Police Scholars Research Articles

Beyond ‘police discretion’: The need for a new conceptual vocabulary

What are we talking about when we talk about police discretion? The concept is ubiquitous yet ambiguous and amorphous. In analytical terms it is redundant, but its continued use remains (for some) convenient and politically expedient. References to police discretion, connote as much as they denote, and in so doing they reproduce politico-legal structures that legitimise, enable, and may even embolden, discriminatory policing practices. We conclude, therefore, that policing scholars ought to move beyond discretion, developing a new conceptual vocabulary for making sense of police power.

Guest editorial: Policing and Asian communities: an area that has been neglected by police scholars

Guest editorial: Policing and Asian communities: an area that has been neglected by police scholars

Police custody in rural Scotland: negotiating boundaries, risk and organisational change

PurposeThis paper explores the challenging nexus of police custody, risk and intra-organisational boundaries in the context of a recently reformed national police service. Police custody is an often-hidden aspect of policing, away from the public gaze and scrutiny. Although there is increasing recognition of the importance of rural policing (e.g. Harkness (2020); Mawby and Yarwood (2011); Ruddell and Jones (2020); Yarwood and Wooff (2016)), there has been little or no focus on rural police custody. This paper seeks to begin to redress this by focussing on the challenges faced by rural police custody in the context of large-scale organisational change.Design/methodology/approachThis paper draws on data from a study funded by the Scottish Institute for Policing Research (2016–2018), entitled “Measuring Risk and Efficiency in Police Custody in Scotland”. The paper adopts a qualitative methodology to develop an understanding of the varying nature of police custody across Scotland. Two contrasting case study locations were selected, one urban and one rural. 12 semi-structured interviews and 15 hours of observation were carried out. Data was transcribed, coded and analysed and thematic analysis enabled themes to be developed. This paper draws on the data from the rural custody suite.FindingsDrawing on the theoretical framework of Giacomantonio (2014) and more recent considerations of abstract policing Terpstra et al. (2019), this paper offers insights into the ways that police custody in rural Scotland has been organised, against the backdrop of challenging organisational change. I argue that as policing services in Scotland have become increasingly “abstract” from communities, police custody as a national division has witnessed the impact of this more greatly than other parts of local policing. Intra-organisational management around staffing has led to complex management of risk, illustrating some of the challenges of national organisational change on police custody.Originality/valueThis paper focuses on the impact of large scale organisational change on rural police custody and intra-organisational relationships and dynamics. Rural policing is still a largely neglected area of study and rural police custody is even less understood. This paper therefore provides an original contribution by focusing on this under-researched area of policing. It also illustrates complexity around risk, staffing and management of people being held in rural police custody suites. It is therefore of value to policing scholars in other contexts, as well as rural criminology more generally. It has applicability to international contexts where macro level policing reform is occurring.

범죄예방에 있어서 시민참여의 한계

Citizens perceive crime prevention as the task of a criminal justice institution, but the police, one of the criminal justice institutions, has a vacuum in crime prevention and policing activities due to excessive policing duties. Accordingly, the participation of the private sector in crime prevention, that is, a way to activate citizen participation, was actively discussed among criminal and criminal justice and police scholars and practitioners. However, civic participation in crime prevention is currently experiencing many limitations rather than being activated.
 This study intends to examine the limitations by exploring the types and limitations of citizen participation in crime prevention and deriving problems.
 As a result, there is a limit to civic participation. First, there is a lack of publicity for the Citizens Police Academy due to the lack of channels for citizen participation in crime prevention activities. Second, the simplification of the participating organizations or participating personnel of the crime prevention conference. Third, there is a limit to citizens' awareness and participation in reporting crimes. Fourth, it was considered as insufficient support for autonomous crime prevention unit activities. Therefore, future research directions were suggested through consideration of the limitations.

