War Stories and Occupying Soldiers: A Narrative Approach to Understanding Police Culture and Community Conflict

Narrative theory and methods are gradually finding a place in the study of crime and its control. However vibrant narrative criminology has been to this point, narrative scholars have somewhat ignored policing, both in terms of the language and grammar of individual officers and the cultural life of the institution itself. In this article, we elaborate the importance of storytelling in the (re)production of contemporary police culture and the broader police power. While storytelling as cultural production is, of course, not the sole purview of police, they are uniquely positioned to shape the broad social, cultural and political imaginaries of crime and the realities of crime control and community interactions. Therefore, in paying close attention to the narratives of police and the cultural work accomplished through storytelling, we gain insight into the production and maintenance of police authority and culture.     

Revisiting the Instrumentality of Voice: Having Voice in the Process Makes People Think They Will Get What They Want

Research on procedural justice has found that processes that allow people voice (i.e., input) are perceived as fairer, and thus elicit more positive reactions, than processes that do not allow people voice. Original theorizing attributed these effects to beliefs that the provision of voice enhances people’s sense of process control, which people were assumed to value because it impacts their perceived likelihood of receiving desired outcomes (the instrumental perspective of procedural justice). Subsequent research questioned this perspective, arguing that outcome expectations do not account for the effects of voice. However, this subsequent research failed to directly examine the interplay of voice, outcome expectations, and reactions. The current studies revisit and extend research on this topic by asking whether manipulations of voice act as shared circumstance effects. Confirming an untested implication of the instrumental perspective, we show that giving everyone voice increases their belief, ex-ante, that they are likely to win an upcoming competition. However, this instrumental belief accounts for only part of the effects of voice on perceived procedural fairness and on general reactions to outcomes. Results suggest that voice does indeed have instrumental significance, an implication not adequately recognized in current justice theorizing. However, this instrumentality does not, by itself, explain why people value having a voice in processes that affect them.     

Myths and Realities of Prison Violence: A Review of the Evidence

In order to distinguish prison myth from reality, the authors examine both official and unofficial estimates of the violence and disorder in prison, as well the dual issues of whether drug abuse and gang activity in prison can be directly linked to the level of violence and disorder in correctional institutions. Based on this review, current responses to prison violence and disorder are examined; the authors argue that the key to reducing the current level of prison violence and disorder is to determine the appropriate tipping point between formal and informal social control mechanisms. The authors conclude by highlighting three distinct strategies for reducing violent incidents in prisons: (1) demand transparency, (2) require evidence-based practice, and (3) implement innovative measures of prison performance and quality.     

Dissent and Strategic Leadership of the Military Professions

One of the central difficulties to a right understanding of American civil-military relations is the nature of the U.S. military. Are our armed forces just obedient bureaucracies like most of the Executive branch, or are they vocational professions granted significant autonomy and a unique role in these relationships because of their expert knowledge and their expertise to apply it in the defense of America? To a large measure, the answer to this question should determine the behavior of the strategic leaders of these professions, including the uncommon behavior of public dissent. Using the “Revolt of the Generals” in 2006 as stimulus, the author develops from the study of military professions the critical trust relationships that should have informed their individual decisions to dissent. After doing so, he makes recommendations for the restoration of the professions’ ethic in this critical area of behavior by the senior Officers who are the professions’ strategic leaders.