Community Policing and Problem-orientated policing Flashcards
What is the historical background of CP? (4)
1) Crisis of legitimacy - Poor police/community relations
2) Research indicates ‘nothing works’ - Impetus to explore alternatives, Move from reactive to proactive policing
3) Observational research - How do police actually spend their time?
4) Lessons from the private sector
What management/managerial principles are borrowed from the private sector in CP?
- Responding to customer needs and demands, and involving customers (citizens) in setting priorities
- Doing the job right the first time
- Solving the problem, not responding to the symptom
- Empowering line-level workers to make decisions
- Providing job enlargement to employees to make them more productive and to increase job satisfaction
What is problem-orientated policing?
- Goldstein (1979) problems are ‘the incredibly broad range of troublesome situations that prompt citizens to turn to the police’
- Managerial response to the publics desired priorities/needs
- Problems = behaviour/territory/persons/time: Cluster of similar, related or recurring incidents OR Substantive community concern
- SARA model
- Emphasis on research and analysis as well as crime prevention and engagement of other organisations in the reduction of community problems.
What is the SARA model?
S- Scanning: determining problem via public communication and patrol
A - Analysis: what of the 4 problem types is this? behaviour/territory/persons/time?
R - Response: target the problem to reduce it and harm it causes or pass onto someone else
A - Assessment: How successful or effective was the response? e.g. satisfaction of citizens, measuring business profits, etc
What is the example of how POP has policed domestic abuse (citywide)?
- Looked at homicide and how perpetrators were often known to the police prior to the incident
- Analysed and seeked knowledge from all relevant parties and found the issues
- employed a new multi-partnership approach that also consider interventions beyond criminal intervention e.g. civil injunctions, therapy, anger management, etc
What is the example of how POP has policed an apartment block in Baltimore that had high levels of crime?
- High crime and high fear in residences of the housing block
- Police created an apartment block community group to change the appearances and become a community, and the police also conducted more frequent patrols around the housing
- There was a significant outcome of reduced burglary and crime
Give examples of POP ‘problems’?
- Disorderly youth who regularly congregate in the parking area of a specific convenience store
- Street prostitutes and the associated robbery of their patrons in a specific neighbourhood
- An apartment complex with a high rate of burglaries and a high level of fear amongst residents
- Domestic abuse (citywide)
- Annual festival with high incidence of disorderliness and property crime
What are the core principles of CP according to Skolnick and Bayley (1986)?
Police-community reciprocity
Area decentralisation of command
Reorientation of patrol
Civilianisation
What are key features of community policing? (6)
- deemphasise responding to calls for service
- deemphasise crime fighting
- concentrate on neighbourhood-level disorder
- develop closer ties with citizens as co-producers of police services
- develop closer ties with other government agencies that have responsibilities for community problems
- redefine the police role in terms of problem- solving and community organising
What are the core elements of community policing outlined by Bayley (1994)?
CAMPS
C - consultation with community (two way communication)
A - adaptation by police (problem-solving)
M - mobilisation of public/other agencies
P - problems identified
S - and Solved
List some of the nine operational examples of community policing by Skogan and Hartnett (1997)?
- Opening small neighbourhood substations (e.g. decentrilise, moblie units)
- Conducting surveys to measure community satisfaction
- Organising meetings and crime-prevention seminars
- Publishing newsletters
- Forming neighbourhood watch programmes
- Establishing advisory panels
- Organising youth activities
- Conducting drug-education projects and media campaigns
- Patrolling on horses and bicycle
What act introduced PSCOs and how many do we have in the police force?
Introduced in Police Reform Act 2002
Currently about 16,000 PCSOs nationally (compared to about 140,000 police officers)
Why were PSCOs brought in? What are their powers?
Brought in for ‘public service’ as police officers were bored and disinterested by public/community roles
- They have the power to Confiscate alcohol/tobacco from minors and Demand name/address in ASB incident
What did the Home Office evaluation show about the impact of PSCOs?
Positive impact
Public viewed them as more accessible, more visible, diverse and valued their role
CP pros and cons of…. Definition
pro: makes attempts to define policing in a realistic and honest way
Con: seeks to be all things to all people therefore has little meaningful content
