NEIGHBOURHOOD SURVEILLANCE (39)
A neighbourhood safety group should make it easier for people to seek help and feel at home in their streets. That purpose is compromised when residents themselves become targets of suspicion because of their appearance or background. For Neighbourhood Watch, a commitment to community safety must include the people who might otherwise be treated as outsiders.
A Guardian investigation published on 12 September 2026 identified at least 28 anti-migrant vigilante groups formed in the UK over eighteen months. [1] This is a journalistic finding, not an official census or evidence of a comparable trend across Europe. The investigation does not establish a connection between those groups and recognised Neighbourhood Watch schemes. It raises a separate but relevant question: how can community safety organisations make the boundary between civic participation and self-appointed enforcement unmistakable?
For EUNWA, the issue concerns the credibility of civic participation. Residents should be able to recognise what a legitimate neighbourhood group does, whom it answers to and how to raise a concern about its conduct. The distinction is not between people who care about safety and people who do not; it lies in what groups actually do, whom they target and whether they respect others’ rights.
Drawing the Line: Vigilance without Vigilantism
Neighbourhood Watch can give residents useful ways to act on concerns: sharing reliable prevention advice, encouraging reports of specific incidents to the appropriate authorities and helping neighbours reach support. Membership does not confer police powers or authority over other residents. Indeed, the Neighbourhood Watch Network advises that crime should be reported to the police or another appropriate reporting service, not to Neighbourhood Watch as though it were an enforcement agency. [2] National organisations should state these limits plainly in volunteer guidance and public communications.
One existing reference point is the Neighbourhood Watch Network, the national umbrella charity supporting Neighbourhood Watch in England and Wales. Its published ethics and standards require fairness, impartiality and respect for privacy. Volunteers are expected to make decisions based on facts, accept responsibility for their conduct and challenge or report discriminatory behaviour within the movement. [3] These are relevant examples for European discussion, not rules that can automatically be attributed to Neighbourhood Watch organisations in other countries.
Applying these principles requires attention to ordinary decisions. Consider a hypothetical neighbourhood message describing an unfamiliar person as suspicious without identifying any concerning behaviour. A coordinator should ask what was actually observed and stop speculation about nationality or religion from becoming an allegation. Where someone reports a specific threat or offence, the priority should be accurate information and an appropriate official response. A group chat must not become a vehicle for identifying, shaming or mobilising against individuals.
Nor should every community walk or public discussion about safety be equated with vigilantism. The warning signs are more specific: attempts to stop or question people as if exercising official powers, intimidation, discriminatory targeting, or calls for residents to take enforcement into their own hands. A group’s stated intention to protect its neighbourhood cannot excuse such conduct.
Accountability, Inclusion and Trust
The same care should shape volunteer recruitment and oversight. Organisations could discuss practical scenarios with prospective coordinators, including how they would respond to a discriminatory comment or a request to confront someone. Written responsibilities, a named point of contact, a complaints route accessible to non-members and a process for responding to breaches would make expectations easier to enforce. The England and Wales Network, for example, publishes guidance on withholding recognition from coordinators who breach national guidelines and removing non-compliant groups from its database. [4]
Inclusion also needs to be visible in whose concerns receive attention. A resident experiencing racist harassment should be able to approach a neighbourhood group with the same expectation of being heard as someone concerned about burglary. Local organisations could work with migrant associations and victim support services to understand barriers to participation. Invitations alone may be insufficient if residents have reason to doubt that their experiences will be taken seriously.
The England and Wales Network’s Hate Crime Community Ambassador project offers one model for examination. The published project page describes a trial in the Royal Borough of Greenwich, combining awareness work and encouragement to report with role-specific training, an application and interview process, and regular review sessions. [5] A programme description does not establish impact, nor does it show that the model has been implemented throughout England and Wales. European partners considering comparable roles should examine local training, supervision and ways to assess participants’ experiences.
Police partnerships should make responsibilities equally clear. Community groups need an agreed route for concerns, guidance on responsible information sharing and a way to discuss recurring problems. They should be able to question an inadequate response and seek explanations through appropriate channels. Such scrutiny is compatible with cooperation; it does not justify assuming the authority to control other people’s movements or demand explanations of their presence.
Political independence matters as well. Members may hold different views on immigration or public policy, but those views should not determine who receives help or who is treated as a suspect. A neighbourhood organisation’s activities and communication channels should remain focused on community safety rather than party-political mobilisation. This does not prevent members, acting as private citizens, from participating in lawful public debate.
EUNWA could turn these principles into a practical comparative exercise: examine how national Neighbourhood Watch organisations define volunteers’ roles, train coordinators, handle complaints and respond to misuse of their names or channels. Residents who have felt excluded or unfairly scrutinised should be heard alongside volunteers and police partners. The central test is whether commitments to safety and inclusion are reflected in everyday practice, including for those who have the least confidence that a neighbourhood group will stand beside them.
Sources
[2] Neighbourhood Watch Network, ‘Reporting a crime’.
[3] Neighbourhood Watch Network, ‘Ethics and standards of behaviour’.
[4] Neighbourhood Watch Network, ‘Frequently asked questions’ (safeguards for legitimate groups).
[5] Neighbourhood Watch Network, ‘Become a Hate Crime Community Ambassador’.
The digital neighbourhood promises greater connection and safer communities. But as private platforms move into a space once occupied by noticeboards, local groups and Neighbourhood Watch, an important question emerges: what kind of neighbourhood are we creating?
For generations, neighbourhood safety has depended on something remarkably simple: people noticing what happens around them and caring enough to act.
A neighbour checks on an elderly resident after a storm. Someone notices that a normally occupied house has been left open. A local resident reports a broken streetlight, helps find a missing pet, or passes useful information to the police. None of these actions requires sophisticated technology. What they require is a degree of trust, familiarity and willingness to take responsibility for the place where we live.
Technology, however, is rapidly changing the way that responsibility is exercised. On 16 September 2026, The Guardianreported that Amazon-owned Ring is preparing to launch its Neighbours service in the United Kingdom. Scheduled to be available through the Ring app from 21 October 2026, the service is intended to provide a digital space where residents can exchange safety information, community updates and alerts about lost pets. Significantly, people will not need to own a Ring camera or doorbell to participate.
At first sight, this may look like another neighbourhood social network. It is potentially something more important.
It raises a question that reaches well beyond one company or one application: as neighbourhood safety becomes increasingly digital, can technology help us watch out for one another without encouraging us simply to watch one another?
From the village noticeboard to the digital neighbourhood
Ring describes Neighbours as a modern community space. Residents will be able to define their local area and receive or post information relevant to it. The ambition is, in part, to provide a more focused alternative to the WhatsApp and Facebook groups that have become commonplace in many neighbourhoods. There is an understandable appeal to the idea.
Local digital networks can distribute useful information almost instantly. They can mobilise people who might otherwise never meet. A missing dog can become a neighbourhood search rather than an individual problem. Information about an incident can reach hundreds of residents in minutes. Someone who has relevant camera footage may be able to help an investigation.
In this sense, technology can strengthen something community-safety researchers have long recognised: the ability of residents to act together when a problem arises.
But a neighbourhood is not simply an information network. The distinction matters. Neighbourhood Watch, at its best, has never been merely about observing suspicious activity. It is about relationships: people knowing their neighbours, sharing responsibility for their surroundings and developing enough trust to cooperate with one another and with public institutions. A digital platform can facilitate those relationships. It cannot automatically create them.
When vigilance becomes suspicion
There is another difficulty. The same camera that records a genuine crime also records the delivery driver, the teenager walking home, the unfamiliar visitor, the neighbour’s children and the person who simply happens to stop outside a house.
What happens next depends not on the camera, but on the community. An image can be treated as information requiring context. Or it can become an invitation to suspicion.
This is not an entirely theoretical concern. Research into Neighbourhood Watch schemes in the Netherlands has identified the possibility that increased vigilance can also produce stigmatisation, profiling and excessive social control. Digital neighbourhood platforms can amplify this effect because observations that would once have remained between two neighbours can now be circulated instantly among hundreds or thousands of people.
The danger is subtle. A community may begin with the intention of making residents feel safer and gradually develop a culture in which unfamiliarity itself becomes suspicious. There is an important difference between saying “something happened and perhaps somebody can help” and “this person does not belong here”. Healthy community safety depends on preserving that distinction.
According to information released around the UK launch, posts on Neighbours will be subject to rules prohibiting, among other things, discrimination and speculation, with moderation involving both automated systems and human review. That is welcome. But moderation addresses only part of the question. The deeper challenge concerns the culture that develops around the technology.
Privacy does not stop at the front door
Smart doorbells occupy an unusual position. They are private devices, installed on private homes, but their field of vision frequently extends into shared or public space.
The UK’s Information Commissioner’s Office makes the implications clear. When domestic CCTV or a smart doorbell captures images beyond the boundaries of a person’s property – for example a public pavement, communal area or neighbouring property – data protection rules apply because identifiable images and voices are personal information.
The issue becomes even more significant when recording is combined with sharing.
