LegislationFourteen Some Policy Implications; The Civilian Firearms Policy Issues; The Role of Firearms in American Life; Violence and Guns; The Circulation of Weapons in the United States; An Assessment of Gun Control Measures; A Concluding Polemic; Bibliography; Index |
| Summary |
"In 1978, the Social and Demographic Research Institute of the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, received a grant from the National Institute of Justice to undertake a comprehensive review of the literature on weapons, crime, and violence in the United States. The purpose of the project is best described as a "sifting and winnowing" of the claims and counterclaims from both sides of the Great American Gun War - the perennial struggle in AmeriƯcan political life over what to do, if anything, about guns, about violence, and about crime. The review and analysis of the available studies consumed the better part of three years; the results of this work are contained in this volume. The intention of any review is to take stock of the available fund of knowledge in some topical area. Under the Gun is no different: our goal has been to glean from the volumes of previous studies those facts that, in our view, seem firmly and certainly established; those hypotheses that seem adequately supported by, or at least approximately consistent with, the best available research evidence; and those areas or topics about which, it seems, we need to know a lot more than we do. One of our major conclusions can be stated in advance: despite the large number of studies that have been done, many critically important questions have not been adequately researched, and some of them have not been examined at all. Much of the available research in the area of weapons and crime has been done by advocates for one or another policy position. As a consequence, the manifest intent of many "studies" is to persuade rather than to inform. We have tried to approach the topic from a purely agnostic point of view, treating as an open question what policies should be enacted with regard to gun, or crime, control. Thus, we have tried to judge each study on its own merits, on the basis of the routine standards normally applied to social-scientific research, and not on the basis of how effectively it argues for a particular policy direction. It would, of course, be presumptuous to claim that we have set aside all our own biases in conducting this study. Whether or not our treatment is fair and objective is clearly something for the reader, and not us, to decide."--Provided by publisher |
| Subject |
Violent crimes -- United States
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Firearms -- Government policy -- United States
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Gun control -- United States
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Firearms -- Government policy
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Gun control
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Violent crimes
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United States
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| Form |
Electronic book
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| ISBN |
9781351300803 |
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1351300806 |
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