Crime, Policing and Social Order: On the Expressive Nature of Public Confidence in Policing (original) (raw)
Related papers
British Journal of Sociology, 2009
Public confidence in policing is receiving increasing attention from UK social scientists and policy-makers. The criminal justice system relies on legitimacy and consent to an extent unlike other public services: public support is vital if the police and other criminal justice agencies are to function both effectively and in accordance with democratic norms. Yet we know little about the forms of social perception that stand prior to public confidence and police legitimacy. Drawing on data from the 2003/2004 British Crime Survey and the 2006/2007 London Metropolitan Police Safer Neighbourhoods Survey, this paper suggests that people think about their local police in ways less to do with the risk of victimization (instrumental concerns about personal safety) and more to do with judgments of social cohesion and moral consensus (expressive concerns about neighbourhood stability, cohesion and loss of collective authority). Across England and Wales the police may not primarily be seen as providers of a narrow sense of personal security, held responsible for crime and safety. Instead the police may stand as symbolic ‘moral guardians’ of social stability and order, held responsible for community values and informal social controls. We also present evidence that public confidence in the London Metropolitan Police Service expresses broader social anxieties about long-term social change. We finish our paper with some thoughts on a sociological analysis of the cultural place of policing: confidence (and perhaps ultimately the legitimacy of the police) might just be wrapped up in broader public concerns about social order and moral consensus.
Title: Does the fear of crime erode public confiden ce in policing
This paper examines the relationship between public confidence in policing and public perceptions of crime, disorder and social cohesion. Combining data from ten sweeps of the British Crime Survey, our analysis shows that public confidence is based less on instrumental concerns about crime and more on expressive concerns about neighbourhood stability and breakdown. Therefore, confidence is driven not by fear of crime but by lay concerns about disorder, cohesion and informal social control. Members of the public look to the police as old-fashioned representatives of community values and norms -as symbols of moral authority who address everyday problems and strengthen social order. To increase public confidence and decrease the fear of crime, the police need to re-engage as an active part of the community and represent and defend community values, norms and morals. However we conclude by questioning whether a pervasive police response to problems of low level social disorder is either fully achievable or fully desirable. The causes of public anxiety about disorder may themselves run deeper than a policing response can (or should) reach.
One of the first actions of the new Home Secretary was to scrap public confidence as the single performance indicator of policing in England and Wales. But public trust and confidence will remain important to policing policy and practice. Trust and confidence can (a) encourage active citizen participation in priority setting and the running of local services, (b) make public bodies more locally accountable and responsive, and (c) secure public cooperation with the police and compliance with the law. Analysing survey data from London we find that overall 'public confidence' condenses a range of complex and inter-related judgements concerning the trustworthiness of the police. This is the case across different population groups and those with different experiences of crime and policing. Even recent victims and those worried about crime seem to place less priority on police effectiveness compared to police fairness and community alignment when responding to summary confidence questions. We argue that confidence summarises a motive-based trust that is rooted in procedural fairness and a social alignment between the police and the community. This social alignment is founded upon public assessments of the ability of the police to be a 'civic guardian' who secures public respect and embodies community values (Loader & Mulcahy, 2003). By demonstrating their trustworthiness to the public, the police can strengthen their social connection with citizens, and thus encourage more active civic engagement in domains of security and policing.
Does the Fear of Crime Erode Public Confidence In Policing?
Policing, 2009
This paper examines the relationship between public confidence in policing and public perceptions of crime, disorder and social cohesion. Combining data from ten sweeps of the British Crime Survey, our analysis shows that public confidence is based less on instrumental concerns about crime and more on expressive concerns about neighbourhood stability and breakdown. Therefore, confidence is driven not by fear of crime but by lay concerns about disorder, cohesion and informal social control. Members of the public look to the police as old-fashioned representatives of community values and norms – as symbols of moral authority who address everyday problems and strengthen social order. To increase public confidence and decrease the fear of crime, the police need to re-engage as an active part of the community and represent and defend community values, norms and morals. However we conclude by questioning whether a pervasive (Loader 2006) police response to problems of low level social disorder is either fully achievable or fully desirable. The causes of public anxiety about disorder may themselves run deeper than a policing response can (or should) reach.
Just Authority? Public trust and police legitimacy
1. Social and moral connections 2. Design of the study FOREWORD This well written and engaging volume articulates and empirically supports a new and innovative approach to policing based upon the goal of creating and maintaining the belief among members of the public that police authority is legitimate. In so doing the authors are providing a new framework for thinking about the goals of policing, one that emphasizes how police policies and practices are experienced within policed communities. Rather than concentrating authority over policing decisions within higher level policing authorities, and rather than evaluating police effectiveness in terms of success in combating particular forms of crime defined by police professionals, this approach suggests that the community needs to play a strong role in defining its problems and in determining how the police should address those problems.
