Crime as a social cost of poverty and inequality: a review focusing on developing countries

When rural life was still dominant in nowadays industrialized countries, cities were often seen by villagers as the domain of evil, the realm of corruption and violence. The process of accelerated urbanization and economic development was then seen as inherently wicked. The widely publicized criminality and violence observed today in several metropolises of both the developed and developing world would seem to justify a posteriori this bucolic bias. The alarming surge of crime and violence in Mexico, Rio or Sao Paulo during the last 20 years or so might indeed be the result of an excessively rapid growth of these 'gigapolises'. Likewise, the increasing minor cirminality experienced today in many large cities' suburbs in developed countries might be the delayed consequences of an urbanization process which was too quick and insufficiently controlled.