frigidweirdo
Diamond Member
- Mar 7, 2014
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and more on Switzerland and Sweden...
Whatever the effect of Swiss guns abroad, they are not even a trivial crime problem domestically. Despite all the guns, the murder rate is a small fraction of the American rate, and is less than the rate in Canada or England, which strictly control guns, or in Japan, which virtually prohibits them. The gun crime rate is so low that statistics are not even kept.
The suicide rate, though, is almost double the American rate. Guns are used in about one-fifth of all Swiss suicides compared to three-fifths of American and one-third of Canadian suicides.
It is not Switzerland's cultural makeup, or its gun policies per se, that explain that low crime rate. Rather, it is the emphasis on community duty, of which gun ownership is the most important part, that best explains low crime rate.
In Cities With Little Crime, author Marshall Clinard contrasts the low crime rate in Switzerland with the higher rate in Sweden, where gun control is more extensive. The higher Swedish rate is all the more surprising in view of Sweden's much lower population density and its ethnic homogeneity. One of the reasons for the low crime rate, says Clinard, is that Swiss cities grew relatively slowly. Most families live for generations in the same area. Therefore, large, heterogeneous cities with slum cultures never developed.
Proud to have the weakest central government in the West, Switzerlan is governed mainly by its 3,095 Einwohrnergemeinde (communes, sub-states of a canton). Several cantons still make their laws by the traditional Landsgemeinden system, whereby all eligible voters assemble in annual outdoor meetings.
Unlike the rest of Europe, the police force is decentralised. Judges and jurors are popularly elected. With less mobility, and more deeply developed community ties, there is less crime.
Most democratic nations impose long prison terms more frequently than does America, but Switzerland does not. For all crimes except murder, the Swiss rarely inflict a prison term of more than a year; most serious offenders receive suspended sentences. As in Japan, the focus of the criminal justice system is on the reintegration of the offender into the community, rather than punishment.
Who wrote this exactly?