Locked into security,keyed into modernity: The selection of burglaries as source of risk in Greece

Consensus among Greeks claims that the rates of burglaries and thefts have been increasing during the last ten years and that this constitutes a major social problem for which immigrants, and, especially Albanians, are responsible. This article theorizes that the selection of burglaries as source of risk deploys the understanding that the flip side of the increase in property crime is increased affluence and that both are part of modernization. The selection of houses as targets of aggression enables people, especially men, to construe themselves as protectors of houses objectifying the longstanding ideals of household management and as members of a modern society in which security is a matter of individual consumer choice. The portrayal of immigrants as destitute thieves reinforces the construct of the Greek nation state as a successful albeit vulnerable household writ-large.