Ring is rolling out stronger technical safeguards, including its TAKE – “Throw Away the Key Encryption” – system, and states that users control which recordings they choose to make available through Neighbours. The company also says that names and exact locations are not displayed alongside public Neighbours posts.
Such protections matter. Yet privacy cannot be reduced to encryption.
A system can be technically secure while still changing the social experience of a street.
The ICO’s own research into people’s relationship with personal data has captured this tension particularly well. Some participants regarded smart doorbells as useful tools for protecting their homes and families; others expressed discomfort at knowing that ordinary movements around their neighbourhood could be recorded and shared. The report observed that social expectations had not fully caught up with the technology. That may be one of the most important insights in this debate.
We have learnt remarkably quickly how to install cameras. We are still learning how to live together when almost every front door can become one.
A new relationship with the police
The issue becomes still more interesting when digital neighbourhoods connect citizens with law-enforcement agencies. In the United States, Ring’s Community Requests system allows public-safety agencies to ask residents voluntarily for video relating to a particular investigation. Ring states that participation is optional and that agencies are not told who viewed a request but declined to provide footage. The feature is not included in the initial UK launch, although Ring plans to introduce it later. It is particularly significant because it illustrates how the architecture of community policing may be changing.
Traditionally, cooperation between citizens and police has been mediated by human relationships: local officers, community organisations, residents’ groups and Neighbourhood Watch coordinators. Digital platforms introduce another participant into that relationship – the technology provider. The model therefore changes from a relatively simple relationship between citizen, community and police to one that may also involve a private digital intermediary.
This does not necessarily make the relationship better or worse. It does, however, make questions of governance, transparency and accountability much more important. Who establishes the rules? Who decides what residents see? How are reports prioritised? What information is retained? How are mistakes corrected? And how can communities ensure that the technology supports cooperation rather than gradually defining what cooperation means?
These are questions European community-safety organisations should be asking now, rather than after such systems have become part of everyday life.
Technology and social trust
There is a broader question behind all of this: what actually makes a neighbourhood safer? Cameras may provide evidence. Alerts may distribute information. Artificial intelligence may identify patterns. Platforms may connect people who have never spoken before. But none of these things is synonymous with trust. Indeed, technology can push neighbourhoods in opposite directions.
Used well, a local digital network can strengthen reciprocity. Someone asks for help and discovers that neighbours are willing to provide it. Residents share useful information. People who previously lived beside one another as strangers begin to cooperate. Small acts of mutual assistance accumulate, and a stronger sense of community can emerge.
Used badly, exactly the same infrastructure can produce the opposite effect: constant alerts, circulating images of strangers, speculation about unfamiliar behaviour and an exaggerated perception that danger is everywhere. The difference between the two outcomes is not primarily technological. It is social.
A safe community is not one in which everybody monitors everybody else. It is one in which people have enough trust in one another to recognise when attention is needed, enough judgement not to turn difference into suspicion, and enough confidence in public institutions to know what to do when something genuinely concerns them. This is where the experience of Neighbourhood Watch remains particularly relevant.
Who owns the digital neighbourhood?
Perhaps the most important question raised by the arrival of platforms such as Neighbours is therefore not about cameras at all. It is about ownership – not ownership of the technology, but ownership of the social space that technology creates.
Traditional neighbourhood organisations are rooted, however imperfectly, in communities themselves. They have coordinators, volunteers, relationships with local authorities and police, codes of conduct and accumulated experience. Their legitimacy ultimately depends on the people who participate in them.
A commercial platform operates differently. Its architecture, rules, moderation systems, categories and future development are determined by a private company. Again, this is not an argument against private technology. Commercial innovation can provide tools that community organisations and public authorities could never develop independently. But the distinction should not disappear simply because the technology is convenient.
If digital neighbourhood platforms increasingly become places where residents report concerns, exchange security information and interact with public-safety organisations, they are no longer merely communication tools. They become part of the infrastructure through which communities understand safety. That brings responsibilities with it.
Watching out for each other
The future of Neighbourhood Watch will almost certainly be more digital than its past. That should not be something to fear. Technology can help communities communicate more quickly, include people who cannot easily participate in traditional meetings, coordinate assistance and provide valuable information when incidents occur. Used carefully, it may strengthen community resilience and citizen–police cooperation. But the purpose must remain clear.
The goal of Neighbourhood Watch is not to create neighbourhoods in which everyone is under observation. Nor should technology encourage residents to divide the people around them into those who “belong” and those who appear suspicious. The goal is to create communities in which people look out for one another.
That requires principles which no camera or algorithm can provide on its own: proportionality, inclusion, privacy, accountability, good judgement and, above all, trust. As digital platforms move further into the field of community safety, Europe has an opportunity to shape that development rather than simply adapt to it afterwards. The question is therefore not whether technology belongs in the neighbourhood. It already does. The more important question is what kind of neighbourhood we want technology to help us build.
References and further reading
Gibbs, S. (2026), Amazon to launch Ring ‘neighbourhood watch’ app in UK amid US privacy fears, The Guardian, 16 September 2026.
Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), Home CCTV systems – guidance covering domestic CCTV and smart doorbells.
Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), Data Lives – Year 2 Report – research into public attitudes towards personal data and emerging technologies, including smart doorbells.
Lub, V. (2018), Neighbourhood Watch: Mechanisms and Moral Implications, British Journal of Criminology, 58(4), pp. 906–924.
Ring (2026), Neighbours by Ring; Neighbours Privacy and Data; Community Requests; Using TAKE (Throw Away the Key Encryption).
To those looking in from the outside, Neighbourhood Watch may conjure up images of CCTV cameras, incident reports and procedures. What we have come to recognise, however, is something rather different: people getting to know one another, relationships growing stronger, and communities rediscovering the value of shared responsibility.
Over the years, EUNWA has had the privilege of observing, supporting and connecting associations, volunteers and communities across Europe. One simple yet profound conviction has emerged from this experience: no one is ever truly safe alone.
Time and again, we have encountered seemingly small moments capable of bringing about meaningful change. We have seen neighbours who had passed one another for years without speaking begin to get to know and support each other. We have seen residents draw attention to signs of vulnerability before they developed into more serious problems. We have seen older people feel less isolated, families become more involved in community life, and local authorities discover that working with residents can be a valuable resource.
Taken individually, such moments may appear of little consequence. In reality, they offer tangible proof that safety often begins with everyday gestures and relationships built over time.
We live in an age of unprecedented connectivity, yet loneliness, mistrust and indifference seem to be increasingly widespread. In this context, Neighbourhood Watch is far more than a crime-prevention initiative. It is an attempt to rebuild connections, shared responsibility and mutual trust.
The Nordic countries are often held up as examples of societies marked by high levels of social trust, strong cooperation between citizens and institutions, and a deep-rooted sense of belonging.
It would, of course, be naive to imagine that these models could simply be transplanted elsewhere. Trust in institutions, and in society more broadly, is the outcome of a long historical, cultural and political process that unfolds over generations.
We cannot import another country’s history, but we can learn from what that history has to teach us.
Our aim is not to replicate Denmark, Norway or the Netherlands. It is to understand the principles that have enabled those societies to strengthen mutual trust and to adapt them to our own circumstances.
Trust, however, is not enough. On its own, it cannot prevent a crime, protect someone who is vulnerable or solve a problem. This is one of the most common objections, and one of the most valid. Yet without trust, it becomes far more difficult to prevent risks, identify vulnerabilities and mobilise the resources needed to address them.
Prevention, training, the identification of vulnerabilities within the community, and cooperation with institutions must all stand alongside trust. Without these elements, the model loses effectiveness; without trust, however, their impact is inevitably diminished.
There are also those who fear that Neighbourhood Watch may foster exclusion.
Some observers argue that it could become a closed circle, wary of anyone perceived as different. Our experience, however, points in another direction.
Neighbourhood Watch groups bring together people of different ages, occupations, cultures, backgrounds and economic circumstances. Their composition will naturally reflect the neighbourhoods in which they operate, but this is not an inherent feature of the model itself.
There is a crucial distinction between a group happening to consist of people with similar backgrounds and a group deliberately excluding those who are different.
Neighbourhood Watch does not ask people to be alike. It asks them to share responsibility.
The role of volunteers is also often misunderstood.
It is true that volunteers are not professionals. That is precisely why their remit must remain clearly defined.
Neighbourhood Watch does not turn residents into police officers, nor does it replace public institutions. Rather, it values a different kind of knowledge: the understanding that comes from knowing an area, from everyday relationships, and from noticing changes that an outsider might easily miss.
Ongoing training and close cooperation with the relevant authorities are essential to reducing the risk of mistakes and ensuring responsible action.
There are also those who argue that Neighbourhood Watch relies on the commitment of only a small number of people.
This criticism is partly justified. Participants represent only a small proportion of the population, but that does not mean the wider community cannot benefit from their contribution.
Experience shows that even a relatively small group of people can have a positive effect on safety, mutual trust and social cohesion.
