Editing Crime (section)

=== Modern era ===
In the modern era, crime came to be seen as an issue affecting society rather than conflicts between individuals. Writers such as [[Thomas Hobbes]] saw crime as a societal issue as early as the 17th century.{{Sfn|Sumner|2004|p=5}} [[Imprisonment]] developed as a long-term penalty for crime in the 18th century.{{sfn|Roth|2014|p=8}} Increasing [[urbanization]] and [[industrialization]] in the 19th century caused crime to become an immediate issue that affected society, prompting government intervention in crime and the establishment of criminology as its own field.{{Sfn|Sumner|2004|p=5}}

[[Anthropological criminology]] was popularized by [[Cesare Lombroso]] in the late-19th century. This was a [[biological determinist]] school of thought based in [[social darwinism]], arguing that certain people are naturally born as criminals.{{sfn|Davie|2010|pp=23–24}} The [[eugenics]] movement of the early-20th century similarly held that crime was caused primarily by genetic factors.{{sfn|Davie|2010|p=38}}

The concept of crime underwent a period of change as [[modernism]] was widely accepted in the years following [[World War II]]. Crime increasingly came to be seen as a societal issue, and criminal law was seen as a means to protect the public from [[Anti-social behaviour|antisocial]] behavior. This idea was associated with a larger trend in the western world toward [[social democracy]] and [[centre-left politics]].{{Sfn|Sumner|2004|pp=4–5}}

Through most of history, reporting of crime was generally local. The advent of [[mass media]] through radio and television in the mid-20th century allowed for the sensationalism of crime. This created well-known stories of criminals such as [[Jeffrey Dahmer]], and it allowed for dramatization that perpetuates misconceptions about crime.{{Sfn|Fattah|1997|p=14}} Forensic science was popularized in the 1980s, establishing [[DNA profiling]] as a new method to prevent and analyze crime.{{sfn|Davie|2010|p=43}}