Age and Crime in Botswana and Namibia: Implications for Developmental and Life Course Criminology

• In Event: Life-Course Studies of Trajectories in and Age-Period-Cohort Effects on Crime

Abstract

We extend scarce research on the age-crime relationship involving Global South countries by investigating age-arrest patterns in the African countries of Botswana and Namibia. Our analysis included comparisons of Botswana age-crime distributions with (a) the reverse J-shaped invariance curve proposed by Hirschi and Gottfredson; (b) U.S. age-arrest curves; and (c) Taiwan and South Korea age-arrest curves. On the one hand, the findings revealed considerable divergence in Botswana and Namibia age-crime patterns compared with the HG invariance projection. On the other hand, there was considerable similarity of Botswana and Namibia age-arrest distributions with those observed in Taiwan and South Korea (collectivist countries) as reported within recent cross-national age-crime research. Implications for research and theory on the age-crime relation more broadly are discussed within.

Authors

• Darrell Steffensmeier, Pennsylvania State University

• Jessie Slepicka, The University of Montana

• Tebogo B. Sebeelo, The University of Botswana

• Jonathan Uhl, Carlow University