Were the behaviours, attitudes and principles associated with Neighbourhood Watch embraced by more citizens, our communities could become safer, stronger and more resilient.
At this point, it is reasonable to ask what broader purpose all this serves. Is it simply about reducing crime? Increasing surveillance? Making the exchange of information more efficient?
Our answer goes further.
The purpose of Neighbourhood Watch is not merely to improve safety, but also to help create the conditions in which people can live with confidence, form relationships, develop their abilities and contribute to the community around them.
This is where the idea of the common good comes into play.
Some regard it as too abstract or too vague. For us, however, the common good encompasses all those achievements and conditions that enable each person to shape and pursue a life of their own choosing, while also contributing to the growth, well-being and prosperity of the community as a whole.
Safety, trust, solidarity, a sense of belonging and shared responsibility are not separate ideas. They are different facets of the same reality.
Finally, some argue that the aims of Neighbourhood Watch are overly ambitious.
That criticism, too, needs to be put into perspective.
Neighbourhood Watch does not claim to solve every problem in society, still less to save the world. Its focus is far more tangible: the street, the neighbourhood, the village, the town and the city.
It is precisely at this seemingly modest scale that its most meaningful results emerge.
Perhaps the most important lesson we at EUNWA have learnt over the years is that safety is not merely the absence of danger.
Safety also means being able to trust others. It is the knowledge that we can rely on them and the certainty that we are not alone.
We have learnt that a community does not grow stronger through mutual suspicion, but when people get to know one another, work together and take on shared responsibilities.
We have learnt that prevention is more effective when it is rooted in human relationships, and that a community’s resilience depends on its members’ ability to face difficulties together.
Above all, we have learnt that the strongest communities are not those that build the highest walls, but those that build the strongest bridges.
And that, in our view, is the deepest meaning of Neighbourhood Watch.
Community safety is one of the foundations of democratic life. People can only feel truly free when they are able to move through their neighbourhoods without fear, use public spaces, take part in community life and feel that they belong.
For this reason, safety cannot be reduced to a matter of law enforcement alone. Nor can it be addressed only through emergency measures, slogans or ever-tighter rules. The ability to live in a city or town, to move through it safely and to participate in public life is closely linked to freedom, wellbeing and social cohesion.
Any discussion about community safety and democracy must start from a simple point: fear is real, but it does not always correspond to a concrete risk of becoming a victim of crime. People may feel unsafe for many reasons: neglected public spaces, isolation, loneliness, economic insecurity, lack of services, tensions between social groups, or a distant and difficult relationship with public institutions.
A responsible approach to safety does not dismiss these fears. At the same time, it avoids oversimplifying them or directing them against particular groups or categories of people. It takes them seriously, listens to them, seeks to understand them and turns them, where possible, into cooperation.
From this perspective, safety is not an individual right to be asserted at the expense of other people’s freedoms. It is a public good. It grows when trust grows; when people know one another; when places are cared for; and when the quality of everyday coexistence improves.
For EUNWA, this point is essential. Neighbourhood Watch is at its best when it is not understood as a form of diffuse social control or organised suspicion, but as an expression of active citizenship, cooperation and mutual care. Its contribution lies in strengthening attentive citizens, supportive communities, trust-based relationships with local authorities and the ability to prevent problems from the ground up.
An alert community is not a fearful community. It is a community that knows its local area, recognises vulnerabilities, reports concerns, supports people who may be at risk and works with public institutions.
In a democratic society, safety works best when protection, freedom and shared responsibility are held together. Law enforcement agencies play an essential role in upholding the law, tackling crime and protecting citizens. Their work, however, becomes more effective when it is supported by strong social networks, local services, associations, schools, families, volunteers, local administrations and responsible citizens.
Control and prevention are not alternatives. They can reinforce one another, especially when they operate within a clear framework of roles, responsibilities and cooperation.
Prevention, however, is often less visible than enforcement. A patrol, an arrest or a new legal provision can have an immediate impact on public debate. An educational project, a mediation process, a sports activity for young people, support for victims or a neighbourhood network may produce quieter results, but often more lasting ones.
This is particularly important when it comes to young people. A democratic society should not automatically treat young people in public spaces as a public order problem. Instead, it should look for places, languages and tools that include them. Where sport, culture, training, listening, opportunities and positive relationships are available, the risk that hardship and marginalisation will lead to isolation, conflict or harmful behaviour is reduced. Where public space is experienced only as a place of prohibition, exclusion or suspicion, conflict is more likely to grow.
The same applies to cultural and religious diversity. European cities and towns are increasingly plural. This diversity can give rise to misunderstandings and tensions, but it can also become a resource for coexistence when it is supported by dialogue, mediation and institutional responsibility.
Community safety can therefore be understood as a complex public good, connected to prevention, urban regeneration and social cohesion. No city or town can face today’s challenges alone: European cooperation, the exchange of good practices and communities of learning are strategic resources.
Technology, too, must be placed within a balanced vision of security. CCTV, data collection, digital platforms and artificial intelligence can help prevent risks and coordinate responses, but only if they are used with transparency, proportionality, respect for privacy and democratic oversight. Technology cannot replace trust. It can only support trust when it is understandable, properly regulated and clearly directed towards the common good.
The European dimension is crucial. Contemporary security challenges do not stop at administrative borders: organised crime, online fraud, radicalisation, disinformation, hatred, gender-based violence, social vulnerability and climate-related risks cut across cities, regions and states. This is why multi-level security governance is needed, connecting the European Union, national governments, local authorities, law enforcement agencies and civil society.
Recent European strategies have broadened the concept of security beyond enforcement alone, placing greater emphasis on resilience, coordination between policy areas and the participation of society as a whole. In this context, neighbourhood networks can make a concrete contribution to community safety: they can help identify early signs of vulnerability, support victims, prevent fraud and predatory crime, strengthen dialogue between citizens and institutions, share practical knowledge and encourage responsible behaviour.
This contribution, however, must remain within a clear framework: no substitution of public authorities, no private justice, and no stigmatisation of groups or individuals. The value of civic networks lies in cooperation, not opposition; in prevention, not suspicion; in trust, not fear.
A form of safety that brings protection and freedom together strengthens the quality of democratic life. It does not arise only from institutional action, but also from the quality of relationships between citizens, local communities and public authorities.
A safe community is not a closed community. It is a community that knows how to observe, listen, prevent and cooperate. It is a community in which citizens are not fearful bystanders, but active participants in a shared responsibility.
In an era marked by growing distrust of institutions and a widespread sense of insecurity, Neighbourhood Watch schemes have become an increasingly common feature in many European cities. Born with the goal of increasing safety through active citizen participation, these groups often find themselves at a crucial crossroads. They can evolve into powerful tools of social cohesion or, conversely, unintentionally become catalysts for populist drifts, fuelling division and fear.
Understanding this dynamic is essential for anyone who cares about both security and the health of the democratic fabric.
A Fertile Ground for Populism
The correlation between populism and Neighbourhood Watch is no coincidence; the former can create the ideal conditions for the latter to emerge. Populism, especially in its right-wing form, thrives on a precise narrative: that of honest, hardworking "people" betrayed by corrupt, distant "elites" who are incapable of protecting them from threats like crime and decay. In this view, the state is portrayed as inefficient, weak, or even complicit.
This rhetoric undermines trust in traditional institutions, such as the police and the judiciary, which are often depicted as being too "soft" or lacking resources. It is in this void of trust that the populist call for direct action takes hold. Feeling abandoned, citizens are urged to "take back control" of their own security. A Neighbourhood Watch scheme can thus become the most concrete manifestation of this impulse: an act of self-organisation that bypasses institutions and asserts the sovereignty of the local community.
Furthermore, the populist tendency to identify a scapegoat—the immigrant, the minority, the "other"—provides these groups with a tangible enemy. The fear of an external threat acts as a unifying force, pushing residents to unite not just for something (security) but also against someone.
The Boomerang Effect
While populism fosters the birth of these groups, it is equally true that the groups themselves can become a powerful vehicle for populist ideas to take root. This "boomerang effect" manifests in several ways:
- The very existence of the group and its actions (a report, a presumed thwarted burglary) become living proof of the state's failure. The neighbourhood chat group turns into a sounding board where anxiety is amplified and the narrative of institutional inefficiency finds continuous confirmation.
- Within the group, a strong sense of belonging based on exclusion is strengthened. The "us" are the respectable residents defending the territory; the "them" is anyone perceived as an external threat. This shifts the focus from crime vigilance to social surveillance, where even non-illegal but simply "different" behaviours can become an object of suspicion. This mechanism generates an exclusive "bonding social capital" that strengthens internal ties but builds walls against outsiders.
- Neighbourhood Watch groups can easily become a political incubator, a training ground for local leaders who, gaining visibility and consensus on security issues, find an ideal platform for a future political career, often aligned with populist parties.
- The issue of security ceases to be a complex social problem and becomes a simple moral battle between "good" and "evil." This fuels the demand for simplistic and punitive solutions, a cornerstone of populist rhetoric.
