Ethical Dilemmas in Law Enforcement - Essay Example

?Ethical Dilemmas in Law enforcement Introduction Law enforcers are not immune to feelings of guilt or mistrust from an unexpected occurrence in their line of duty. Policing is a demanding task that not only requires good training and police rules but also active ethics. In addition, most police officers are caught in the crossroads due to mixed expectations from their employer and the public. In such situation, police officers find it hard to determine the right action or the next step they should take in line with their duties. Ethical dilemmas often results in such situations making the police officers to rely on moral knowledge to determine their next step. Law enforcement ethics are codes of conduct or the expected behavior among law enforcers. Police officers have two basic roles or expectation from the public and their employers. Firstly, police officers are peacekeepers. This role requires them to be on the service of the public. On the other hand, police officers are law enforcers. This role requires them to be active in identifying and prosecuting lawbreakers. Peacekeeping and law enforcement are the basic duties of police officers in any country. However, it has been established that most police officers are more comfortable with peacekeeping or policing than law enforcement. The crash between law enforcement and society laws is the source of ethical dilemma in law enforcement. A police officer on patrol will be faced with a dilemma on whether to take a bribe for a minor traffic offence or to take the offender to court. Ethical dilemmas in law enforcement are directly related to lack of appropriate training for law enforcers. This essay will therefore analyze available literature and scholars who have contributed to the subject. The paper will also give a discussion on different categories of law enforcement dilemmas or situations that promote dilemma in law enforcement. Finally, the paper will access any possible solution or way out from the situation through recommendation. Literature review There is a growing interest on the significance of incorporating ethical study in criminal justice curriculum that is fundamental for law enforcers (Pollock, 1994). There are varieties of well-developed literature materials that address police ethics from different perspective. Generally, most of the available literature tackles the issue from a law enforcement perspective with the intentions of establishing the conflicts between law enforcement and ethics. Another interesting issues tackled by most literature is whether ethics should be incorporated in police training. There has also been a growing debate over a classroom versus academy version of training for law enforcers. All these issues are captured by Pollock in his work on ethical dilemma in law enforcement. Another discussion tackled by the same scholar is whether ethical training for law enforcers should be carried out during the recruitment process or it should be conducted as an in-service training. Pollock argues that ethical dilemma in law enforcement would take a different dimension if the training mechanism of law enforcers is changed. Finally, the author suggests that cases of ethical dilemma in law enforcement can be minimized by increasing in service training. Kleinig (1990) is also among the authors who have greatly contributed to the existing literature on ethical dilemma in law enforcement. In his article “Teaching and Learning Police Ethics” that was published in the Journal of Criminal Justice, Kleinig begins by stating that ethics are relevant to law enforcers. In this article, Kleinig identifies various factors that cause dilemma in law enforcement. Kleinig goes on to classify these factors into police authority, police expectations, peer pressure, crisis within a situation, temptation, and imperfect nature of humanity. The article goes on to explain various elements in police training program and their significance in the ordinary role of a law enforcer. Kleinig points out that a typical training police program only includes rules and guidelines on how to perform law enforcement duties. His analysis also demonstrates that most training programs do not cover how police officers are expected to conduct their duties in a free society. Thus ethical issue in law enforcement and investigations are not incorporated in typical police training program. Swift, Houston & Anderson (1993) have also contributed a lot to the available literature. On their paper titled “Cops, Hacks and the Greater Good”, the three authors focused on various methods that can be used to incorporate ethics in police training. The three authors suggested ethical dilemmas in law enforcement could be avoided by incorporating ethics in basic training of law enforcers. In addition, the authors suggested utilitarianism philosophy as the most appropriate system that requires adoption in law enforcement training. The authors also explained that an ordinary police officer is conversant with the system and, therefore it can be beneficial in executing necessary reforms in the police force. This paper is based on Kleinig’s work since the three authors assume that most police training curriculums do not incorporate ethical concept. Literature on ethical dilemma on law enforcement cannot be a complete subject without the inclusion of different ethical dilemmas experienced by law enforcers. The book “Character and Cops: Ethics in Policing” by Delattre’s (1989) is a useful source of such dilemmas. The book also analyzes various situations that police find themselves in ethical dilemmas. The book identify gratitude, bribery, corruption, loyalty, whistle blowing, discretion, sleep and duty, sex, brutality and force as some of the ethical dilemma in law enforcement. The author however claims that this s not an exhaustive list but a general overview of available dilemmas in law enforcement. The author also mentions the possibility of existence of hybrid dilemmas. The author argues that such dilemmas results from a direct combination of the basic ethical dilemmas in law enforcement that are illustrated above. The author also acknowledges that ethical dilemmas in law enforcement are variable. This is to imply that every dilemma included in his analysis depends on an individual law enforcer and a specific situation. His work concluded that it is impossible to develop a common solution for all law enforcement dilemma or situation. The author also acknowledged that ethic should be incorporated in police force training as a strategy to contain the problem. Barker and Carter (1994) are