Policing Protest Events: The Great Strike of 1877 and WTO Protests of 1999

The notion of the police as protecting dominant economic interests is explored by presenting two case studies of direct action social movements occurring nearly 100 years apart. Recent protests in response to a non-state international organization (the World Trade Organization) are compared with a major labor strike of the late 19th century (the Great Strike of 1877). Historical data supports the contention that, despite many changes to contemporary policing strategies, the police are routinely used to protect existing economic structures. These narratives demonstrate how shifts in economic institutions shape formal social control practices. Comparing these events reveals how new technologies have allowed for certain adaptations and innovations for contemporary protesting and protest breaking activities. It is argued that the police institution should not be understood as only charged with responding reactively to criminal violations, but rather as serving more important social functions such as protecting dominant economic structures.     

Crowd Situations and their Policing from the Perspective of Finnish Police Officers—a Case Study of Finnish Police Knowledge

This study explores crowd situations from the perspective of the Finnish police. The qualitative data consist of focused face-to-face interviews with police officers (n = 15). The results of these interviews indicate that special crowd control units have shifted from being an innovation to being an ordinary part of public order policing, despite the infrequent use of these units. Furthermore, police knowledge concurrently involved diversity and polarity. Crowd situations vary from political protests to sporting events and street festivals, and the police play multiple roles and apply diverse measures and tactics depending on the situation. Polarity is linked to the way the police perceive different crowds and crowd events as ‘easy’ and ‘ordinary’ or ‘difficult’ and ‘deviant’. Finally, tension emerges between national and global aspects within police knowledge. This tension is linked to how police perceive crowd events and public order policing in terms of the past, the present, and the future.     

A Multidimensional View of Legal Cynicism: Perceptions of the Police Among Anti‐harassment Teams in Egypt

In Egypt in 2012, several anti‐harassment groups were established to respond to an increase in sexual violence in public spaces and to the failure of the state to tackle the issue. Anti‐harassment groups organized patrol‐type intervention teams that operated during demonstrations or public celebrations to stop sexual assaults. This article examines how activists perceived the police in five anti‐harassment groups between 2012 and 2014, and the role these perceptions played in groups' decisions about cooperating with the police, and on‐the‐ground strategies of action. I argue for a multidimensional view of legal cynicism that conceptualizes legal cynicism as composed of three dimensions: legitimacy (a sense that law enforcement agencies are not entitled to be deferred to and obeyed), protection (a perception that the law fails to protect rights and provide public safety), and threat (a perception that the law represents a threat). This approach helps uncover the various meanings that legal cynicism takes for different actors in different contexts, and how actors justify their strategies of action based on their specific perceptions of the police's legitimacy, protective role, and threat.     

Feeling Blue: Officer Perceptions of Public Antipathy Predict Police Occupational Norms

American Journal of Criminal Justice - Recent protests against law enforcement have spurred claims by practitioners and editorialists that public antipathy toward the police may influence police...     

The dilemma of ‘racial profiling’: an abolitionist police history#

While the conquest of the world by the concept of ‘racial profiling’ was a major victory for activists, real victory for racial justice at the hands of the police was foreclosed, for the notion is a Trojan Horse. Snuck inside this term developed for radical purposes are distinctly conservative propositions. This paper analyzes the ways the individualizing implications of the concept of racial profiling mask the depth and reach of the state’s commitment to containing resistance and eliciting consent by deploying technologies of race. Against ‘racial profiling’s’ suggestion of incidental, improper police practice, this essay offers a history of the U.S. police that shows their deep and abiding commitment to reproducing race and racism. Tracing police history in relation to colonialism and slavery, the essay argues that the history of this fundamental instantiation of state racism leaves no hope for successful reform, but rather demands a practical and thoughtful commitment to police abolition.     

The “war on cops,” retaliatory violence,and the murder of George Floyd*

The police murder of George Floyd sparked nationwide protests in the summer of 2020 and revived claims that public outcry over such high-profile police killings perpetuated a violent “war on cops.” Using data collected by the Gun Violence Archive (GVA) on firearm assaults of U.S. police officers, we use Bayesian structural time series (BSTS) modeling to empirically assess if and how patterns of firearm assault on police officers in the United States were influenced by the police murder of George Floyd. Our analysis finds that the murder of George Floyd was associated with a 3-week spike in firearm assaults on police, after which the trend in firearms assaults dropped to levels only slightly above that which were predicted by pre-Floyd data. We discuss potential explanations for these findings and consider their relevance to the contemporary discussion of a “war on cops,” violence, and officer safety.     

Command-level Police Officers’ Perceptions of the “War on Cops” and De-policing

Policing has been the subject of intense public scrutiny for the better part of two years after several high-profile police killings of unarmed African Americans across the United States. The scrutiny has been so extreme that some contend there is currently a “war on cops”—whereby citizens are emboldened by protests and negative media coverage of the police, and are lashing out by assaulting police officers more frequently. In response, it is argued that officers are de-policing (i.e. avoiding proactive stops). We surveyed command-level police officers from a southeastern state about their attitudes concerning the war on cops and de-policing. The majority of our sample believed there has been a war on cops over the last two years. Moreover, officers who felt strongly about the existence of a war on cops were more likely to believe that de-policing is common among officers in today’s world of law enforcement.     

