Recently, I wrote about Grand Est in France. The truth is that, statistically, French cities often rank among the most dangerous in Europe. In many cases, this is true not only statistically.
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| Grande Île de Strasbourg |
I wrote about
Grand Est intentionally because cities in Grand Est, such as Strasbourg, do not rank among the most dangerous cities.
I don’t like statistics. Safety statistics, including those from Eurostat, are based on reported cases. Reality can be different, and from experience, it is. In Czechia, cities have everyday crime that Eurostat does not cover, I think. This is precisely because it concerns safety—things are either not reported, or people don’t see that reporting would solve the problem, or the issue does not turn against the person reporting another. In many Czech cities, people complain that they are afraid to be outside during the day, let alone after dark. Eurostat, however, shows nothing like this.
„definitions and counting of official crime vary between countries, and comparisons between countries can therefore be misleading“ European Commission
The same goes for cost of living. Statistics often deal with prices but not with wages, for example. When statistics claim that living costs are lower somewhere, income is not taken into account at all. This is just one example of how statistics fail when it comes to cost of living or poverty.
I don’t know exactly how Strasbourg compares statistically to cities in Czechia, for instance. However, my impression is that Strasbourg itself is safer and calmer than cities in the Czechia. For example, at night, a drone is enough to cover many areas and monitor moving people. In Czech cities, a drone would not be sufficient in similar places.
At first glance, this might seem like excessive control. But the situation is clear: Strasbourg is calm at night in these areas. People are practically absent, homeless people or drug users are minimally visible—or rather, they are simply not there—and the space is well monitored. In such a case, a drone is sufficient for prevention and monitoring.
The contrast with many Czech cities — statistically different places — is stark. In city centers and main areas, movement of various “undesirables” is common even during the day—homeless people, drug users, thieves, or even worse. People often fear intervening, even when something happens that would require a reaction. In such an environment, a drone would not be sufficient—the area is too lively.
It is also clear that official statistics, for example Eurostat in my view, do not provide an accurate picture. They are based only on reported cases and often do not reflect how people actually feel or how safe their daily environment is. In cities, people regularly experience fear from everyday crime, complain about the situation, which statistics almost never capture.
Strasbourg, which I used here as an example, is, from the perspective of nighttime calm around the center and safety, simply a “different world.” Drone there work as an effective supplement for prevention. In similar Czech cities, this approach would fail because the dynamics and concentration of problematic groups in the center and main areas do not allow for simple technological monitoring.
During the
COVID-19 pandemic, drones began to be used in France to monitor compliance with lockdown measures and the movement of people in public spaces; this practice was subsequently restricted by courts due to privacy concerns, which led to the adoption of legislation in
2023 that legalized the use of drones and established conditions for their deployment—officially for purposes such as maintaining public order or preventing crime.
So calm and a sense of safety in a city are not just about statistics or technology, but about the actual reality, the visibility of problems, and the experience of the people who live and move there. Strasbourg shows that sometimes it’s enough to simply have a space where people “normally aren’t” for prevention to be effective. In my view, if there were a society that denied the existence of crime, Eurostat would evaluate that society as perfectly fine.
I don’t even need to mention why so many people outside of a country know me. This is also something that could be sociologically questioned.
