The keystones of the network:

• Safety is a human right – to feel free from risk and fear of danger is crucial for all human beings and is a pre-condition for modern societies. A safe environment enables the fulfillment of the most basic individual needs – a safe dwelling and a secure urban environment that allow free movement.

• Understanding of the situational conditions of crime – crime does not occur in a vacuum. It happens in particular places and times. If the conditions in which crime occurs can be tackled, the overall safety conditions of a place will improve. This requires knowledge that is context-based. Urban and rural environments are not exposed to crime in the same way. New realities demand new methodological challenges. KTH provides an outstanding platform for Safeplaces network in a methodologically strong research environment with professionals who work interdisciplinary.

• Interdisciplinarity and beyond sector boundaries – making places safer is a fundamental task for the network. Ensuring safety is not a task for a single discipline or stakeholder. Improving crime and safety conditions demands knowledge from a wide array of research disciplines: criminology, sociology, psychology but also geography, architecture and planning, statistics, engineering and computer science. Safety depends on the coordinated cooperation of multiple societal stakeholders working towards collaborative frameworks to prevent crime and promote perceived safety.

• Intersectionality of safety – There is a need to investigate intersectionality in victimization and in poor perceived safety; knowledge on how, when, and why gender intersects with age, class, and ethnic belonging, which together may result in multiple dimensions of disadvantage, victimization, and poor perceived safety.

• Translational criminology – If we want to prevent, reduce and manage crime, we must be able to translate scientific findings into policy and practice. Practitioners in the field describe challenges they face in their jobs every day, but scientists also discover new tools and ideas to overcome these challenges and evaluate their impacts. This process recognizes that successful dissemination of research findings may require multiple strategies.