Fostering Better Policing through the Use of Indicators to Measure Institutional Strengthening

Abstract

Despite the remarkable achievements in the development of Mexico's democracy, there is a lack of substantial progress in an essential matter: justice and police reform. This has been aggravated in recent years, following a very violent outbreak of organised crime, which has shown the incapability of, and the extent of the corruption within, these institutions. Although there have been 15 years of increased investment in the sector, it is easy to infer that lots of resources have been wasted and little progress achieved because of the lack of clear objectives and sound evaluation. The State of Queretaro, Mexico, developed a programme to promote police reform within the municipal police services, based on standards designed to strengthen the institutional capabilities to measure and improve individual and organisation performance. This paper relates the experience of evaluating police agencies in Queretaro where, as in the rest of the country, police institutions have been historically closed to public scrutiny. It shows the expected and unexpected outcomes, some positive and some negative, of a programme to reform police services through evaluation, with a voluntary, transparent and objective approach.