The geography of (un)reasonable suspicion: Rethinking causes of racial disparities in police stops

AbstractIn Illinois vs. Wardlow (2000), the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that presence in a “high‐crime” area is one factor that police can consider when establishing reasonable suspicion to justify a Terry stop. Some legal scholars argue that through this decision the Court propagated inequity in police stops by setting a lower evidentiary standard for establishing reasonable suspicion in neighborhoods with greater numbers Black residents, which are more likely than White neighborhoods to be considered crime hot spots. To assess these claims, I analyze pedestrian stop data from the Chicago Police Department for the years 2016 and 2017. Using spatial regression techniques, I evaluate relationships between neighborhood measures of Black disadvantage, police stop justifications, and “hit rates” of stops. The results suggest that reasonable suspicion is uniquely constructed in disadvantaged Black neighborhoods but that this does not result in significantly different enforcement rates. Based on these results, I argue that policing scholars must reconsider sources of inequity in policing and, in particular, consider the role of the law in shaping these outcomes.

Digital policing in Nigeria: A study of Jigawa State Police Command

The application of digital technologies in police practices can engender a number of benefits, which include round-the-clock surveillance, intelligence collection (in real time), community policing (through regular online briefings and trust-building by policing agencies) and disruption of crimes, among others. This study used situational crime prevention theory and examined the use, benefits and challenges of digital policing in Jigawa State Police Command, Nigeria. A sample of 230 respondents was utilized in the study. From the sample, 215 police personnel were administered questionnaires, and 15 in-depth interviews were conducted with 5 police personnel, 5 information technology professionals and 5 policing scholars. The study revealed that use of digital technologies in police practice is low in Jigawa State, because the study discovered insufficient digital technologies in the police command. Furthermore, the majority of police personnel sampled were not skilled in information and communications technologies. No doubt, poor use of digital technologies may pose a serious setback to crime prevention in Jigawa State, Nigeria. Therefore, it is recommended that the police should acquire and leverage on emerging policing technologies. Police personnel should be given adequate training and retraining on the use of digital technologies. Collaboration and information sharing with relevant agencies should also be improved.

Understanding contradictory styles of policing

Policing scholars have shown that logics of police governance that appear mutually exclusive can coexist in the same space and time. Within police institutions, we can find more military-like mindsets alongside democratic rationalities. We here present a novel theoretical perspective for understanding such coexistence. Instead of attempting to identify police rationalities by reference to organizational/structural factors such as subcultures, training, or firearms and other equipment, we show that contradictory logics of policing can coexist within the same force by differentiating policing's targets by space, temporality, and identity. To do so, we use the idea of “chronotope” to identify and understand how police officers decide between conflicting rationalities of policing.

How generalizable are findings from police surveys? A review of multi-agency studies

ABSTRACT Policing scholars frequently use surveys to understand officer attitudes and behavioral intentions. Yet, it is difficult to gain access to one – let alone multiple – agencies. Thus, officer surveys often reflect views in a single department, making it unclear how generalizable the findings are. For the present study, we conducted an exploratory review of articles published in 16 criminology and policing journals from 2000 to 2017. We identified 600 studies that involved surveying one or more samples of police officers. From this list, we set out to determine: (1) how often authors administered their surveys to more than one sample, and (2) when surveys were administered to more than one sample, how often were results consistent across samples? We found eighty-seven (14.5%) articles that involved collecting survey data from multiple agencies, though only 29 (4.8% overall, 33.3% of multi-agencies studies) met our inclusion criteria. Importantly, only 15 studies could be analyzed as some authors no longer had data, could not share data, or did not response to our emails. Results were fully consistent across samples in just one published study. In the other studies, findings partially replicated – though sometimes results were in the opposite direction across departments. Thus, replication is critical before policy is created from single-agency surveys.

