Body-Worn Cameras in the Post-Ferguson Era: An Exploration of Law Enforcement Perspectives

Abstract

In the aftermath of Michael Brown’s death in Ferguson, Missouri, confidence in police has weakened. Body-worn cameras (BWCs) are perceived to increase law enforcement transparency and accountability, and, by proxy, restore law enforcement legitimacy. Though the empirical status of BWCs has grown in recent years, missing from these accounts are the actual words and narratives of officers. Through a qualitative approach, the data and analysis within this paper overcome this issue and indicate that BWCs have had an impact on police–citizen interactions in one Southern American State. More specifically, citizen and officer accountability from BWCs was found to have positive and negative consequence. Officers articulated this supposition in a number of ways and the paper contextualizes these perspectives within the extant literature. The policy implications and areas of future research from these findings are discussed as they inform a non-positivist approach to research.