Towards an Inclusive and Democratic Model
Is it inevitable then that a Neighbourhood Watch scheme will slide towards populism? Absolutely not. It is possible to design and manage these groups in a way that makes them a bulwark against polarisation and a driver of genuine cohesion. The key is a paradigm shift: moving from a fortress mentality to a town square mentality, from defence to inclusion. This requires the adoption of some fundamental principles.
- Partner with institutions. The group should not be born as an antagonist to institutions but as their partner. Formal agreements with local, regional, or national authorities are crucial for defining roles and boundaries. The regular presence of a police liaison officer at meetings and adequate training on the legal limits of citizens' actions can transform distrust into collaboration and prevent vigilante behaviour.
- Embrace inclusion. A healthy group must reflect the neighbourhood's actual composition. A proactive effort is needed to include residents of every nationality, culture, and social background. Multilingual communication, the involvement of migrant associations, and horizontal, rotating leadership are effective antidotes against the creation of an exclusive "us."
- Focus on community. The group's energy should be channelled not just towards surveillance but especially towards improving the quality of life. "Situational" prevention—like advocating for better lighting or the redevelopment of a park—increases real and perceived safety without fuelling a climate of suspicion. Initiatives such as neighbourhood parties, collective clean-ups of green spaces, or the creation of urban gardens build the kind of "bridging social capital" that unites people rather than dividing them.
- Communicate responsibly. Populism feeds on moral panic. To counter this, internal communication within the group must be rigorous. It is crucial to rely on official crime data provided by authorities rather than anecdotes and hearsay. A strict rule should be established against the spread of unverified news, and language should be adopted that talks about problematic "behaviours," not categories of "people."
A Choice to Make
Neighbourhood Watch is not inherently "good" or "bad." It is a tool, and like any tool, its impact depends on how it is used. If left at the mercy of fear and distrust, it can easily become a weapon in the hands of populist propaganda, eroding social cohesion and undermining the principles of the rule of law.
If, however, it is built on solid foundations of collaboration, inclusivity, and active community care, it can transform into an extraordinary exercise in active citizenship. A healthy Neighbourhood Watch doesn't build higher walls; it builds longer tables. It is not measured by the number of "enemies" it identifies, but by the number of neighbours it brings together. Ultimately, the choice between being a fortress and an open town square rests with the community itself.
The European Neighbourhood Watch Association (EUNWA) is excited to announce a transformative new initiative: EUNWA Academy. This innovative e-learning platform marks a significant shift in our approach, one that puts education and training at the very heart of our mission to make communities across Europe safer, more aware, and better prepared for the challenges of our time.
For years, EUNWA has taken pride in hosting annual European meetings. These events were a valuable opportunity to connect stakeholders, share knowledge, and foster collaboration. Yet, as impactful as these gatherings were, they came at a high cost, both in terms of financial resources and human effort. In an increasingly digital world, where needs are evolving and challenges growing more complex, we felt it was time to adapt.
When considering the geopolitical instability and war that are currently unfolding in Europe and beyond, it becomes evident that awareness and preparedness are of paramount importance. The world around us has changed. Communities today face an unprecedented mix of challenges: rising insecurity, growing social tensions, and the widespread effects of climate change. At the same time, digital threats have become as real and pressing as physical dangers.
The decision to replace in-person annual meetings with the EUNWA Academy reflects our commitment to finding smarter, more sustainable ways to serve our communities. This new e-learning platform is designed to be accessible to everyone, everywhere. Whether you are a community leader, a practitioner, or an individual committed to safety, EUNWA Academy will provide you with tools, knowledge, and insights to recognize risks,prepare for threats, and protect those around you.
At the heart of this change is a desire to reach more people, more effectively. Instead of limiting knowledge to a few days of in-person discussions, we want to provide an ongoing opportunity to learn and grow. The Academy will feature carefully designed courses, developed in collaboration with leading experts and practitioners, on topics that truly matter: crime prevention strategies, community engagement, risk awareness, digital tools, and best practices drawn from real experiences across Europe.
But EUNWA Academy is not just about learning; it is about empowerment. By sharing the right tools and knowledge, we can help individuals and organizations respond to the uncertainties of our time. Whether we are facing cyber-attacks, rising local crime, or the ever-present spectre of organized violence, preparedness is our greatest defence. The Academy will serve as a resource for building resilience and fostering cooperation, ensuring that communities are equipped not only to prevent threats but also to overcome them together.
This shift in strategy reflects the values we have always held dear: collaboration, security, and adaptability. At a time when Europe is at a crossroads, when the challenges we face seem to multiply, we believe that education is the key to a safer, stronger future. The Academy represents a commitment to building proactive, empowered communities that can stand resilient in the face of uncertainty.
We invite all our members, partners, and stakeholders to join us on this new journey. Together, we can transform the way communities learn, act, and cooperate for their safety. We are excited about what lies ahead and confident that EUNWA Academy will mark the beginning of a new era of collaboration and resilience.
Stay tuned for the official launch of EUNWA Academy – a place where knowledge becomes action, where training fosters transformation, and where security begins with awareness.
EUNWA remains dedicated to supporting neighbourhood watch initiatives and fostering collaboration across Europe. By sharing knowledge and building awareness, we can ensure that safety, resilience, and preparedness become the foundation of our communities. Thank you for being part of this exciting journey.
EUNWA Board
The bystander effect, also known as the apathetic bystander effect or diffusion of responsibility, is a psychological phenomenon that occurs when people are less likely to help or intervene in an emergency situation when surrounded by other individuals. In other words, the larger the number of people present, the less likely it is that any one of them will feel responsible to act.
This phenomenon was first observed and studied in the 1960s following the Kitty Genovese incident, when a young woman was attacked and killed in New York City while many people nearby listened to her cries for help without intervening. This tragic case led psychologists to examine human behaviour in emergency situations and led to the formulation of the bystander effect.
The main causes of the bystander effect include:
- Diffusion of responsibility: When many people are present, everyone tends to assume that someone else will take care of the situation. This can lead to inaction, as no one feels directly responsible for helping the victim.
- Social conformity: People often look to other people to figure out how to behave in a given situation. If the others seem calm or indifferent, the observer is more likely to behave in the same way.
- Fear of judgement: People may avoid intervening for fear of negative judgement from other people present. For example, they may worry about looking stupid or putting themselves in a dangerous situation.
To challenge the bystander effect and promote help in emergency situations, it is important to raise awareness and teach people how to react. Some suggestions include:
- Awareness-raising: Awareness of the bystander effect is the first step to overcome it. People should be informed about this phenomenon and the risks involved.
- Intervention training: People can be trained to react in emergency situations through first aid courses and specific training.
- Individual empowerment: It is important to encourage people to feel responsible and to act if they feel someone is in danger. This can be promoted through awareness-raising campaigns.
- Effective communication: In emergency situations, people can be encouraged to clearly communicate their intentions and assign specific tasks to the people present.
The bystander effect is a complex phenomenon that can have serious consequences in emergency situations. However, with awareness and education, it can be overcome and a more responsible and supportive behaviour on the part of people can be encouraged.
Neighbourhood Watch is a community approach to urban security that can make a significant contribution to overcoming the bystander effect. It involves the residents of a given area in monitoring and developing security in their community. Here is how Neighbourhood Watch can help counter the bystander effect:
- Creating a support network: Neighbourhood Watch promotes social cohesion and connection between neighbours. When people know and trust each other, they are more likely to respond when an emergency or dangerous situation arises. This sense of community can break the bystander effect, as people are more likely to feel responsible for their neighbours.
- Active communication: Neighbourhood Watch organisations often promote active communication between residents. This may include the use of chat groups, messaging apps or regular meetings to discuss issues of safety and well-being in the community. When people communicate regularly and share information, they are more likely to report emergency situations and help each other.
- Shared vigilance: Neighbourhood Watch encourages residents to be vigilant about suspicious or unusual activities in their area. This does not mean that people have to be vigilant 24 hours a day, but rather that they can report unusual behaviour to the relevant authorities. This helps create an environment of shared security where people feel responsible for the wellbeing of the community.
- Training and awareness-raising: Neighbourhood Watch organisations can provide security training and information to residents. This helps them recognise emergency situations and act appropriately, overcoming the bystander effect through empowerment and self-efficacy.
- Partnership with Law Enforcement Agencies: Neighbourhood Watch very often cooperates with local Law Enforcement Agencies to report and resolve security problems. This cooperation can improve the efficiency of emergency responses and strengthen trust between the community and Law Enforcement Agencies.
Neighbourhood Watch promotes an environment where people feel more responsible for each other and for the security of their community. This helps overcome the bystander effect, as people are more likely to intervene and help when they see an emergency or dangerous situation.
Francesco Caccetta - ANCDV Board
Short-term rentals, especially in the B&B industry, are having a significant impact on the rental market in many European cities.
The phenomenon initially affected historical centres and the most commercially attractive areas of capital and tourist cities, and then spread to secondary locations and less commercially attractive neighbourhoods, especially those with good public transport connections.
