Alfred Blumstein is a university professor and the J. Erik Jonsson Professor of Urban Systems and Operations Research and former Dean (from 1986 to 1993) at the H. John Heinz III School of Public Policy and Management of Carnegie Mellon University. He is also director of the National Consortium on Violence Research (NCOVR). Joel Wallman is Senior Program Officer at The Harry Frank Guggenheim Foundation in New York. He is the author of Aping Language (Cambridge University Press, 1992) He has also published in Computer Applications in the Biosciences, Current Anthropology, Criminology and Public Policy.

'The Crime Drop in America is a must-read for anybody concerned about crime in the United States, as it thoroughly and dispassionately assesses the possible causes of the striking reduction in crime during the 1990s. This volume stands alone in the literature. It addresses many of the topics found in criminology texts but is much more narrowly focused.' A. Didrick Castberg, Perspectives on Political Science

• 1. The recent rise and fall of American violence Alfred Blumstein and Joel Wallman; 2. Some recent trends in US violence Alfred Blumstein; 3. Guns and gun violence Garen Wintemute; 4. The limited importance of prison expansion William Spelman; 5. Patterns in adult homicide: 1980–95 Richard Rosenfeld; 6. The rise and decline of hard drugs, drug markets, and violence in inner-city New York Bruce Johnson, Andrew Golub, and Eloise Dunlap; 7. Have changes in policing reduced violent crime John Eck and Edward Maguire; 8. An economic model of recent trends in violence Jeff Grogger; 9. Demographics and US homicide James Alan Fox; Epilogue to the revised edition. After the crime drop Joel Wallman and Alfred Blumstein.