People here in Sweden are quite attuned to both general crime rates as well as the particular factors behind those rates.
We are all happy that crime has fallen. You seem to be against it falling further?
People in Sweden want the crime rates reported separately for:
a) "sorta native Swedes" (people whose families have lived here many hundred years)
b) "new Swedes" (e.g. people who arrived last year from Somalia)
It is a well-accepted opinion that the people in category b) are grossly (by a factor of 10 or more) over-represented in crime stats.
The authority you linked to has famously denied creating fresher stats than their 2005 report on origin vs crime frequency report - simply by saying "it's not needed". This is right. Sweden hasn't extracted and published crime stats based on the perps' origins simply because the results would be inconvenient.
I'm all for less crime, and for crime stats to be reported accurately. But come on, this is Hacker News, we don't do "well-accepted opinion". Find the facts, report them honestly and then we can have a discussion.
Truth is, crime has fallen everywhere for decades and we don't really know why. Maybe globalization? The banning of lead in gasoline? That's a real mystery worth solving.
So you support having BRÅ redo their stats on crimes per origin in light of the new immigration since 2005?
For any non-swedes who may be interested enough to follow this: BRÅ is the "Swedish National Council for Crime Prevention". The are tasked with doing research on crime and how to prevent it.
Meanwhile, this particular authorithy actually published new stats recently. For example:
Over the past three years 1.7% of the population of Sweden reported they were subject to sexual crimes. During the period 2005-2012 this number was relatively stable at around 1%. So we are talking about a 70% increase in just a few years.
The most obvious thing that changed during these three years? Massive, historically unsurpassed immigration levels from Africa/The Middle-East.
I'm definitely in favour of more high-quality research into the causes of crime and its relationship with immigration, social factors, gender etc. Again, we need facts, which can only be won by serious, honest research, not glib generalizations.
Yes. Of course, they should do it properly and not stop at that but look at all plausible factors. For example, there's a very common chromosomal abberration that leads to a ten-fold increase in the violent crime rate (or more), yet this is hardly discussed at all.
a) Yeah, I would say that it is highly likely that the incredibly dramatic demographic change the past three years has been quite relevant for the 70% increase in sex crime victimization during the same three years. Of course, if your're an academic type person you can chose to ignore what you're seeing with your own eyes. Just carry on.
b) How about you actually stating that BRÅ should re-do their crime stats based on immigration status etc? Not that it matters one bit in the grand scale of things, but since you seem to be escaping the issue I would like to see you say yes or no.
People here in Sweden are quite attuned to both general crime rates as well as the particular factors behind those rates.
We are all happy that crime has fallen. You seem to be against it falling further?
People in Sweden want the crime rates reported separately for:
a) "sorta native Swedes" (people whose families have lived here many hundred years)
b) "new Swedes" (e.g. people who arrived last year from Somalia)
It is a well-accepted opinion that the people in category b) are grossly (by a factor of 10 or more) over-represented in crime stats.
The authority you linked to has famously denied creating fresher stats than their 2005 report on origin vs crime frequency report - simply by saying "it's not needed". This is right. Sweden hasn't extracted and published crime stats based on the perps' origins simply because the results would be inconvenient.