The spread of short-term rentals practice has generated as a first consequence a scarcity of available accommodation for those in need of stable housing solutions, generating difficulties for off-campus students and families looking for medium to long-term solutions.
In addition to other considerations on the cities rental market, the rapid turnover of guests in short-rented properties can have safety and security implications for both tenants and other residents.
The first significant effect of the high turnover of guests, is increased anonymity between neighbours. Consequently, there is greater difficulty in building the network of informal neighbourly relations that almost always characterises community life, limiting the spontaneous surveillance of private and shared spaces.
Temporary residents tend to adopt defensive attitudes towards themselves and their belongings rather than taking on the role of monitoring the surrounding environment, which is more typical of long-term residents.
The temporary resident, in most cases, is unable to read the signals, sometimes weak, that the unfamiliar environment transmits, reducing the level of spontaneous control of public and shared spaces, making them more vulnerable to degradation and petty crime.
The increased flow of people within apartment buildings, thanks to short-term rentals facilitated by online booking platforms, can raise the risk of intrusions, thefts, acts of vandalism, damage to common property, harassment, and assaults. This can be attributed to the temporary guests' lesser familiarity with the environment (who are often less present during the day in the rented accommodations) and the potential presence of valuable items within the rented apartments (currency, cameras, computers, and more). The commission of these crimes can alarm other residents, deteriorate relationships, and reduce the overall quality of life within the community.
A second critical element is the breaking, even unintentionally, of shared codes of behaviour by temporary residents. The latter tend to behave as if they were in a hotel, ignoring the rules of the building community and causing discomfort and conflict among neighbours.
Temporary guests are often not aware of the in-depth norms of the apartment building and may behave inappropriately or neglect safety regulations. For example, they may not be aware of the rules on waste separation or may not be willing to respect them; they may not respect silence during the night hours; they may leave the entrance doors of the building open, making it difficult for residents to monitor access; they may misuse common spaces (parking, swimming pools, gyms, etc.). Furthermore, they may not have the same degree of care for properties as long-term residents, thus increasing the risk of damage, inconvenience or accidents.
Last, but not least, short-term rental properties can be used for illegal activities if not properly controlled and regulated. Consequently, many buildings have adopted specific rules to protect the safety and tranquillity of residents while still providing some flexibility to tenants. In other cases, it has been decided to completely ban short-term rentals, a fact that is a source of frequent disputes due to regulatory uncertainties related to the novelty of the phenomenon, mostly not provided for in building regulations.
Nevertheless, despite the potential problems, it is important to emphasise that short rentals can also improve building security. Landlords who rent out their homes can be motivated to ensure the safety of their guests by installing additional security systems and monitoring their behaviour. Many landlords are safety-conscious and respect the rules of the building to offer their guests a quiet and safe stay. Owners can also be motivated to maintain building security to avoid property damage and receive positive online ratings.
Hence the call for appropriate training for landlords, and tenants, aimed at understanding how correct and conscious behaviour can significantly improve the relationship between permanent and temporary guests, in everyone's interest.
Very interesting is the approach of the UK's Neighbourhood Watch with respect to the safety issue related to the practice of short-term rentals.
In July 2021, the UK Neighbourhood Watch and Airbnb signed a partnership, as part of the UK Trust and Safety Alliance, whereby Airbnb pledges to open its doors to communities by helping temporary guests to 'live like a resident', encouraging them to stay responsibly and respectfully in the communities where they are hosted. To this end, the parties have co-published a series of mini guides.
One of these, made available to guests, has the significant title of 'How to be a good neighbour during your trip’. The guide contains brief tips on how to keep the home safe, how to park safely without disturbing residents, and how to follow house rules.
Another mini guide, entitled 'How to be a good neighbour', encourages homeowners of rented houses to create a network with their neighbours, asking them to report any problems that may arise with temporary guests and to check on the house when it is not occupied, applying the rule of good neighbourliness. The guide also suggests sharing the house and neighbourhood rules with guests to ensure their safe stay.
We are aware that agreements like the one between the UK Neighbourhood Watch and Airbnb do not solve the problem of the shortage of medium to long-term rental accommodations, due to the proliferation of short-term rentals (which are generally more lucrative for property owners). However, the agreement appears to be a good example of how community respect and safety can be reconciled with the practice of short-term renting.
We think it is a "good practice" that should certainly be followed by Neighbourhood Watch organizations in other European countries.
Umberto Nicolini - EUNWA Advisory Board
Leonardo Campanale - EUNWA President
We are deeply saddened by the loss of our dear friend Günter Halvax.
He has worked without hesitation to support the European Neighbourhood Watch Association and contributed significantly to its growth and development.
His tireless work, extraordinary dedication and commitment will never cease to be remembered. He was a true pioneer. A beloved and respected friend. A model of enthusiasm and passion that inspired all those who were lucky enough to know him.
Let us gather its fruits and seize its example of integrity and dedication to the community.
We send our deepest condolences to his family and friends.
Thank you, Günter, for your valuable contribution to making our communities better and safer.
We will miss you. Rest in peace, dear friend.
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Speech at the National Association of Neighbourhood Watch National Conference "Participatory Security and Horizontal Subsidiarity" - 8 October 2022 - Venice
by Mauro Bardi (Member of EUNWA Board)
Here is some food for thought: today we are not dealing with a starting hypothesis and an ending thesis, but with the proposal of certain aspects that may be of interest for our general topic.
The first aspect we briefly wish to address is the content of the principle of subsidiarity.
The principle of subsidiarity represents a technique, of administrative nature, that aims at transferring functions (or even the mere performance of functions), typical of certain organs and traits of the central state, to other subjects and entities.
Within the principle one can distinguish:
- vertical subsidiarity, under which the central state may transfer certain functions of administrative nature to lower-ranking local authorities, i.e.: regions, metropolitan cities, and municipalities.
- subsidiarity, which can be defined as horizontal, whereby the central state and other public authorities (including local ones) can favour and strengthen the autonomous initiative of citizens, both individual and associated. Therefore, on the basis of this principle, certain functions typical of public authorities can also be performed by citizens, by private citizens in individual or associated form.
Having made this argumentative premise, we can affirm how the theory, activity and practice of Neighbourhood Watch can be inscribed within the principle of horizontal subsidiarity: Neighbourhood Watch, in fact, can contribute to the improvement of urban security (or sense of security) brought about and organised not by public powers, but by the initiative of citizens.
Now, we must go deeper and focus, first of all, on what is the basic mission of Neighbourhood Watch activity.
This is identified - first and foremost - in the attempt to set up strategies to prevent, or minimise the impact and effects, of certain crimes: in particular, crimes against property, commissions of house burglaries (and all the profiteering that can occur within the home).
Within this perspective (and set of intentions), Neighbourhood Watch (in its theory and practice) is concerned, first of all, with typifying (or cataloguing) offences against property (and specifically those indicated above) and then with identifying typical strategies relating to the prevention of such offences.
This activity leads, again in theory and in practice, to the typification of the behaviour, actions, and manners of the perpetrator in the context of the above-mentioned offences against property. At this point, however, there is a missing piece: there is an aspect to which the activity, theory and practice of Neighbourhood Watch should turn its attention the victims of property crimes.
Neighbourhood Watch actually only considers the victim of property crimes from one point of view: the one of the potential victim.
In other words, the victim is only considered in the space/time phase of pre-victimisation, through the identification of who could be an ideal potential or abstract victim: in other words, the ideal-physical victims of crimes against property. This way, in fact, all those environmental, material, and personal vulnerabilities that may favour or facilitate the commission of property crimes are also identified.
But as regards of the actual victimisation, the actual moment when the offence has been consummated and has created patrimonial or non-patrimonial damage to the victim, what prospects can we encounter?
Shifting the focus to the victims of crime (i.e., those who have immediately been victimised), leads us to rethink the function not only of all those strategies of preventive nature, but also of all possible interventions subsequent to the commission of the crime.
First of all, we can think and reflect on the question of criminal law, in particular on the function of punishment (generally, the criminal reaction). However, we do not consider this function in reference to the perpetrator and his harmful or dangerous actions, but in relation to the victim, in whose head vague expectations of justice often coagulate.
Therefore, we ask ourselves: what is the function of punishment from the perspective of the crime victim?
We may have different visions, different conceptions of punishment and criminal reaction.
Let’s examine them precisely in perspective and in relation to the victim.
One can introduce a retributive view of punishment: the view that the evil that has been committed by the offender with the crime must be answered with the corresponding evil that is an afflictive punishment.
Does this retributive view of punishment have either restorative or beneficial effects on the victim?
In view of this question, some doubts may arise.
On this point, one could refer to the thought of one of the most considered and esteemed scholars of criminal law, Giovanni Fiandaca.
The author states that:
"...the studies on victim’s psychology, currently available, highlight that the heart of the victims is crossed by contradictory reactions and partly dark feelings, to which real traumatic aspects are added in case of most serious crimes. In order to process the suffering and achieve moral reparation for the damage suffered, it is not enough for the victim to be satisfied by an afflictive punishment applied to the offender. Rather, the need for a psychological process of elaboration and for the grief of victimisation arises, and this has led to the prospect of a new track of criminal justice aimed at the re-education of lives"[1].
