Crime Reduction - Helping to Reduce Crime in Your Area

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5Is framework: a practical tool for transfer and sharing of crime prevention knowledge illustrative guide

5Is is organised as a sequence of stages which emphasise the bringing together of evidence and experience – of the crime problem, the context, what works and how to realise it. This often requires the involvement of a range of different people. The 5 stages, and illustration of the kinds of 'good practice' knowledge which can be captured under each, are listed below.

Graphic of 5 eyes: intelligence, intervention, implementation, involvement, impact

 

INTELLIGENCE – gathering and analysing information on

  • crime and disorder problems and their consequences

  • offenders and modus operandi

  • causes of crime and (with longer-term, developmental prevention) the 'risk and protective factors' in young children's life circumstances associated with later criminality

INTERVENTION – blocking, disrupting or weakening those causes. The interventions cover the entire field:

  • acting through both civil prevention and traditional justice/ law-enforcement

  • addressing both situational and offender-oriented causes

  • and tackling causation at different levels – immediate 'molecular' causes of criminal events, higher-level causes in communities, networks, markets and criminal careers, and remote 'upstream' causes influenced by manipulation of risk and protective factors in children' early lives

IMPLEMENTATION – converting the intervention principles into practical methods that are:

  • customised for the local problem and context

  • targeted on offenders, victims, buildings, places and products, on an individual or collective basis

  • planned, managed, organised and steered

  • monitored and quality-assured, with documentation of inputs of human and financial resources, outputs and intermediate outcomes

  • assessed for ethical issues

INVOLVEMENT – mobilising other agencies, companies and individuals to play their part in implementing the intervention, or acting in partnership, because crime prevention professionals must often work through or with others, rather than directly intervening in causes of crime. In both cases specifying:

  • who were involved

  • what broad roles or specific tasks they undertook

  • how they were alerted, motivated, empowered or directed (eg by publicity campaigns, financial incentives)

  • how a broadly supportive climate was created in the community and how hostility was reduced

IMPACT

  • nature of evaluation (how the project was assessed, by whom; whether this was a reliable, systematic and independent evaluation; and what kind of evaluation design was used)

  • impact results (what worked, how)

  • cost-effectiveness, coverage of crime problem, timescale for implementation and impact

  • process evaluation (what problems/ tradeoffs faced in implementation, how they were resolved at each stage)

  • replicability (which contextual conditions and infrastructure are helpful, or necessary, to successfully replicate this project – or particular elements of it – at each of the 5Is stages)

  • learning points – both positive and negative (what to do, what not to do)

 

This introduction has set out the basic information to collect on crime prevention projects using the 5Is framework. The format has been 'illustrative' rather than detailed and specific, but people unready for such detail can use it in this 'headline' fashion.

In most cases the full guidance presents more detailed headings and under these, categories for description. This reflects the complexity of real-world crime prevention itself and the information necessary for practitioners to select, replicate and adapt good practice. Full project descriptions take 5-10 pages depending on the amount, complexity and newsworthiness of the preventive action. (Shorter descriptions could cover just the 'best bits' of projects, for more experienced practitioners.)

5Is will continue to evolve, but using the headings as consistently as possible helps communication and retrieval. Different crime prevention projects may be organised in very different ways (some may use several methods of prevention), so to build in flexibility, writers can vary the order of the description. The content – what information is documented – should be chosen on the basis of what is judged to be critical for success of the project, what is newsworthy (including to less-experienced practitioners), and what is needed just to complete the picture. Ideally, only knowledge from reliably and independently evaluated projects should be captured using 5Is. However, these are still too rare, and for cost reasons supply will never meet demand – so for the interim at least, 5Is can equally be used to capture experience-based knowledge.

Return to 5Is introduction 

Further Information 

The current full guidance version, plus examples and a detailed exposition will be added to the EUCPN website in the near future.  Anyone wishing to obtain detailed guidance on headings, sub-headings and content should request copies direct from Paul Ekblom via email.

Download a print version of the 5Is introduction and illustrative guide Word 97 (170 Kb)

Paul Ekblom
Home Office UK
30 January 2003

Last update: 03/03/03

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