What crimes shape you? For me, it’s a missing MP and poor old Shergar

The first crime I remember was a zinger: lurid, fantastical, daring and, ultimately, doomed. It was the case of the MP John Stonehouse, who in late 1974 arranged a pile of his clothes on a Miami beach and did a runner to Australia, there to set up a new life with his secretary, free of all his money troubles and the (justified) suspicions that he was a Czech spy. I was six, and by the time he was arrested, the idea that Stonehouse – who, upon capture, was briefly investigated in case he was actually Lord Lucan – had not merely faked his own death but actually swum to Australia had taken root. How did he do it without being eaten by sharks?

According to a report in the British Journal of Criminology, this early exposure to malfeasance may have shaped my perceptions of crime to such an extent that, even now, I overestimate the number of Reggie Perrins in the world. A study into the lasting effects of our perception of crime reveals that it is closely bound up with what dominated the political agenda during one’s formative years, solidifying between the ages of 15 and 25.

Thus, those who grew up during the Wilson and Callaghan era expressed a high level of worry about mugging and robbery, along with burglary, which also preoccupied those who came of age during the Thatcher years. By the time we get to New Labour, antisocial behaviour is of most concern – with those expressing the most acute worries tending to be from the least well-off and least educated sections of society.

We don’t need Michel Foucault to tell us that the lawlessness and disorder that we brood on most is inextricably linked to the dispositions of those in power. One might therefore be unsurprised that in the Thatcher reign, with its focus on home-owning, there was anxiety about the possibility of burglary; especially, perhaps, because of the excitement that surrounded high-value purchases such as video cassette recorders. The Thatcher government, the report also points out, had already capitalised on the state of industrial relations and the economic crisis of the late 1970s to promote the idea of “a wider crisis of law and order”, with successive home secretaries emphasising their punitive responses to crime and their policies on criminal justice.

And fear of crime is always, in one way or another, also a fear of the other. The “moral panic” of the early 1970s, generated by politicians and newspapers, wasn’t merely about a rational worry about being assaulted and robbed on the street; it was also about fear of young black men and, later, about the tension between the black community and police “sus” laws that found an outlet in the 1981 Brixton riots. Brixton’s “bloody Saturday” was followed by unrest across the country, most notably in Handsworth and Toxteth – places disproportionately affected by the recession. And yet the study also shows that, rather than the fears of the white population, black, Asian and minority ethnic communities experienced the most anxiety about being mugged or attacked, perhaps suggesting not only the prevalence of racially motivated crime, but also the inadequate response of the authorities.

Interestingly, the survey focuses on the kind of crime that, by its nature, will be most widespread – the kind that people can imagine happening to them. But what of the more niche crime, such as that of John Stonehouse? The jigsaw puzzle seems to be missing that element of fascination with the far-fetched, the distinctly non-quotidian. The 1970s and 80s, for example, appeared to my febrile imagination the heyday of plane hijackings, restaurant sieges, targeted killings with poisoned umbrellas. Alongside the likes of Patty Hearst, kidnapped by the Symbionese Liberation Army and subsequently one of their (extremely hapless) freedom fighters, nicking a handbag seemed small beer.

What will those growing up now carry with them into their fearful futures? If they’re based in a large city, knife crime and mopeds may feature heavily; not to mention the visceral terror of acid attacks. For minority ethnic and immigrant groups, it’s hard to imagine that the rise of xenophobic and racist crime and the rhetoric of a re-emergent far right will not have lasting effects; for a tech-deluged generation, fears of identity theft must surely loom large. If people listen to Boris Johnson, and we must pray that they do not, they will quail before the thought of burqa-clad bank robbers.

Back to the days of yore, though. I have got over my Stonehouse addiction, and I’ve even accepted that Lord Lucan will never turn up. But I rarely see a racehorse without thinking: poor Shergar. I hope they treated him kindly.

• Alex Clark is a Guardian writer