GMAT Essays (AWA)

Hello GMAT Gurus...
Please evaluate my first attempt at AWA :

Argument :
The following appeared as part of a campaign statement for Velazquez, who is seeking election as alderman in the town of Barchester:"¨"¨"Under Police Commissioner Draco, the city of Spartanburg began jailing people for committing petty crimes such as littering, shoplifting, and spraying graffiti. Criminals in Spartanburg must have understood that lawlessness would no longer be tolerated, because the following year Spartanburg saw a 20% drop in violent crimes such as homicide. Our town should learn from Commissioner Draco's success, and begin a large-scale crackdown on petty crime.""¨


MY Essay:
The argument proposes to follow similar methods to punish criminals in Barchester as employed in the city of Spartanburg in order to achieve a comparable degree of reduction in the violent crime rate. Though the proposal seems optimistic, it has some inherent flaws as it is evident that it is based on certain assumptions which may not be true.

Whether the rate of violent crime will reduce in Barchester after imposing strict punishments for committing petty crimes is based on many other parameters prevalent in Barchester. This includes the current scenario of petty crimes vs violent crimes. If the residents in general are law abiding, then this plan may not work. A selected group of malicious people involved in violent crimes can continue to do so even after the plan is in action.

In addition, it is assumed that the reduction in violent crime in the city of Spartanburg happened because people started taking the law seriously and were scared of committing any crimes lest they should be severely punished. What this argument fails to consider is that there might have been other factors playing their part in achieving the desired results. It might be the case that the local government took steps to improve the economic condition which in turn led to the reduction in crime, making the residents happier so that they don't resort to any criminal acts.

Without having an idea of the current scenario in Bachester, the usefulness of this plan cannot be assessed. If homicide is a major problem in Bachester, then the first step should be to find its prominent causes. Only if the underlying causes are addressed in an efficient manner, a potential decrease in the horrendous crime can be observed.

To summarize, blindly copying the plan of action from another town cannot promise the same results as with each city come a different set of people, their concerns and their problems. This requires a careful analysis of the current situation in Barcheter followed by the implementation of a custom made plan, drafted specifically for Barchetser and not copied from Commissioner Draco in the city of Spartanburg.