Therefore, summarising Fiandaca's words, the application of punishment, understood as retributive and afflictive punishment, doesn’t necessarily have useful effects on the victim. The penalty, in fact, concerns the perpetrator, and the victim runs the risk of being left without satisfaction and reparation.
On the basis of another concept, punishment can be considered from a preventive perspective. It can therefore be understood as an instrument of dissuasive (deterrent) pressure against the commission of offences. Again, this function of punishment does not have any particular beneficial or useful effect on the victim of the crime. Deterrence and dissuasion, in fact, are specifically directed against the potential perpetrator or, in the case of special prevention, against the actualperpetrator, but do not immediately and directly involve the victim and the harm he or she has suffered as a result of the offence.
In the same way, a re-educative view of punishment is not able to deploy particular effects towards the victim of the offence, but focuses considerably on the offender, understood as a subject in need of social rehabilitation.
It is therefore necessary to introduce a more modern perspective and vision, a vision that calls into question the so-called restorative justice: a series of procedures and interventions that, involving - also in a dialogic form - the offender, the victim, and the observing community, are able - as much as possible - to overcome the negative effects of the criminal conduct and to mend the communication and comprehension gap that the offence has created.
Having made this premise about the function of penal reaction (and ordinal reaction), about the perspective of punishment in relation not so much to the offender but rather in relation to the victim, we can ask ourselves a question, a problem; which is not only a problem but also a challenge.
Remaining within the framework of the principle of horizontal subsidiarity that we set out earlier, can we transfer the commitment, theory, and practice of Neighbourhood Watch to the area of victim-centred care?
In the introduction, we presented the concept according to which, the theory, the practice of Neighbourhood Watch deal with prevention, typification of prevention strategies, typification of offences, and typification of offender behaviour. The offence victim is only considered as a potential victim: therefore, the space/time phase of pre-victimisation is mainly, or almost exclusively, examined. Generally speaking, we can therefore observe how the theory and practice of Neighbourhood Watch do not deal directly with the actual victim, those who have actually suffered harm as a result of the crime.
At this point, we can introduce a normative source which, for the purposes of our general argument, may be very relevant.
In particular, we refer to Directive number 29 of 2012 of the European Union (which has been transposed in a not particularly complete way within Italian law by Legislative Decree number 212 of 2015) establishing minimum standards on the rights, assistance and protection of the victims of crime (it should be noted that, within the category of crime victims, all those who have suffered prejudice as a result of a criminal offence are included, and not only the victims of certain crimes - such as, for example, domestic violence or gender violence).
We refer in particular to Articles 8 and 9 of the aforementioned directive.
Article 8 identifies victim support centres and services. In particular, paragraph 4 states that victim support services may be established as public or non-governmental (i.e., private) organisations. In this section, the principle of horizontal subsidiarity is recalled, within which subjects that do not belong to public organisations are involved in carrying out activities that are typical of public authorities (i.e. assistance to victims of crime).
Therefore, Article 8 of the Directive indicates that assistance to victims of crime can be carried out by private people, also in the form of voluntary work, in the form of a ngo organisation.
Article 9 of the directive, then, identifies the assistance provided by the victim support services, and centres, in particular:
- information, advice, and assistance on the rights of the offended person
- information on possible and relevant specialist (social and health) support services;
- emotional support, where available psychological support, advice on financial and practical aspects deriving from the crime;
- advice concerning the risk and prevention of secondary victimisation and, in particular, of re-offending.
Now, let us come to some sort of conclusion.
First of all: we are faced with two structures that denote a certain parallelism.
On one hand, we have the Neighbourhood Watch groups that, as part of the horizontal subsidiarity principle, are concerned with the prevention of certain crimes (as detailed above).
On the other hand, we have the crime victim support centres which, again as part of the implementation and application of a horizontal subsidiarity principle, deal with assistance to victims of crime.
We can ask ourselves, then, can the centres, the subjects that deal with Neighbourhood Watch, also deal with the victims?
We have already noted that these two structures have some parallels.
Neighbourhood Watch and Neighbourhood Watch practitioners are distinguished by certain specialisations towards the prevention of property crime. Victim assistance centres, on the other hand, are characterised by a specialisation in victimology, as working with crime victims is an extremely delicate activity. One of the sayings of victimology is indeed 'first of all no more harms'.
Is it possible, however, for Neighbourhood Watch groups to provide initial assistance to victims of crime (first to victims of property crime, then possibly also to victims of other crimes), so that they are properly directed to victim support centres for competent and specialised care?
In this sense, Neighbourhood Watch centres could become victim interceptors and could direct victims to the assistance centres. It is clear that a certain organisation is needed to carry out this design: an organisation within the Neighbourhood Watch centres, and an organisation within the crime victim assistance centres, and especially a continuous coordination and dialogue between these two structures.
[1] G. Fiandaca, Prima lezione di diritto penale (First lesson in criminal law), Laterza, Bari-Roma, 2017, p.16.
More...
E.U.N.W.A. Spirit
An informal atmosphere and a great desire to meet again in person. An opportunity to exchange experiences and network. A common interest in learning more about the realities of Neighbourhood Watch in the different European countries. This is the climate and spirit that characterised the sixth annual meeting of EUNWA.
After two years of virtual meetings, we finally met 'in person' in Venice on October 7th. As in previous years, the meeting was attended by representatives of Neighbourhood Watch associations from several European countries, public administrators, subject-matter experts, representatives of Law Enforcement Agencies, representatives of civil society, and academics.
A different format for our annual meeting
As you may have noticed from the title of the event, 'Awarding excellence: the French case', this year we focused specifically on the French experience of Voisins Vigilantes and Solidaires. This new format of our annual meeting responds to the need for a deeper knowledge of the various national realities of Neighbourhood Watch. Indeed, this format gives the awarding country the opportunity to present its activities in depth and share its national experience with others.
Over the past year, we have been working hard to reconnect with European Neighbourhood Watch associations and re-launch our network. We took advantage of the pandemic to completely rebuild our website, browsing in all European languages, and launched a multilingual online questionnaire to survey the situation of Neighbourhood Watch in Europe.
EUNWA's last publication on the state-of-the-art of Neighbourhood Watch in Europe “White Book”, dates back to 2015. Since then, many things have changed and are still changing in front of our eyes. We, therefore, are planning to publish a new edition of the book in 2023.
This year's EUNWA annual meeting included the Mythos Award event to honour European citizens who have most distinguished themselves in promoting Neighbourhood Watch in their community. This is an event that we would like to repeat annually for each individual country or group of countries.
Where we have met
This year our annual meeting was held at Palazzo Corner della Ca' Granda or simply Ca' Corner. It is an imposing Renaissance palace in Venice, located in the district of San Marco and overlooking the Grand Canal. It is the seat of the Metropolitan City of Venice and the Prefecture.
Ca' Corner was designed by the architect Jacopo Sansovino after afire destroyed the Corner family's previous residence, Palazzo Malombra, in 1532. In 1817 the palace was ceded by Andrea Corner to the Austrian Empire, which placed there the Imperial Royal Provincial Delegation and later also the Imperial Royal Lieutenancy, corresponding to the Prefecture. Later, when Venice was annexed to the Kingdom of Italy, it retained the same destination, which still exists today.
Situated in a prestigious location not far from Piazza San Marco, the palace is characterised by its monumentality, already highlighted by its appellation Ca' Granda (Big House), which breaks the sequence of neighbouring palaces with its prominence.
Participants
The event was attended by a large delegation from the French association Voisins Vigilantes et Solidaires, delegations from the Austrian, Danish, Estonian, Moldavian, and Italian Neighbourhood Watch associations, and one from Associazione Nazionale Controllo di Vicinato, representing the various associations and partners that are members of the Italian national network. Also present were municipal administrators, representatives of Law Enforcement Agencies, representatives of social organisations and of the academic world.
Delegates from various European countries would have certainly been more numerous but, unfortunately, due to some organisational and logistical problems caused by the new format of the event, our communication was delayed. This prevented many of our partners from attending the event due to the short notice. We apologise and promise to be much more efficient in organising the next event.
Speakers
The meeting was opened by the Councillor of the Metropolitan City of Venice, Enrico Gavagnin, who welcomed the participants
and brought greetings from the city authorities.
Then the honorary president of EUNWA, Karl Brunnbauer, spoke, updating those present on the latest EUNWA news, such as the relocation of the headquarters from Vienna to Venice, the new EUNWA website (browsable in all European languages), the novelty of the Mythos Award, the still in progress work to strengthen relations with all our partners, and last but not least, the survey on the situation of the various Neighbourhood Watch experiences in Europe through the distribution of an accurate on-line questionnaire. President Leonardo Campanale spoke next, focusing on the pros and cons of virtual versus real communities and the importance of neighbourhood micro-communities as a basis for the development and growth of strong, free, and cohesive communities. Vice-President Roberta Bravi concluded the speeches, focusing on the importance of cooperation at European level and the importance of public policies on security.