Striking the right balance? Evidence, ethics and the effectiveness of stop and search

Systematic reviews are often most powerful and persuasive when they provide evidence that goes against accepted wisdom and upsets the status quo. The paper by Weisburd et al. is very likely to fall into that category and provide evidence-based policing with a major challenge when disseminating the results to policymakers and practitioners. While it should come as no surprise to policing scholars that police stops can simultaneously reduce crime at an area level1—particularly when targeted in crime hot spots—and adversely affect the people stopped by the police at an individual level, the Weisburd et al.’s bold conclusion that the ‘existing scientific evidence does not support the widespread use of [police stops] as a proactive policing strategy’ (this issue, XX) will undoubtedly test the policing ‘common-sense’ and inevitably draw criticism. There is much to discuss about the Weisburd et al. excellent summary of the evidence. I wish to raise two specific points about police stops and their legal purpose in England and Wales in respect of crime reduction, before moving on to make some more general points about the review.

The Endless Juggle: Differential Effects of the Pandemic for Criminal Justice Scholars

While inequalities in scholarly productivity have long existed, the long-term implications on productivity due to the COVID-19 pandemic are not well documented. Using data from a survey of policing scholars, we conduct a mixed-methods analysis to determine the differential impacts of the pandemic on scholarly productivity, focusing on the intersectional effects by gender, childcare responsibilities, academic rank, and teaching load. Findings suggest that the effects of the pandemic were not evenly experienced by criminal justice and criminology researchers with the effects of productivity influenced by gender, rank and childcare responsibilities. We specifically discuss the longer-term implications of the pandemic on academic careers.

A Study on the Operating Conditions and Implications of the Japanese Police System

Many police scholars in the West describe Japan as one of the world's most secure countries because its police system is run mainly by citizens. Japan has a low crime rate and its police system has a unique structure in which national and municipal police coexist. And the Japanese police are successfully carrying out crime prevention activities in such an organization. The Japanese police system is a combination of a centralized police system controlled by the state and a decentralized police system controlled by the prefecture. Though it is not well organized like a centralized police system, it is better organized than a decentralized police system. Even if prefectural control and impact are not as large as the decentralized police system, they can be said to be greater than the centralized police system. The Japanese police are receiving a lot of favorable reviews in terms of system and operation, but they also have many problems. In this study, the organizational structure of the Japanese police is analyzed to examine the characteristics that appear due to the dual structure, and to find implications for the Korean police system.

“I'm just different–that's all–I'm so sorry … ”: Black men, ASD and the urgent need for DisCrit Theory in police encounters

PurposeLimited research focuses on the challenges that exist at the intersection of race and dis/ability for Black men on the autism spectrum in encounters with law enforcement. An interdisciplinary approach is necessary to fully comprehend and mitigate the complex challenges. This conceptual article presents Critical Dis/ability (DisCrit) Theory, a framework usually applied to education, as a lens through which to think about encounters between Black autistic men and police officers. The article concludes with recommendations for collaboration between social scientists, police scholars, law enforcement and the public to improve the outcomes of police encounters involving Black men on the autism spectrum.Design/methodology/approachUsing a literature review and analysis of current events, this conceptual article explores the intersections of race and disability, specifically neurodiversity, in policing using Critical Dis/ability (DisCrit) theory, and its predecessors, Intersectionality Theory and Critical Race Theory (CRT).FindingsAn interdisciplinary approach might be a potential solution to improve police encounters with Black autistic men. Expanding the theoretical frameworks utilized in scholarship about policing might allow for innovative approaches to examine current practices in law enforcement. Collaboration and critical dialogue may yield opportunities for further research and shifts in practice.Originality/valueThis conceptual article uses two incidents from recent events to highlight the need for increased scholarship around the intersections of autism and race, with a particular focus on Black autistic men. It advocates for the use of social science frameworks, namely DisCrit Theory, as a novel way to approach new research regarding race and dis/ability.

