Gendered Risks
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In the concluding section of the book these separate “Narratives of Neglect” intermingle. The inequality in cultural capital between professionals and residents renders the latter ultimately passive in the governance of their estate’s regeneration and security. A Resident Steering Group participates in authoring a “Good Neighbour Agreement”, the rules governing continuing residence. Through a process of “silencing and steering” the professionals impose a model of security based on an assumed commonality of values with those identified as “decent”. This definition is based on exhibited standards of presentation in self, family and home, and the potential to cooperate with state authority in delivering an idealized version of a safe and renewed Milton. That a punitive and exclusionary agenda is essentially imposed by the professionals, ultimately confirms residents’ suspicions that they are not equal partners but at the mercy of municipal authority to be ignored, coerced, further ghettoized or moved on, regardless of their input. Overall this book is an important resource and food for thought for all with an interest in, among other issues: urban renewal, participatory governance and community safety partnerships. The reader gains a rich picture of the relevant actors. There is a detailed consideration of methodology and photography throughout, both of which complement the central text. Occasionally the numerous sub-divisions into which Karn divides her various participant groups, each with their own subtly differing narrative, can generate a certain amount of confusion. Given, furthermore, the frequency of references to “decent” and “offending” values throughout, it is curious that these cultures and the role of social class and aspiration in forming them are not explored more thoroughly nor much of the relevant literature considered. These omissions do not overly subtract from a solid ethnography of issues that go to the heart of contemporary urban planning, community development, crime prevention and security. Jonathan Ilan Dublin Institute of Technology, Room 323, Mountjoy Square, Dublin 1, Ireland. E-mail: [email protected] G e n dere d R i sks K. Hannah-Moffatt and P. O’Malley (eds) Abingdon, Routledge-Cavendish, 2007 256 pp, £70.00 Hbk ISBN: 1-90438-578-8 (Hbk) 0-20394-055-5 (Pbk) Crime Prevention and Community Safety (2008) 10, 142–145. doi:10.1057/palgrave.cpcs.8150061
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he concept of risk has been used to refer to the preoccupation of contemporary Western societies with precaution and safety and this broadly constitutes the starting point for this jointly edited book.
Jonathan Ilan
Crime Prevention and Community Safety 143
For these editors and each of the contributors to the volume, understanding contemporary risk society, whether as a governmental technique, a form of consciousness and action or as a political issue, must accommodate “how gender and risk are interlinked and often mutually constitutive” (p 7). The explicit focus on the risk/gender nexus as claimed in the “blurb” on the back cover
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