By Jennifer Quinn BBC News Online Magazine

Firing from both barrels

For what seems like the first time in recent campaign memory, crime hasn't been a major issue in the US presidential elections.

Terrorism, education, the economy and gay marriage are all hot button issues, but until this week, voters heard little about assault weapons, or murder rates.

The United States sets the pace for so much that happens in the UK. Could this trend, too, cross the Atlantic? Could ASBOs and binge drinking get nary a mention during Britain's next election?

Until this week, and unlike other campaigns, crime and gun control - an issue that deeply divides Americans - hadn't really been a focus on the campaign trail. But just days after being photographed firing a shotgun into the air at an election event, Democratic candidate John Kerry decided to change that.

War on terror, not drugs

He castigated the administration of President George Bush for allowing a 1994 ban on assault weapons, which had a 10-year lifespan, to lapse, saying, "I don't think we need to make the lives of terrorists any easier."

Flash back to the early 1990s, when gun control seemed to be an all-consuming issue. Then, the focus of many of those campaigns was to prevent domestic crime rather than international terrorism.

But the war on guns and drugs isn't a major issue this year - and the so-called war on terror very much is - and part of the reason for that is, simply, that crime in the United States is at a 30-year low.

Women fear intimidation from hooded youths as they walk home at night. And couples stay in rather than run the gauntlet of the binge drinkers who have taken over many of our towns and city centres Michael Howard

And in the UK, figures reported by the British Crime Survey showed that overall crime fell by 5% in 2003, and has been in decline since 1995.

Police figures showed crime rose by 1% and violent crime by 11%. The police statistics cover only those crimes recorded by police, while the crime survey includes unreported and unrecorded crime and can show trends and regional differences. The Home Office publishes both sets of figures in order to give a broader picture of crime.

Yet in Britain, crime remains an issue at the top of many agendas. In August in Middlesbrough, Conservative leader Michael Howard said crime has "left people feeling insecure and uneasy".

"This is the reality of Britain today," he said. "Parents are afraid to let their children walk to school. Women fear intimidation from hooded youths as they walk home at night. And couples stay in rather than run the gauntlet of the binge drinkers who have taken over many of our towns and city centres."

In July, Labour unveiled a five-year plan to show its own commitment to law and order, with Prime Minister Tony Blair saying, "for the first time in years, people's fear of crime, and of [anti-social behaviour] and of their satisfaction levels with the [criminal justice system] are moving in the right direction.

"I want this to be a major part of our offer to the people of Britain in the time to come."

Why?

In America, there doesn't appear to be one simple reason why crime has declined. For many Americans, their belief in why crime has come down depends on their political stripes. Liberal might point to community-based policing, for example, while a more conservative voter would tout tougher judicial sentencing as a crime-buster.

Howard says the Tories will be tough on crime

One of the reasons frequently cited for the drop in the crime rates is the end of the crack cocaine epidemic, which blighted inner cities and led to street violence and increased gang activities. One suggestion, reported by US News and World Report in 1996, is that "the crack epidemic may be fading, partly because kids have seen what it did to their parents".

Then there's the proliferation of prison-building, which helps the United States incarcerate more convicted criminals, per capita, than any other industrialized nation. In 2003, nearly six million Americans were doing time, according to the Christian Science Monitor.

"A lot of people think that the reason crime rates have been dropping over the past several years is, in part, because we're incarcerating the people most likely to commit crimes," Stephan Thernstrom, a historian at Harvard University, said.

The streets are policed differently, as well. In New York, the much-hyped "broken window" theory - where the smallest crimes, such as graffiti and public drunkenness, are vigilantly policed because minor misdemeanours can lead to major felonies - helped change the image and the streets of the country's largest city.

Additionally, community policing - where the police undertake a collaborative relationship with neighbourhoods - is believed to have made inroads into areas where police had been seen as the enemy.

Demographics are also a factor, with the baby boom generation getting older. Criminals are getting greyer, said the Seattle Post-Intelligencer.

"You can't underestimate the effect of age on crime," University of Washington sociologist Bob Crutchfield told the paper. "It's a young man's game."