Testing the Job Demands–Job Resources Model for Police Officer Job Burnout in a Sample of Indian Police Officers

Using the job demands–resources model, the association of job demands (dangerousness, role underload, role overload, role ambiguity, and role conflict) and job resources (instrumental communication, formalization, input into decision-making, views on training, and job autonomy) with the burnout dimensions of emotional exhaustion, depersonalization, and reduced sense of accomplishment was studied among of 827 police officers in the State of Haryana in India. Multivariate regression indicated that dangerousness, underload, ambiguity, and conflict were associated with higher emotional exhaustion, while input, training, and job autonomy were negatively related. Underload, ambiguity, and conflict were related to higher depersonalization, while overload, instrumental communication, training, and autonomy were related to lower levels. Ambiguity was linked with a reduced sense of accomplishment, while dangerousness, instrumental communication, and training had negative associations. Overall, the results support the job demands–resources model; however, curiously, overload was linked to lower depersonalization and dangerousness was linked to an enhanced sense of accomplishment. The implications for Indian police administrators are lower the significant job demands and raise the significant job resources to reduce job burnout among officers. What is not clear is if the results of the current and past studies apply to officers across the world or vary by nation/culture. The implication for police scholars is the need to conduct research among officers in a wide array of nations to help answer the question of which job demands and resources are universal in their association with the burnout dimensions and which ones are contextual, varying across nations.

Towards reflexivity in police practice and research

AbstractIn their recent article, Bennell et al. (2021) address the ongoing series of critical incidents within law enforcement across the globe and the amplified public debate that ensured. The team of renowned international police scholars and practitioners intend to ‘provide insights into the fundamental issues related to police use of force’ (Bennell et al., 2021, p. 1) and work out what they perceive to be ‘urgent issues and prospects (p. 1)’. Since the author's proposal is likely to influence future debates, we feel warrants that foremost the issue on how the issue of urgency is handled in the paper at hand deserves scientific attention. While Bennell et al. (2021) emphasize the importance of evidence‐based policing for the further professionalization of policing, we advocate for reflexivity in modern police practice and research. Reflexivity calls for the analysis on preconditions and consequences of scientific perspectives themselves, thus touching issues of evidence of evidence.

Further Mitigating the Academic-Law Enforcement Research Divide

Since the 1960s, there has been well-documented incidents of the scholar-practitioner tension within policing research. Though there has been maturation in the professional partnership over the years, hindrances persist. The current study aims to advance collaborative efforts between the academic and law enforcement communities. Data for the current study derived from written documents and interviews. Results indicate that one individual, who possesses the appreciative cultural and social capital, can successfully mobilize collaborative research agendas between academics and police officers. These forms of capital (i.e., cultural and social) offer a new outlook on negotiating the obstacles that inhibit successful research collaboration between both professions. For new policing scholars, who have minimal connections with law enforcement, findings in the current study may serve as a recipe of sorts to better understand the practitioners to identify in collaborative research endeavors.

Can Police Unions Help Change American Policing?

Police unions are part of the problem in American policing. Could police unions also be part of the solution? This Comment begins by putting into practice the dialectic we must achieve at a societal level by detailing the ways in which police and Black Americans have been positioned to be in conflict from the seventeenth century to the present, and by discussing the formation of police unions. American society needs truth-telling about the history and present context that drives police officers into deadly conflict with Black Americans to heal, trust, and effectuate a more perfect system for public safety. This Comment wrestles with the need to understand several truths at once: that police organized into unions in part to protect the rank-and-file from managerial abuse; that the American policing system is in many ways designed and implemented against Black Americans; that police unions organized in the Civil Rights Era to protect police officers from discipline for following orders; and that deep, structural change should include police unions. Less fundamental changes that leave in place the core of American policing, without examining its racist foundations and incentives toward brutality and lethal force, will not serve to bring about lasting reconciliation. This Comment reviews several ways to improve the management of police departments put forth by labor and policing scholars and suggests that the promise of such reforms could motivate participation in a truth process. The conversation about policing reform in the United States has expanded and deepened tremendously in the past year, and it continues to evolve and take on new dimensions. This Comment urges policymakers to create a truth process as part of police reform and suggests that the process be implemented via the police unions because the voices of police organizations that represent rank-and-file officers are a critical ingredient for meaningful change.

