Gangs of London and Public Housing
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Series
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Speaker(s)Carmen Villa (University of Zurich, Switzerland)
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FieldSpatial Economics
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LocationVrije Universiteit Amsterdam, De Boelelaan 1105, HG-13A33
Amsterdam -
Date and time
April 30, 2026
12:00 - 13:00
Abstract
Novel spatial data on London street gangs between 1990 and 2015 are combined with local housing characteristics to produce a newly constructed data source that shows how social housing and its architectural design relates to gang presence and neighbourhood crime. High-rise public housing estates built in the post-World War II era are far more likely to host gangs than areas without social housing. To address concerns that social housing was built in already high-crime areas, localised high-rise construction is shown to be predicted from spatial patterns of WWII bomb damage that occurred in the 1940-41 Blitz. Bomb-induced high-rise construction significantly raises gang presence and criminality, with especially high juvenile crime rates in gang areas. Joint paper with Richard Disney, Tom Kirchmaier and Stephen Machin.