Editing Broken windows theory (section)

===Class bias===
[[File:Beskucnik Tkalca 280309.jpg|thumb|Homeless man talking with a police officer]]
A common criticism of broken windows policing is the argument that it criminalizes the poor and homeless. That is because the physical signs that characterize a neighborhood with the "disorder" that broken windows policing targets correlate with the socio-economic conditions of its inhabitants. Many of the acts that are considered legal but "disorderly" are often targeted in public settings and are not targeted when they are conducted in private. Therefore, those without access to a private space are frequently criminalized. Critics, such as [[Robert J. Sampson]] and [[Stephen Raudenbush]] of [[Harvard University]], see the application of the broken windows theory in policing as a war against the poor, as opposed to a war against more serious crimes.{{Sfn | Sampson | Raudenbush | 2004}} Since minority groups in most cities are more likely to be poorer than the rest of the population, a bias against the poor would be linked to a racial bias.<ref name="Golub"/>

According to Bruce D. Johnson, Andrew Golub, and James McCabe, applying the broken windows theory in policing and policymaking can result in development projects that decrease physical disorder but promote undesired [[gentrification]]. Often, when a city is so "improved" in this way, the development of an area can cause the cost of living to rise higher than residents can afford, which forces low-income people out of the area. As the space changes, the middle and upper classes, often white, begin to move into the area, resulting in the gentrification of urban, poor areas. The residents are affected negatively by such an application of the broken windows theory and end up evicted from their homes as if their presence indirectly contributed to the area's problem of "physical disorder".<ref name="Golub"/>