Always an interesting statistic.
Data such as these have to be taken with a large dose of salt. But it's intriguing to see England and Wales at 43rd out of 198, with a murder rate of 1.6 per 100,000 (where one is the lowest rate in the world, on this account at least; Luxembourg at 0.4). Exactly equal with France and slightly worse than Canada and New Zealand. Scotland, as ever, has a higher murder rate, coming in 72nd with 2.6 per 100,000.
Plainly, the UK isn't the violent hellhole the tabloids and some government ministers would like us to think it is. But it does have a slightly higher murder rate than equivalent countries - and in Scotland the rate could be characterised as substantially higher. So some mixed messages here, and it isn't easy to disentangle them. Are we to conclude that the UK has something of a problem, compared with some of its European neighbours (Germany, 1.0 per 100,000; Italy and Spain 1.2)? Or that we're about on par with other similar countries in terms of size and economy (France) or 'culture' (Canada, New Zealand)?
My money is on the later, actually, but that's personal preference, rather than thought out position, at this stage.
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...well size it not really an argument given these numbers are rates per 100,000 (is that per 100,000 deaths or people alive..must be the latter I reckon)- unless you can come up with some theory why people in smaller countries are more/less likely to murder their fellas.
ReplyDeleteAlso, not convinced it's a good idea to study the causes or contexts in which people are more likely to kill others at the country level; this particular topic has written ecological fallacy all over.