PROTOCOL: Police stops to reduce crime: A systematic review.

PROTOCOL: Police stops to reduce crime: A systematic review.

Advancing police use of force research and practice: urgent issues and prospects

Leading police scholars and practitioners were asked to reflect on the most urgent issues that need to be addressed on the topic of use of force. Four themes emerged from their contributions: use of force and de‐escalation training needs to improve and be evaluated; new ways of conceptualizing use of force encounters and better use of force response models need to be developed; the inequitable application of force, and how to remediate biases, needs to be more fully understood; and misconceptions about police use of force need to be identified and corrected. The highlighted topics serve as an agenda for future research. Such research should provide greater insight into when, where, and why force is used by police officers, and how it can be applied appropriately. If implemented, the practical recommendations included in the contributions should have a positive impact on police performance, public trust and confidence in the police, and citizen and officer safety.

SWAT everywhere? A response to Jenkins, Semple, Bennell, and Huey

This paper is a response to an article on public police special weapons and tactics (SWAT) teams written by Jenkins and colleagues (2020). Jenkins and colleagues are responding to a study showing that tactical units and members are being used more in Canadian policing. For Jenkins and colleagues, not only are SWAT teams being used properly, but drawing from interviews with tactical members they suggest SWAT teams should be used more in the future. This response focuses on conceptual, methodological, and empirical deficiencies in the work of Jenkins and colleagues. This response shows that Jenkins and colleagues ignore social theory, ignore relevant contrary data, are ignorant of the harms of policing, and are ignorant of the violence that Black and Indigenous peoples face from Canadian police. Relatedly, this response offers a criticism of what is called evidence-based policing scholarship. Using the work of Jenkins and colleagues as an example, the argument here is that evidence-based policing scholars are in a conflict of interest because of how closely they work with police and due to the funding they receive from police agencies and justice ministries. This conflict of interest decreases the credibility and trustworthiness of the claims of evidence-based policing scholars. Overall, this response draws attention not only to the harms of public policing and criminalization, but also to how evidence-based policing scholarship is supporting the expansion of violent, harmful, and regressive forms of social control.

A Conditional Likelihood Model of the Relationship Between Officer Features and Rounds Discharged in Police Shootings

Assess whether the number of rounds fired in an officer-involved shooting is related to police officer features. The data come from 55 member agencies in the Major Cities Chiefs Association. The full dataset describes 2574 officers involved in 1600 shootings between 2010 and 2018 but only incidents involving multiple officers provide information. Our final dataset included 317 shooting incidents involving 849 officers and 5026 rounds. We match officers on the scene of a shooting incident and develop a conditional truncated Poisson model that eliminates confounding due to time, place, and environment. We use a permutation test to formally assess the strength of the relationship between officer features and shooting rate. We find no officer feature strongly predicts shooting rate. Age at recruitment, age at the time of the shooting, and years of experience all had relative rates nearly equal to 1.0. There was no statistical relationship with an officer being female (p = 0.27), black (p = 0.64), or Hispanic (p = 0.39). Having prior involvement in shootings, prior force complaints, and special assignments appear to elevate the relative rate of shooting, but all confidence intervals included 1.0. Officer features appear to have little or no relationship with shooting rate. These findings correspond with police scholars’ supposition that duty assignment may be more responsible for explaining differences in police use of force than individual officer characteristics. It contrasts with some prior research suggesting that officer race, age at recruitment, and prior performance affect shooting risk. In doing so, these results also lend support to theoretical frameworks emphasizing the role of organizational features and other system-level factors over individual-level explanations for police use of force. The proposed methodology addresses bias due to confounding, but demands a large number of shootings. Expanded participation in multi-agency data collections and including data on all non-shooting officers at the scene of the incident can increase precision.