The Expansion and Normalization of Police Militarization in Canada

Despite extensive analysis of police militarization in the United States (US), the case in Canada has been overlooked. Building on Kraska’s (in Policing 1(4):501–513, 2007) framework of police militarization indicators, this paper examines militarization within Canadian police forces between 2007 and 2016. Drawing from data on deployments disclosed under freedom of information law, our research shows deployment of special weapons and tactics (SWAT) teams have escalated in many major Canadian cities and are even higher in some cases than those reported by Kraska on militarization of US public police. We show how SWAT teams are increasingly used by public police for routine police activities such as warrant work, traffic enforcement, community policing, and even responding to mental health crises and domestic disturbances. We also analyze data on SWAT team growth, and benchmarking between police service SWAT units. We conclude by reflecting on the implications for public policing in Canada and avenues for future research on police militarization and police violence in Canada and other countries.     

Editor's Introduction

This double issue of Statutes and Decisions consists of translations of official documents, media reports, speeches by Minister Nurgaliyev, and interviews with local police chiefs, and analyses of public opinion surveys about the police force made by private public opinion agencies (Baltic Media Group and Levada Center). It covers the analyses and discussions about police reform in Russia in spring 2012, the final days in office of both President Dmitry Medvedev and Minister of Internal Affairs Rashid Nurgaliyev. These days have been full of scandals involving police crimes, including the torture of a detainee in the Dal'nii police station in Kazan, the capital city of the Republic of Tatarstan. These scandals as well as continuing police brutality¹ in the context of the 2012 presidential elections triggered more criticism of policing and police reform as well as damage control efforts on the parts of police chiefs. The items in this issue of Statutes and Decisions can be roughly divided into three parts: views of the police reform held by the police establishment, human rights activists, and local officials.     

Police confirmation of use of force in Australia: ‘To be or not to be?’

Despite significant transgressions during encounters with Indigenous peoples and marginalised groups, all six state police organisations in Australia espouse the principle of minimum force and identify service and crime prevention as paramount in community interaction and intervention. This article offers some insight and perspective of police talk and thinking about the potential use or avoidance of force. The four Victoria Police focus groups, when confronted by the specific police use of force scenario, speak of the adrenalin rush and the need to achieve results, if reasonable and necessary by force, but also of the desire to control the situation and follow proper police procedures. Officers support ‘Safety First’ principles that advocate a cautionary and suspicious approach to the scenario combined with rational and methodical tactics rather than emotional responses. The reflective talk of individual officers about the hypothetical situation parallels actual behaviour when police collectively and visibly confront public disorder. Control and containment of the situation—whether the scenario or a major crowd disturbance—are paramount while time, in the form of acting slowly and adopting a low-key approach, can be seen as assets in achieving objectives. In both the scenario and police planning for collective action, a readiness to threaten force, rather than actually employ it, appears central to police thinking. Police justification of non-coercive tactics in certain situations can be revealing about their thinking processes in justifying force in other circumstances.

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警务实战中的警察心理研究

警务实战中的警察心理是警察在警务实战过程中表现出来的,对警务实战效果有直接而显著影响的心理品质的总和。结合心理理论基础和警务战术理论基础对警务实战中警察心理进行研究,对培养警察以良好的心理素质开展工作,执行任务有非常重要的意义。通过对警察心理的个性特征和群体特征的深入研究,提出警务实战中的警察心理训练应该建构起一套科学的、有序的、有层次的、有目标的训练体系。     

The impact of race/ethnicity, neighborhood context, and police/citizen interaction on residents' attitudes toward the police

The purpose of this study was to extend the current knowledge of public attitudes toward the police. Independent variables derived from three models, the demographic, the neighborhood context, and the police/citizen interaction models, were used to explain public perceptions of the police. More specifically, public attitudes toward the police was measured in two dimensions— General Attitudes toward the police and Specific Trust in the police. The data was obtained by a telephone survey of 756 respondents in Houston, TX in 2008. The primary findings suggested that race, gender, age, victimization, and satisfaction with police work were significant predictors. Hispanic respondents reported lower levels of General Attitudes toward the police than their White counterparts. In addition, there was no significant difference between Whites and Hispanics in terms of Specific Trust in police such as the use of Taser guns. These results and their practical implications for police agencies were addressed in discussion.     

