Stop & Search Flashcards
Politics of risk & uncertainty
Social Imaginaries’ as shared understandings of existence
(Ericson, 2007)
Politics of Prosperity: our primary service to each other…is the
provision of collective security…but we also serve each other in practicing economic exchange.
These two main ends, security and prosperity, are now the principal goals of organised society
Risk: 3 Themes:
Risk as probability:
‘risk is a close relation to uncertainty. Where we cannot be certain about the relation between cause and effect, we clutch to the straw of probability…estimates of probability of particular
harms are quantified expressions of ignorance’
(Adams, 2003:90).
ØRisk as a scientific language of management
ØRisk as a forensic language
Law, Risk & Uncertainty
Use of law as:
‘another institution and technology through which we act as if the future is knowable and governable’
(Ericson, 2007:16)
Contract administrative & criminal law to ‘police’ risk
Slide towards use of ‘precautionary logic
Risk as ‘counter law’
Concept used to note how state now circumvents traditional
principles of law:
‘when it [the CJS] sustains high standards of due process, evidence, proof…criminal law creates a great deal of uncertainty in the capacity of the CJS to prevent, discover, build a case against and successfully prosecute criminal behaviour. In the
precautionary urge for greater certainty in crime control, these standards of criminal law are weakened’ (Ericson, 2007:25).
Counter law a function of‘biopower’
Domestic security and risk
Domestic security about ‘fear’ around local matters – tackled with counter law, obviating principles of law
①Policing of anti-social behaviour
②Policing of possession
③Policing of private property
Policing’ Through Uncertainty
Traditional policing imagination replaced through policing of uncertainty
Attempted shift to govern by uncertainty rather than certain knowledge about crime
Use of counter law as the expression of certainty
Fragmenting of society:
‘when everything is read for its criminal potential, then we have indeed reached a state of being governed through crime.
Crime becomes the governing principle in social policy, community planning…and everyday practical
decisions’ (Ericson, 2007:214
Consequences of policing as risk
A ‘zero-sum’ game of ever-expanding security pursuits
Used to justify individual choice around security, not as part of wider social good to managing crime
Causes people to air on their consumer, NOT citizenship side
Risk and Policing 1
Use of ‘risk management’ in policing related to
available technology(Johnston and Shearing, 2003)
Use of technology to manage ‘risky’ populations
e.g. COMPAS system in USA
Requires significant co- ordination, interpretation and caution to place info in context
Risk and policing 2
Use of risk as part of ‘front line ‘policing:
Problem solving, with social problems defined in terms of their criminogenic qualities only (Crawford, 1995)
Transformation from ‘crime intelligence’ to ‘criminal intelligence’ through use of risk (Brodeur, 1983)
Reassurance policing model as based upon potential risk, not actual police problems
(Millie and Herrington, 2005)
Main stop & search ‘regimes’ in NI
Ordinary’ Powers
Misuse of Drugs Act 1971
Police and Criminal Evidence (NI) Order 1989
Both require reasonable
suspicion i.e. a legal test /
Threshold
Counter-terrorism Powers
Justice and Security (NI) Act 2007
Terrorism Act 2000
Suspicion-less i.e. do not require
reasonable suspicion
Reasonable suspicion
A legal test
CANNOT be based upon:
‘common sense’
Stereotyping / discrimination on any grounds
Suspicion must be genuine, based on objective
Information
Is stop & search effective for managing the crime risk?
Evidence:
Limited / weak effect on
Disrupting and deterring crime
Marginal impact on crime needs to weighed against negative social costs / effects of use
Politics:
If some is good, more must be better?
Visible, simple and quick response to complex crime problems which taps into popular law and
order sentiment
Stop & search: children & young people
Disconnect between principles of stop & search and application of power against children:
77% of 16y/o understand PSNI must have a reason to
S&S, but evidence shows that:
PSNI gave no clear reason for the S&S in 69% of S&S
The officer did not give name or station in 88% of S&S
Details were not recorded on electronic device nor
receipt/reference number given in 90% of S&S
Effectiveness vs effect:
What about the 94%??
Police initiated contacts more damaging to community perceptions of police fairness / legitimacy
The ‘availability pool’ - clustering and concentration fused with socio- economic deprivation, low arrest rates and histories of policing
Stop & Search as Classificatory action?:
A tool for coercive, classificatory police practice
Stop & search part of a simultaneous overt and covert police curriculum
Need to recognise community ‘costs’ of S&S
Evidence across U.K. shows stop & search as an operational choice, rather than absolutely necessary practice in
Isolation
