1 INTRODUCTION

Changes that have been taking place in policing over

the past thirty years and
that have led to new policing concepts, such as
community policing or problem
oriented policing, are the results of efforts to find more
effective ways of policing,
which will promote public safety and enhance citizens’
quality of life, i.e. increase
the feeling of safety and reduce the fear of crime. The
scope and nature of crime,
as well as changes in the type of crime have led the
police to find more effective
solutions and to expand crime control tactics with crime
prevention strategies,
increasing the feeling of safety and the quality of life in
communities. Therefore,
lack of feeling of safety, i.e. fear of crime has turned into
a significant problem
and has gradually become the focus of police interest.
Due to the function that
the police have in society, it is considered that their
presence and visibility can
successfully reduce such fear in local communities, i.e.
improve citizens’ overall
sense of safety. Namely, research related to perception
of safety provides scientific
evidence on the effectiveness of various policing
strategies in reducing fear among
citizens (Bureau of Justice Assistance, 1994). These
strategies, to be effective, have
to be tailored specificly for the nature and cause of fear
of crime (Cordner, 2010).
Cordner (2010) recommends a targeted problem-
oriented approach as the most
effective strategy for fear reduction but also recognizes
12 crime-reductions
measures or actions devides into six diffetent (effective)
strategies: traditional
approach (reducting crime); professional policing
(motorized patrols; police
visability; rapid response; solving crimes); crime
prevention (target hardening,
street lighting); community policing (police-citizen
contact; public confidence
in police; public information); broken windows (reducing
disorder) and
Targeted-oriented policing (targeted responses).
Modern approaches to policing, such as community
policing in its
comprehensive sense, encompass numerous aspects,
having as one of teir primary
goals to create the feeling of safety (Schorer, 2007). As
opposed to traditional
policing which is focused on crime through identifying
and arresting perpetrators,
as well as assessing police work through police
statistics, i.e. identified and
reported crime, modern policing particular attention
paids to the subjective feeling
of safety, i.e. fear of crime. This is understandable if
we take into consideration the
fact that citizens’ satisfaction with the police and their
activities depends, in large
part, on whether citizens feel safe or not. According to
the traditional policing
concept, the police become responsible only when a
crime is committed or when
some other incident takes place. For this reason,
citizens consider this kind of
policing passive because it is only concerned with
consequential reactions to
crime, and not with the possibilities of preventing crime,
as well as concerns and