论执法战术行动的警察意识

有效的警察执法战斗方式是缉捕犯罪嫌疑人最基本的途径。要达到效果,必须由执法的主体——人民警察来实施。而战术行动方式的警察意识、战术行动目的的警察意识和战术行动规律的警察意识是警察战斗行动必须包含并具备的,否则,再好的战术方案、战斗计划都是枉然。     

Law of assembly in China: People''s Republic of China vs. Republic of China

This paper is a comparative study of law of assembly between the People's Republic of China (PRC) vs. the Republic of China (Taiwan) (ROC). The comparison is achieved by looking at how these two societies regulate and police assembly, procession, and demonstration (hereinafter “public assembly”). Particularly it looks at the constitutional mandate and legal limitations on police powers in managing such public gatherings, e.g. what are the role and functions, and powers and limitation of the police in dealing with public assembly application and conduct.This comparative project is conducted with a view to understand the relative development in police powers in the two Chinese societies, once linked by history and culture and now divided by geography and ideology. It is assumed that in order to achieve a political “unification” of the two societies under a “one country two systems” formula,or any other viable political settlement, some understanding of how the two legal systems work is important in breaching their differences.In a still larger context, this research rides the tide of comparative policing in exposing and explicating how police in these two closed societies, ROC (Confucianism) and PRC (Socialism), come to terms with social protests and political challenges; more broadly how they balance the forces of reform and control with the use of law.     

The Vernacular Mobilization of Human Rights in Myanmar's Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity Movement

This article examines how activists build a movement for sexual orientation and gender identity minorities in Myanmar, a country that is known for violent suppression of protests and is undergoing political reform. Based on original fieldwork, it finds that activists deploy a strategy of “vernacular mobilization of human rights” to persuade others to join their cause despite the risks to personal safety and to get around political constraints on collective organizing. Conceptualized at the intersection of the cultural study of human rights and social movements scholarship, “vernacular mobilization of human rights” theorizes the relationship between vernacularization—the translation and local adaptation of human rights—and movement micromobilization, specifying how the former unfolds as collective action framing processes. Through vernacularization activities, such as human rights workshops, movement leaders reframe grievances and shift the attribution of blame to empower and recruit new activists. Furthermore, with these framing processes, they generate a political community with a collective identity and social networks that they use to continue expanding the movement. The article enriches debates about the implications of implementing human rights and understandings of the relationship between human rights and movement mobilization, especially under repressive or uncertain political conditions.     

Citizens' perceptions of aggressive traffic enforcement strategies

In this study we examine citizens' support for aggressive traffic enforcement strategies and discuss whether the implementation of two different types of traffic enforcement decreases public support. We also examine whether citizens' perceptions of crime, quality of life, and the police are influenced by an increased police presence in their neighborhood. The public opinion data presented here are taken from two experimental target areas and one comparison area. Overall the findings suggest that citizens strongly support aggressive traffic enforcement practices and that the implementation of such strategies does not reduce their support. Residents of areas where police are using these types of tactics do not think that the police are harassing them. Citizens living in one of the experimental areas are significantly more likely to support the police, and think that the police work well with the neighborhood. Residents of the areas that experienced two types of aggressive enforcement, however, did not think that crime had decreased, nor that quality of life had improved. We discuss implications for the use of these strategies and for community policing in general.     

Section 1983 litigation: An effective remedy to police misconduct or an insidious federalism?

In recent years the federal courts have experienced a dramatic increase in civil suits alleging police misconduct under the federal provision, 42 U.S.C. Section 1983, which was originally enactd as part of the Civil Rights Act of 1871. Section 1983, presently the second most litigated provision of the United States Code, grants a private right of action for redressing violations of federal and Constitutional rights committed by persons (including municipalities) acting under color of state law. The recent development of Section 1983 as a mechanism for controlling police misconduct has profound implications for New Federalism, public official conduct and traditional legal doctrines (such as the exclusionary rule). This study reviews the legal basis for civil liability remedies, examines the impact of recent developments on police behavior, and explores the policy considerations underlying an assessment of this expanding legal remedy as a viable option in preventing police misconduct.     

Ethical Limitations on the State's Use of Arational Persuasion

Policy makers frequently use arational appeals and nudges—such as those relying on emotion, cognitive biases, and subliminal messaging—to persuade citizens to adopt behaviors that support public goals. However, these communication tactics have been widely criticized for relying on arational triggers rather than reasoned argument. This article develops a fuller account of the nonconsequentialist objection to arational persuasion by state actors, focusing on theories of decisional autonomy and metadecisional voluntariness. The article concludes by proposing ethically justifiable limitations on state communications that should be compelling to both critics and advocates of arational persuasion.     

A Comparison of Racial Attitudes: Right of Police To Strike

A number of studies have focused on public perceptions of police and have concluded that black citizens have lower evaluations of police than their white counterparts. A review of the recent literature reveals that few studies have compared black and white respondents on attitudes toward strike activity among police despite the growing militancy of public employees. In this paper, the significant relationship uncovered between race and attitudes of university undergraduates (F = 30.3; p = .0001) is validated by examining a referendum vote of the general electorate on the right of public employees to strike. Comparative analysis suggests that black citizens are more sympathetic to the problems and tactics of urban police than their white counterparts. Data from the municipal referendum indicated that eighty four percent of the variance in voting patterns could be explained by the percentage of registered black or white voters in the Memphis precincts.