Cooperating with the Police: Social Control and the Reproduction of Police Legitimacy
Calling upon and assisting police officers are acts of public cooperation that link informal and formal mechanisms of social control. An in-depth study of seven London neighborhoods investigates the relationships between (a) cooperation with the police, (b) public trust in police fairness and effectiveness, and (c) public perceptions of everyday social regulation processes. Cooperation with the police is associated first with high levels of public trust in procedural fairness, second with confidence that local residents will intervene on behalf of the collective good, and third with heightened concerns about disorder and the loss of authority and discipline in society. We conclude with the idea that cooperation is shaped by trust in the police and is reinforced and challenged by a complex set of relational concerns. Moreover, by recognizing and supporting the function of the police to fight crime and administer justice, acts of cooperation both constitute and confer police legitimacy.
Criminology and Criminal Justice, 2014
Accounts of public 'trust and confidence' in criminal justice agencies often fall into one of two camps. Instrumental accounts suggest that people trust police and the criminal justice system (CJS) when they believe them to be effective in fighting crime and reducing offending. Expressive or affective accounts, by contrast, suggest people place as much or more emphasis on the social meaning of justice institutions as on their instrumental activities. In this article we add to recent studies that have sought to weigh up the balance between instrumental and expressive factors. Using data from the Crime Survey for England and Wales panel experiment, we present evidence that trust in police and the wider CJS is implicated in public concerns about the nature of local order and cohesion. The expressive account appears to offer a better understanding of why people may grant trust to, or withdraw trust from, the police and the CJS.
Legitimacy and the Social Field of Policing
Public actions that summon and assist police officers are vital for the effective and equitable functioning of the criminal justice system. Such acts of cooperation link informal and formal mechanisms of social control. They also reflect the legitimacy of the police. This paper reports the findings of a probability sample survey investigating public trust, institutional legitimacy and cooperation with the police in London, England. We find that the readiness of individuals to cooperate with the police is associated with their trust in police procedural fairness and the legitimacy they invest in the police. This replicates prior US-based research in the UK for the first time, but we also highlight some predictors of public cooperation that have hitherto gone unexamined. Linking police legitimacy and cooperation to perceived collective efficacy (confidence that local residents will intervene on behalf of the collective good), concerns about disorder, and authoritarian positions on the perceived loss of discipline in society, we use Bourdieu’s notions of field and habitus to highlight the role that the social position of the police plays in generating public cooperation. Police legitimacy is shaped by its location in the social ‘field’ of policing and the web of relationships that link organization and citizen.
Drawing upon original survey research this article seeks to identify the generative processes that influence perceptions of the police in the context of an inner-city neighbourhood in Northern Ireland that has been affected by increases in crime and disorder in the aftermath of the peace process. Conceptually we draw upon recent research from England and Wales that outlines confidence in the police in terms of instrumental and expressive dimensions. We apply this framework and consider whether it provides a useful template for understanding the postconflict dynamics of police-community relations in our study area. Contrary to much received wisdom our analysis suggests that instrumental concerns about crime and illegal activity are a more influential predictor of attitudes to the police than expressive concerns with disorder and anti-social behaviour. Consequently our discussion points to the variance in local and national survey data and questions the degree to which the latter can usefully inform our understanding of trends and developments in discrete micro-spaces. Our conclusion outlines the potential policy implications for state policing practice in deprived urban spaces.
Just Authority? Trust in the Police in England and Wales
What does it mean to trust the police? What makes the police legitimate in the eyes of the policed? What builds trust, legitimacy and cooperation, and what undermines the bond between police and the public? These questions are central to current debates concerning the relationship between the British police and the public it serves. Yet, in the context of British policing they are seldom asked explicitly, still less examined in depth. Drawing on psychological and sociological explanatory paradigms, Just Authority presents a cutting-edge empirical study into public trust, police legitimacy, and people’s readiness to cooperate with officers. It represents, first, the most detailed test to date of Tom Tyler’s procedural justice model attempted outside the United States. Second, it uncovers the social ecology of trust and legitimacy. Third, it describes the relationships between trust, legitimacy and cooperation. This book contains many important lessons for practitioners, policy-makers and academics. As elsewhere the dominant vision of policing in Great Britain continues to stress instrumental effectiveness: the ‘fight against crime’ will be won by pro-active and even aggressive policing. In line with work from the United States and elsewhere, Just Authority casts significant doubt on such claims. When people find policing to be unfair, disrespectful and careless of human dignity, not only is trust lost, legitimacy is also damaged and cooperation is withdrawn as a result. Absent such public support, the job of the police is made harder and the avowed objectives of less crime and disorder placed ever further from reach.