Awarding Excellence: The France case
The Mythos award, conceived by Councillor Enrico Gavagnin and organised by his staff, is an 
important opportunity to reward European citizens who have distinguished themselves in their communities in promoting and organising the practice of Neighbourhood Watch, and it’s an opportunity for organisations from a specific country to share with other European associations their story, progress, challenges, and the tools they use to promote the project.
The EUNWA Board decided to begin with France, which has seen incredible growth in a relatively short time (one million adherents, second only to Neighbourhood Watch UK which has three and a half million) and has developed a robust web platform to develop the Voisins Vigilantes et Solidaires network that EUNWA is currently studying as a best practice.
In addition to Thierry Chicha, president of VVS, French citizens Jack Cabral and Anthony Delbecq were awarded the Mythos Prize for their commitment to the development of Neighbourhood Watch in France.
The Voisins Vigilantes et Solidaires web platform
The event continued with an explanation, by President Thierry Chicha, of the evolution of the VVS system over the last twenty years and the presentation of its web platform, designed to facilitate real encounters between citizens who join it. The web platform has different interfaces for citizens, municipal administrations, and the French State Police, to facilitate dialogue between citizens and institutions. The platform attracted a lot of interest, and many questions were asked about how it works.
Acknowledgements
We would like to thank the Metropolitan City of Venice for its hospitality and generous contribution, the Mythos hotel group for sponsoring the event and naming the award, the Municipality of Venice, City Councillor Enrico Gavagnin for conceiving the event and coordinating the support team, the support team itself: Camilla, Sophia, Rui, Maria Cristina, and Fausto, and the guests from Italy and other countries.
Where shall we meet next year?
EUNWA has organised its six annual meetings (2014, 2016 in Austria, 2015, 2019 and 2022 in Italy, 2018 in Greece) mainly in Central and Southern Europe. We are a European network and therefore think it is appropriate to organise the next events in Northern Europe. Applications are now open!
The day after
The following day, October 8th, the EUNWA board participated in the national conference of the “Associazione Nazionale
Controllo di Vicinato”, (the Italian network of Neighbourhood Watch), where public administrators, Law Enforcement Agencies and representatives of Italian associations discussed the topic 'Participatory Security and Horizontal Subsidiarity'.
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Download speeches and presentation (EN/FR/IT)
Karl Brunnbauer (Honorary President) EN FR IT
Leonardo Campanale (President) EN FR IT
Roberta Bravi (Vice-President) EN FR IT
Thierry Chicha (VVS President) EN FR IT
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After two years of virtual meetings, we are happy to inform you that the EUNWA annual event is finally back “in person” and we would like to warmly invite you to join it!
This year the event will take place in Venice, Italy, on October 7th, and we hope it will gather, as the previous years, a wide range of participants: representatives of Neighbourhood Watch associations, scientists, practitioners, subject matter experts, representatives of law enforcement agencies, civil society representatives, academics.
EUNWA has the ambition to become a centre for the study and documentation of participatory security in Europe, and this requires in-depth knowledge of each national reality. Therefore, its Board has decided, as of this year, to change the format of its annual meetings. Based on the experience of our past meetings, we have found it more profitable to focus on one country at a time, in order to better understand it. This year the French Neighbourhood Watch (Voisins Vigilants et Solidaires - VVS) will be the main focus.
Two French citizens who are members of the Voisins Vigilants et Solidaires network and its President, Thierry Chicha, will be honoured with the “Mythos Award”, a prize created in collaboration with the Metropolitan City of Venice and the Mythos hotel chain, which aims to reward citizens who have particularly distinguished themselves for their commitment to promoting “participatory security” in their communities.
The award ceremony will be held in the prestigious venue of the Metropolitan City of Venice, PALAZZO CA' CORNER, Nassivera Hall, San Marco 2662, 30124 Venezia – Italy.
The event will be attended by local civil authorities and representatives of Italian and European Neighbourhood Watch associations.
During the event, our French friends will illustrate the development strategy of their network that has led them to reach one million members in just a few years. They will also present the VVS web platform, whose development and dissemination have been crucial to their growth.
We count on your active participation in order to make this event successful!
Registration to the event is required. Registration link here: https://forms.gle/riEkQegJaTj8aJrE7
Looking forward to seeing you in Venice!
the EUNWA Board
® All rights reserved
The Neighbourhood Watch programme has its roots in the criminological 'Situational Prevention' and 'Theory of Routine Activity’. The scope of intervention of Neighbourhood Watch is very specific, and never overlaps with the functions performed by the police: the repression of offenders remains an exclusive domain of the law enforcement agencies.
However, participating in community security requires not only a significant cultural change on the part of the institutions and the police, but also a cultural change in civil society.
It is not enough for citizens to trust the police and for the police to trust citizens, but it is also necessary for citizens to trust each other. It is fundamental to realise that security is an issue for the whole community, and that there is a strong interdependence between your own security (real and perceived) and your neighbour’s.
How the Neighbourhood Watch works
Residents can interpret and understand the private space and context in which they live (be it people or situations) better than the police, which makes them capable of identifying risks and criticalities in private contexts that the police do not routinely monitor and in which most predatory crimes occur. With Neighbourhood Watch, this interpretative ability is made available to the police for a better chance to intervene in the prevention and repression of petty crime. The knowledge and ability to interpret the context characterised by micro-community places represent an added value for citizens in participatory processes, both related to security and to many other aspects of community life.
Another important aspect is that residents are the only ones who can implement specific passive prevention actions in their private spaces for specific vulnerabilities (e.g., install high quality locks, install alarm systems, change of habits and behaviour, etc.).
Different approaches
The emergence and development of the Neighbourhood Watch in Europe has followed different paths depending on the history, political situation, and regulatory framework of each country. However, they all have in common two possible approaches to launch the programme: top-down or bottom-up approach.
Top-down approach means promoting the Programme through the institutions. This approach assumes an initial relationship of trust between citizens and police and can last as long as this trust relationship remains high. If the trust relationship breaks down, there is a high probability that citizens will stop cooperating with the police. This approach is difficult to apply where there is a historical distrust between citizens, institutions, and the police.
In Bottom-up approach citizens self-organise into Neighbourhood Watch groups. In many European countries, Neighbourhood Watch was established directly by citizens, and only later supported by the institutions and police (e.g., in France or Italy). In areas where Neighbourhood Watch started from the bottom-up, there was a good level of social cohesion and sense of community, and a good response from the mayors and local police. On the other hand, Neighbourhood Watch hardly started in areas where individualism is highly developed and social solidarity is lacking.
However, there are still some countries in Europe where the Neighbourhood Watch is barely tolerated by the authorities due to historical and cultural factors. These factors can be summarised in an atavistic distrust of citizens towards institutions, or a suspicion towards citizens' participation in the security of their communities, seen as interference in the institutional activities of law enforcement agencies.
Positive side effects
Based on Neighbourhood Watch experiences in both Western and Eastern Europe, some recurring positive side effects have been observed:
- reduction of perceived insecurity in the communities (this is extremely important because very often people think, and vote, based on this perception and rarely on objective crime statistics.);
- reduction of petty crime rate (the Ministries of the Interior of several European countries claim a reduction in crime from 20 to 40 per cent in areas where this programme is well developed.);
- improved citizen dialogue with police and institutions (dialogue is better structured where community policing policies have been implemented.)
Where Neighbourhood Watch is implemented and there is a good level of cooperation among neighbours and between neighbours and the police, we generally witness:
- an increase in social cohesion and citizens' sense of belonging to their community;
- an intensification of dialogue between citizens and institutions (especially at local level);
- a readiness of the institutions to develop processes of participatory democracy and the willingness of citizens to participate in them.
Ready for Neighbourhood Watch?
If the society is not ready for the promotion of Neighbourhood Watch programmes, by introducing into the public debate the principle that security is a matter not only for institutions but also for each individual citizen, the consequences could be counterproductive. Its 'forced' introduction could generate a perception of a loss of authority and status on the part of the police, and a fear of being 'evaluated' by citizens or, on the part of citizens, of becoming 'confidants' of the police. Instead, we are deeply convinced (and experiences in the field have proven it) that listening to citizens about their security needs and involving them, within a clear and defined legal framework, does not mean a loss of authority, status, or professionalism on the part of the police, but an increase in the latter's ability to prevent and repress crime.
Leonardo Campanale - EUNWA President
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Interview with Thierry Chicha, President of "Voisins Vigilants et Solidaires”
In France over the last decade, the Voisins Vigilants et Solidaire (VVS) programme has developed strongly and gained a lot of public visibility. We interviewed its President, Mr Thierry Chicha, to understand the reasons for this rapid expansion, what difficulties they have faced and what their future plans are.
Good morning, Mr Chicha, and thank you for this interview. We have read on your website that the VVS system has now been adopted by more than six hundred French municipalities and some Belgian municipalities, and that more than one million citizens have signed up to it. This growth is unparalleled in any other European country in the last ten years. What is the reason for this increased interest?
