Abstract
The police are faced with a uniquely important role in the initiation of a process of justice. Through a framework of distributive justice, which examines both processes and outcomes of police encounters and the concrete and symbolic resources at their disposal, this paper seeks to analyse data from three policing projects over a 16-year period. The findings indicate a remarkably consistent story of barriers to justice which preclude the opportunity to access justice or of a satisfactory outcome or indeed any outcome at all. The lack of allocated concrete or symbolic resources was evident in complainants receiving limited time, investigation and voice. This paper argues that there is evidence of an unfair and inequitable distribution of resources to victims and potential victims of crime which is enabled by police discretion, justified by focusing on deservedness and personal choice and encouraged by the cultural language of stigmatisation of people and place.
Highlights
The police are faced with a uniquely important role in the initiation of a process of justice
It is perhaps pertinent to revisit a branch of justice which prominent towards the end of the last century has seen its influence within the field of criminology waning – distributive justice
The paper seeks to consider this allocation of resources through an examination of police discretion and how, alongside the concept of ‘deservedness’ and the cultural schemas which influence police actions, this might impact upon different sections of the population
Summary
The police are faced with a uniquely important role in the initiation of a process of justice. There is a danger of conflating procedures with justice by focussing too much upon processes (Cropanzano and Ambrose, 2001; Thibaut and Walker, 1975), a danger of conflating the issue of fairness with that of generosity when considering positive outcomes (Lerner and Clayton, 2011) and a danger of conflating legitimacy with fairness by focussing too much on the legitimacy of the authority granted to powerholders rather than on the ethical behaviour of those involved (Leibling, 2004) This is relevant for policing as the relationships are already problematised by traditional perceptions of ‘good’ and ‘bad’ and ‘guilty’ and ‘innocent’ and discussions around fairness remain about power and consent to power rather than the embedding of ethical behaviour in practice. The aim is to explore the barriers to accessing justice by drawing on qualitative data from three separate policing research projects conducted over a sixteen-year period
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