While usually discussed as a cause of crime, guns also may protect against it. Firearm ownership is difficult to measure, but all sources agree that millions of Americans have guns for defense. Although existing research is not in complete agreement, defensive gun ownership appears to increase with fear of crime and with concerns about collective security. How often victims use guns against offenders is controversial; some data suggest that armed resistance is rare, while other data suggest that it is very common. The data showing that firearm defense is rare also indicate that it is often successful.
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References
1.
1. Kathleen Maguire, Ann L. Pastore, and Timothy J. Flanagan, eds., Sourcebook of Criminal Justice Statistics, 1992 (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1993), tab. 3.133.
2.
2. Gallup Organization, Gallup/CNN/USA Today Poll: December, 1993, Wave I (Storrs, CT: Roper Center for Public Opinion Research, 1993).
3.
Franklin E. Zimring and Gordon Hawkins, The Citizen's Guide to Gun Control (New York: Macmillan, 1987).
4.
4. Liz Marie Marciniak and Colin Loftin, “Measuring Protective Handgun Ownership,”Criminology, 29:531-540 (1991).
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5. Philip J. Cook, “Notes on the Availability and Prevalence of Firearms,”American Journal of Preventive Medicine, 9 (suppl.): 33-38 (1993).
6.
6. Wright, Rossi, and Daly, Under the Gun, pp. 81-101.
7.
7. For additional discussion, see Kleck, Point Blank, pp. 27-34.
8.
Arthur L. Stinchcombeet al. , Crime and Punishment: Changing Attitudes in America (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1980).
9.
9. Lizotte, Bordua, and White, “Firearms Ownership for Sport and Protection.”
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David McDowall and Colin Loftin, “Collective Security and the Demand for Legal Handguns,”American Journal of Sociology, 88:1146-1161 (1983).
11.
11. Lizotte, Bordua, and White, “Firearms Ownership for Sport and Protection.”
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12. Robert L. Young, “Perceptions of Crime, Racial Attitudes, and Firearms Ownership,”Social Forces, 64:473-486 (1985).
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13. James D. Wright and Peter H. Rossi, Armed and Considered Dangerous: A Survey of Felons and Their Weapons (Hawthorne, NY: Aldine de Gruyter, 1991).
14.
14. Daniel W. Webster, Patricia S. Gainer, and Howard R. Champion, “Weapon Carrying among Inner-City Junior High School Students: Defensive Behavior vs. Aggressive Delinquency,”American Journal of Public Health, 83:1604-1608 (1993).
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15. McDowall and Loftin, “Collective Security and the Demand for Legal Handguns.”
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16. Ibid.
17.
Charles T. Clotfelter , “Crime, Disorders, and the Demand for Handguns: An Empirical Analysis,”Law and Policy Quarterly, 1:147-175 (1981).
18.
See also idem, “Collective Security and Fatal Firearms Accidents,”Criminology, 23:401-416 (1985).
19.
Robert L. Young , David McDowall, and Colin Loftin, “Collective Security and the Ownership of Firearms for Protection,”Criminology, 25:47-62 (1987).
20.
John T. Whitehead and Robert H. Langworthy, “Gun Ownership and Willingness to Shoot: A Clarification of Recent Controversies,”Justice Quarterly, 6:263-282 (1989).
21.
21. Wesley G. Skogan, Disorder and Decline: Crime and the Spiral of Decay in American Neighborhoods (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1990).
22.
David McDowall and Brian Wiersema, “The Incidence of Defensive Firearm Use by U.S. Crime Victims, 1987 through 1990,”American Journal of Public Health, 84:1982-1984 (1994).
23.
23. The 999,068 figure is from Gary Kleck, “Crime Control through the Private Use of Armed Force,”Social Problems, 35:1-21 (1988). The 783,000 figure is from idem, Point Blank. The 2,454,683 figure is from idem, “Debate: Defensive Gun Control” (Remarks delivered at the annual meeting of the American Society of Criminology, Phoenix, AZ, 30 Oct. 1993).
24.
24. Kleck, “Debate.”
25.
25. Peter D. Hart Research Associates, Study 1760, Violence in America (Photocopied report, 1981).
26.
26. Wright and Rossi, Armed and Considered Dangerous, p. 102.
27.
27. In addition, the NCVS does not include homicides. Persons killed while trying to protect themselves thus are excluded from the estimates. For evidence that resistance may increase the risk of death, see, for example, Franklin E. Zimring and James Zuehl, “Victim Injury and Death in Urban Robbery: A Chicago Study,”Journal of Legal Studies, 15:1-40 (1986).
28.
28. For a more detailed analysis of NCVS data, see Gary Kleck and Miriam A. DeLone, “Victim Resistance and Offender Weapon Effects in Robbery,”Journal of Quantitative Criminology, 9:55-81 (1993). Kleck and De-Lone also discuss other studies of resistance.
29.
For evidence that victims are prudent in resisting crimes, see David F. Luckenbill, “Compliance under Threat of Severe Punishment,”Social Forces, 60:811-825 (1982).
30.
See also Arthur L. Kellermann et al., “Suicide in the Home in Relation to Gun Ownership,” ibid., 327:467-72 (1992); Arthur L. Kellermann et al., “Gun Ownership as a Risk Factor for Homicide in the Home,” ibid., 329:1084-91 (1993).
31.
31. James D. Wright, Joseph F. Sheley, and M. Dwayne Smith, “Kids, Guns, and Killing Fields,”Society, 30:84-89 (Dec. 1992).
