First, urban America was afflicted by serious and violent crime and there was widespread fear of crime. The cover of Time magazine on 23 August 1993 read ‘America the violent: crime is spreading and patience is running out’ (Smolowe, 1993). Business Week (13 December 1993) wrote on ‘The economics of crime: the toll is frightening; can anything be done? ‘, and estimated the country's total annual expenditure on crime to be some $90 billion. It is tempting with hindsight to see this as a turning point in political and public determination to ‘do something’ about crime.

Second, the deprivation in parts of American cities was appalling. Poverty and discrimination had been reported in detail by academics and journalists for several decades, but by now the contrast between ‘private affluence and public squalor’ in American society was stark. Conditions in the ghettos sometimes approached those of developing countries. This was illustrated by an image on the cover of The Economist (6 November 1993), which displayed an elderly black man, walking bowed with the aid of a stick, along a dilapidated street that looked like a war zone. The caption was ‘Hell is an American city’.

Crime and urban blight were spoiling the American success story. In New York, however, things were about to change.

The New York story, a kind of criminological ‘miracle’ that drew many pilgrims to worship at Police Plaza in downtown Manhattan, has its roots in three main factors:

• • Crime and disorder were seriously affecting economic life and the reputation of the city; the centre of global capitalism was unsafe and violent.

• • The election of Giuliani as mayor brought in a highly ambitious political figure with a determination to leave his mark on the city. His campaign message was ‘it is disorder that is driving the city down’.

• • Giuliani found in William Bratton a police chief who had a record of bringing down crime levels in the subway system and who also appeared to possess the ability to reorganise the city police force.

Together Giuliani and Bratton were determined to tackle New York's crime problem. Initially, the approach attracted the label ‘zero tolerance policing’ from politicians and the media.