It is this same analytic separation that David Matza. one of the most influential spokesmen of the sociology of deviance. identifies as the main hallmark of “positive criminology." “The most celebrated and thus the most explicit assumption of positive criminology is the primacy of the criminal actor rather than the criminal law as the major point of departure in the construction of etiological theories. . . . The law and its admin- istration is deemed secondary or irrelevant" (Matza I964. 3). Generally geographers have focused on the associations between indicators of crime (offi- cial statistics) and indicators of the social envi- ronment (usually drawn from the census). Such strategies limit the variables used to indices relating to the circumstances of the crime or the characteristics of the criminal. Rarely consid- ered is the idea that law. law enforcement. and indices of social control might need to be included as important environmental variables. Even where associational analyses have been used as a basis for more intensive social survey research (Herbert and Evans I973; Herbert I976: Evans I980). the effects of social control on area differences in crime and delinquency rates are rarely considered. This is not to say. however. that geographers have entirely missed the importance of the way that social control structures human environments. Davidson (I981) and Herben (I982) include reviews of the work of Damer (I974), Baldwin. Bottoms. and Walker (1976). and Gill (I977) on the effect of both police and housing authority policy on the development of problem crime areas. particu- larly in terms of their labeling as such by out- siders. These studies in sociology and criminol- ogy focus on the role of "urban gatekeepers" and the news media in increasing the appear- unre of criminality in such areas.