Civilianising the ‘Blue Code’? An Examination of Attitudes to Misconduct in the Police Extended Family

Abstract

Despite the importance of integrity to policing, the extensive literature on police misconduct, police culture and the code of silence, a significant knowledge gap exists in respect of the integrity of police staff and their opinions of misconduct. Having identified these gaps, a methodology was developed that built on previous studies of policing integrity across the world. This methodology, which consisted of an anonymous electronic survey distributed to every employee of a police force in northern England, provided the means through which any variances between civilian police staff and police officers could be examined. The results of the survey showed that despite certain similarities between police officers and police staff, there were a number of significant differences in respect of their views and opinions on integrity. The key finding of this research project was that in spite of the literature affirming the strength of the ‘blue code of silence’ amongst police officers, police staff were actually less likely to report incidents of misconduct than officers. This indicated that the code of silence amongst police staff may actually be stronger than that of police officers. This paper also offers explanations as to why this might be the case.