The Jamaican people have been suffering from a well-known epidemic. This is none other than crime and in particular, violent crime. One need not look further than the July 15 incident where 10-year-old Jaheim Bogle was shot while riding his bicycle.

If children are meant to be our future, what do we look forward to if crime is allowed to dim, and even erase, many of our brightest beacons of hope? Mitigating Jamaica’s crime problem is not impossible by any means. However, we need to rethink our current strategy.

This issue requires a collaborative effort involving many key stakeholders. The judicial arm of Government and, by extension, the police force cannot do it alone. So the question becomes: How do we approach this destructive social issue as a united force?

Mastering Conflict Resolution

The first element of crime prevention is conflict resolution. How many stories have we heard about turf-related feuds, violent crimes stemming from simple disagreements, or even domestic disputes that became horrid nightmares? Certainly, if many of the individuals in these situations knew how to amicably resolve their differences events may have unfolded quite differently.There is no question that this begins in the home.

If there’s one thing we know, it’s that adults learn many of their behaviours and mannerisms as children. Therefore, it would be incredibly effective to place a high degree of emphasis on conflict resolution as an essential skill in our educational system. Why not incorporate it into our school curriculum? The concepts could be delivered in an age-appropriate manner for younger minds and progressively developed for students at higher levels. This approach would enable our children to resolve their differences using alternative means to fighting, which would translate to a greater ability to repeat variants of the same course of action as the variables become more complicated during adulthood.

Social Work and Social Responsibility

The next layer of the strategy involves social work. While the previous point alluded to protecting the future, this one speaks to tackling situations that have already gone down an incorrect path.

Our Government needs to support the Jamaica Association of Social Workers (JASW) in a special training programme. The idea would be to identify abusive and immoral behaviours in the home with the objective of correcting the same. Depending on what is observed, some of the behaviour corrections could be effected by trained social workers, while others could be reported to and taken care of by the relevant agencies. Of course, this special team would need to have adequate resources at their disposal and be granted the required protection.

Additionally, greater support from the Church would go a long way in the resolution of our epidemic. Churches are perfectly placed and have the kind of mission statement that should make this kind of thing a priority. If there were ever a reason for religious and political ministers and teams to join hands, this would be it.

Let us not forget that the teachings of the Church include social responsibility. While there are numerous examples of this, one needn’t look further than Proverbs 22:6 or Galatians 6:2. Using the English Standard Version (ESV) of the Bible, the former states: “Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it,” while the latter instructs us to “bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfil the law of Christ”. Certainly, these teachings indicate the need to be involved in the well-being of others and to pay special attention to instilling the required values in children so that they can become functional members of society as adults.

Out of Many Ministries One Focus

The final point speaks to how active our government ministries are in addressing crime. For some reason it seems as if the Ministry of National Security has an unfairly large burden to bear. Note that no one is discounting the purpose of this ministry, but its counterparts should not be left out of the discussion, since they can also contribute greatly to crime-mitigating initiatives.

One such is the Ministry of Justice, which is responsible for administering legislation and providing adequate support and analysis on issues relating to justice. In so doing, there must be respect for constitutional rights and freedoms and ensuring that Jamaica has an efficient and fair justice system in place. However, the extent to which this system focuses on rehabilitation is questionable at best. It is not conducive to understanding why crimes were committed and attempting to effect the necessary changes to prevent recurrences. First time offenders would particularly benefit from this kind of thing if they can be dissuaded from repeating their immoral actions.

The Ministry of Education, Youth, and Information also has a role to play. We have already mentioned the incorporating of conflict resolution into the existing school curriculum. However, this is just one of many strategies that could assist our youth to see crime as an undesirable option. We must re-evaluate the way we present information and appeal to our youth in this regard. Where is this information going to go? Who are the people we are putting in front of our young audiences? Are they relatable? What is being presented as an alternative path?

The final ministry we will discuss here is that of culture, gender, entertainment, and sport. Sport is intertwined in the Jamaican culture, and it could be one of the many pillars on which crime prevention can stand. It’s a matter of tapping into and taking advantage of what the elements of participation and competition could mean to sporting hopefuls and the impact it could have on them.

If we are going to change the mindset towards crime there must be better alternatives. This is the time for the ministry to ramp up its quantity of and accessibility to sporting programmes in Jamaica. If our current international competitive representation is any indication, sprinting, football, netball, and cricket are no longer our only options. We’ve seen that Jamaica can excel in other areas such as field events, swimming, and even gymnastics. What about virtually untapped areas, such as weightlifting, cycling, and even wrestling?

Now, you may be wondering how this will make for a more appealing alternative to crime. It all sits with the potential for revenue, exposure, and networking. While revenue is self-explanatory, exposure and networking promote interactions and experiences beyond those that at-risk persons are familiar with.

This gives rise to new and better perspectives. Additionally, competing at a high level is synonymous with greater discipline. This means the potential to respond in a better way to conflict and undesirable outcomes. The desire to follow the wrong path diminishes when there is hope and gratification elsewhere. Some of our current top athletes could’ve easily gone down a darker road. Do you think they would even consider this today? Of course not!

Of course, this is no more than a start. These are no more than a few ideas to illustrate the potential when the responsibility for a problem that affects all is shared by all.

A Multifaceted Problem

You see, approaching crime demands more than identifying criminal elements and punishing them for their misdeeds. What if crime became less attractive? What if there were better alternatives and programmes? What if people became better communicators and conflict managers? What if parenting were streamlined in a way that created better-functioning children? What kind of future would that create? Crime is a layered issue and it is time for the Jamaican people to begin taking a layered approach to solving it.

Tia Ferguson is a vice-president of Generation 2000 and a registered pharmacist. Send comments to ftia21@gmail.com.