Hello EUNWA team and thank you for your interest in the initiative we are developing in France. Things are evolving fast... we are more than 700 cities at the moment. In my opinion, the key to the success of Voisins Vigilants et Solidaires in France is the communication tool. We have invested between 2 and 3 million euros and almost 20 years of work to develop a reliable web platform, mobile application, SMS, and telephone messages exclusively dedicated to the Neighbourhood Watch with all the necessary safeguards.
What is the average size of the municipalities participating in the scheme and in which areas has it developed most?
There is no real rule ... it goes from 50 inhabitants to 500 000 inhabitants.
Have you had the opportunity to reflect on why the VVS scheme has developed more in rural and peri-urban areas than in urban areas? Is it possible that the programme has taken root mainly in areas where there are more solid networks of social and neighbourly relations, which is often absent in cities where anonymity prevails? Do you think that the current organisational and participation model of VVS can also take root in big cities or do you foresee a change of strategy to achieve the "villages in the city" effect?
I quite agree with this first analysis, I would also add the type of housing. Voisins Vigilants et Solidaires is a system that mainly focuses on the problems of theft and burglary, and these problems are over-represented in houses compared to flats. That said, this is not as true today as it was 10 years ago. A city like Marseille, for example, is gradually deploying the system.
What, if any, is the typical profile of the citizen joining the VVS scheme?
As you know, with 1 million participants, the VVS is increasingly a reflection of the French population. Homeowners are obviously over-represented, and the average age is therefore a little higher than that of the rest of the population.
VVS has developed a web platform enabling virtual dialogue between citizens, local authorities, and the police on security issues. Of the one million citizens registered, how many actually use the platform?
Roughly 50% of subscribers receive regular alerts and consult them immediately.
When registering on the VVS platform, do citizens have to subscribe to rules of behaviour? For example, how do you manage the social anxiety that may result from reporting false positives or alarmist messages, and how do you manage any messages of hatred, discrimination, or political controversy?
Of course! All VVSs commit to respecting a charter of good conduct. All alerts are broadcast within a restricted perimeter (delimitation of sectors carried out by the town hall). The VVS are trained in partnership with the Police. All contact details of registered users are checked by our teams. All alerts are checked by our moderators and the authors can be sanctioned.
Without questioning to the personal responsibility of those who carry out actions contrary to the law, do you have a mechanism to exclude from the VVS system those who intervene personally against thieves, as happened in the municipality of Hénin-Beaumont, going beyond the mission of VVS and acquiring prerogatives that are the exclusive responsibility of the police?
Let us specify that there has never been the slightest drift noted in the framework of the VVS system for 20 years and on 1 million members. The event to which you refer has nothing to do with VVS. I am even convinced that it is the absence of VVS that leads to this kind of drift. The inhabitants organise themselves; they are not trained; no framework is set up and that is where it can go wrong. It is important that the public authorities become aware of the problem and rely on a solution validated by the national police in order to structure these angry inhabitants.
Has vigilantism ever developed within VVS communities? We know that these activities are strictly forbidden by the laws of the French state.
No, never!
In addition to the revenue from the costs of municipalities joining the VVS scheme, do you receive other subsidies from the French state? For example, through the FIPD (Fonds interministériel pour la prévention de la délinquance)?
Membership of the VVS scheme for individuals is completely free of charge, regardless of whether the town council is a member of the scheme or not. Municipalities’ membership represents 95% of our income. Some municipalities can get funding from other local, regional or national institutions, but this does not really concern us directly anymore.
Notwithstanding the controversy between the left and the right in France about the effectiveness of VVS, a million adherents of your device may appeal to politicians as a potential voting pool. Have you ever been courted by any party? And in general, what is your relationship with political parties?
It goes without saying that we are apolitical.
Citizens registered on your web platform can report problems related to safety and urban decay to their municipality (if it is also a member of the scheme) using case codes. Is there a channelling process behind these reports? Who handles the reports? Do citizens who submit reports receive feedback from municipalities?
There are as many operating methods as there are town halls. Our tools (once again, this is the key) allow us to adapt the operation of the system to the size and problems of the municipality.
In France, the political-administrative model is strongly characterised by state centralism and does not include the possibility of citizen participation in policing. Some things have changed since the serious terrorist attacks of 2015-2016. In fact, already in 2011, after the birth of VVS, the French state launched, with the circular of the then Minister Claude Guéant, the "Participation Citoyenne" initiative, a pact of collaboration between prefects, police forces and municipalities under the supervision of the Ministry of the Interior. How did you interpret this decision? Was it an opening of the French State to the participation of citizens in the security of their communities, or was it an attempt to "saturate the spaces" and prevent your "bottom-up initiative" from gaining a foothold outside the institutional sphere? The coexistence of the two systems created some problems for mayors who often did not understand the difference and controversy in the press due to the fact that VVS was paid for (by municipalities). How did you manage this problem?
What was the original intention ... I honestly don't know. One thing is for sure: today the institutions are moving closer to VVS. The simplistic opposition of free VS paying has had its day and many municipalities, police stations, gendarmerie brigades realise that if they want to set up a system that works without being obliged to dedicate a civil servant to it all year round ... VVS is the right solution! Our recommendation is to systematically implement VVS + Citizen Participation.
With the circular of 30 April 2019 the Ministry of the Interior Christophe Castaner states that "private systems can be complementary to the state apparatus", with an implicit reference to VVS. This seemed to us to be a further step forward by the French state towards bottom-up citizen initiatives on security. The subsequent signing, in February 2021, of an agreement between VVS and the “Direction Centrale de la Sécurité Publique” seems to us to have been a radical change of perspective. Do you foresee an operational convergence between the two systems in the future?
This is indeed a big step! And I can't tell you at this time what will happen in the coming months ... we are moving forward on different topics.
VVS groups are present in suburban and rural areas, representing mainly homeowners, often elderly, who fear property crime. In your opinion, does this not pose problems of representativeness, effectively endorsing social fragmentation and the exclusion of undesirable groups? For example, what is the percentage of residents of foreign origin who adhere to the scheme?
This is of course not a question that is asked in the registration form. I have no data to answer this question.
Is there any content on the VVS platform other than community safety issues?
Yes, of course, the VVS have a neighbourhood newspaper and a message board. It is not uncommon in these spaces, which are quite distinct from the alert, to see exchange of messages for lost pets or neighbourhood meetings.
Do you have evidence of the participation of the VVS in other activities and social networks (as is often the case in other European Neighbourhood Watch experiences), committed to the safety and decorum of neighbourhoods, such as the "exploratory walks" that took place in some French cities to reappropriate public spaces invaded by prostitution or drug dealing?
I have no data on this subject.
Given the increased involvement of institutions in the VVS scheme, is there a real possibility that in the future representatives of the VVS will be formally involved in the activities of the CLSPD (Conseil Local de Sécurité et de Prévention de la Délinquance) as was the case in Rennes? This would also allow the voice of citizens to be heard in more targeted prevention and law enforcement actions.
This is already the case in the majority of municipalities that have a CLSPD and VVS.
In your opinion, is there a risk that VVS, which has been promoted as a participatory model on the issue of security, could, in time, serve as a way for local and national authorities to channel citizens' complaints, preventing them from overflowing onto social networks or, even worse, resulting in protest movements, without receiving an effective response from the institutions?
No. I do not feel that the authorities are willing to do this at all levels. Moreover, VVS remains an independent organisation.
On an individual level, citizens involved in the VVS network can be gratified by involvement and active participation, developing feelings of usefulness, and belonging to the community. These activities produce positive concrete effects such as the reduction of thefts and a greater sense of security in the neighbourhood. In general, do you think that VVS can also contribute to lobbying for better local and national security policy?
Our DNA is not to lobby but to do. We are currently working on various projects: video protection, securing shops, connected alarms, partnerships with housing stakeholders, etc. In this way, we hope to contribute in a very modest way to the reduction of insecurity. We obviously give our full support to the police, gendarmes, and municipal police officers, it is thanks to them that we sleep peacefully.
It is certainly complex to establish a statistical correlation between the presence of Neighbourhood Watch activities and a decrease in predatory crimes. There are many variables to consider, from the Covid pandemic to the arrest or displacement of thieves operating in a particular area, to the general reduction in these crimes. The French press reports different percentages of effectiveness, and the Ministry of the Interior speaks of a 40% reduction in crime. The difficulty of measuring the real impact represented by citizens' participation in the security chain is common to all European Neighbourhood Watch realities. What is your opinion about this?
The reduction in crime is undeniable ... but by how much? We do not have the time or the means to conduct a large-scale study on this subject.
We will follow the development of VVS with great interest. We look forward to interviewing you again to follow your new developments.
I would like to add one last point: In partnership with the EUNWA, we have always wanted to deploy an effective Neighbourhood Watch in Europe. The approach that we have implemented in France is working. If some of you wish to rely on us to develop your NW in your country, we would be delighted to help you, in particular by providing you with all our tools.
Thank you very much Mr. Chicha!
Visit the website of Voisins Vigilants et Solidaires www.voisinsvigilants.org
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