other scholars who investigated the issue to considerable depth. In their articles titled “A Typology of Police Deviance” and “Theoretical Dimensions in the Abuse of Authority by Police Officers” respectively, the two authors tried to develop a theoretical background of the issue. Their work borrowed heavily from Delattre’s (1989) work. In particular the two authors assumed various dilemmas found Delattre’s’ work. Using the different dilemmas indicated in the book, the two authors developed a typology that consisted use of force, misconduct and corruption as the main classes of law enforcement dilemmas. The authors argued that all dilemmas that law enforcers experience could be placed in the three categories. This is an effective approach in studying the subject since it applies an objective approach. The resource is therefore, a significant piece of literature for ethical dilemma in law enforcement. The authors also emphasized that their classification does not imply that the three issues are the main cause of ethical dilemma in police force. The authors mentioned deception or undercover tactics as a major source of ethical dilemmas in law enforcement. According to the two authors, the issue is a major source of ethical dilemma among law enforcers. However, most police officers are not confronted with the dilemma due to their lack of participation in criminal or undercover investigations. Pullok (1994) is another scholar who concentrated his attention on ethical dilemma in law enforcement. In his article “Ethics and the Criminal Justice Curriculum”, Pullok also tried to categorize different ethical dilemma in law enforcement. This approach is significant to the subject since it enhances other auxiliary studies aimed at establishing improved details about ethical dilemma in law enforcement. His work also provides a basis, which other scholars can use to develop their work. Pollock (2007) is a high quality resource by the same author. In his book Ethical Dilemmas and Decisions in Criminal Justice Pullok, conduct a comprehensive analysis on the impacts of decision making in criminal justice and law enforcement. The author argues that decision-making is the main source of ethical dilemma in law enforcement. This is because all ethical dilemmas involve making a choice in one way or the other. Although decision-making is an important aspect in an ethical dilemma literature, the element is insufficient. The author therefore needs to incorporate other aspect or sources of ethical dilemma among law enforcers to improve the reliability of the book. Banks (2009) is an essential piece of literature for the subject. In his book, Banks tackles ethical dilemma from a sociologist perspective. The author argues that accountability of law enforcers and their expectations from the public are the main factors that can be used to define ethical dilemmas among law enforcers. The author also relies on Rawls theory and the feminist approach to ethics in criminal justice. His research also reflects on the results of qualitative study that was conducted by LAPD to establish various law enforcement dilemmas among police officers. In his book, the author tries to rank the different dilemmas experienced by officers according to their seriousness in relation to the LAPD research. The study indicates that more than 90% of law enforcers are faced with ethical dilemmas in their daily operations. Bank base his analysis of the subjects on the results of a qualitative research. This aspect makes the book to be among the most reliable literature in the subject. Discussions According to the different available literatures on the subject, different authors attempt to analyze different situations in which law enforcers encounter law enforcement dilemma. In order to compile an appropriate analysis or discussion, the authors are made to make general assumption from which to build their analysis and discussion. Generally, most authors define law enforcement dilemma as a situations where a law enforcer lacks the knowledge of the right course of action. In other scenarios, a law enforcer is forced to evade doing the right action due to the perceived difficulties. Other definitions rely on the fact that unethical actions are tempting and attractive to law enforcers. All the above definitions have essential substance that enables different authors and scholars to conduct objective research on the subject. All the above definitions are based on situations and this shows validity in the issue among law enforcers. Discretion is another significant aspect of ethical dilemma. By definition, discretion is the ability or power to make choice or to distinguish a right action from a list of choices. This is an obvious factor in ethical dilemmas since all dilemmas are concerned with making of choices. This area of literature however is concerned with discretions within law enforcement discipline such whether to arrest a person or take a bribe. However, it has been established that some dilemmas within law enforcement are not ethical issues. These are the different situations where law enforcers feel uncomfortable concerning their expectations and the legal requirements on their duties. In such cases, an officer is faced with the dilemma of whether to enforce or fail to enforce a certain law. Traffic officers are the most affected by such scenarios since traffic rules lacks a direct connection with the reality on the ground. The age and gender of the offender in relation to the law enforcer also determines the level of dilemma that a law enforcer experience. This approach is appropriate since it enable different researchers to categorize the different situations that cause dilemma in law enforcement. Lack of a fixed definition or criteria for law enforcement dilemma implies that profound theories can only be established on appropriate categorization of situations. This aspect is therefore essential for the theoretical approach that most researchers have taken in order to tackle the subject. However, categorization of different situations that lead to law enforcement dilemmas is of little benefit particularly to the experimental approach taken by some scholars. In this approach, researchers base their finding on both qualitative and quantitative research results. Duty is also a significant aspect of available literature on law enforcement dilemmas. In such case duties involves the expectations of law enforcers both by their employers and by the public. Duties create situations that cause dilemma to the law enforcers making it an interesting aspect of the subject. Using this factor, researchers can be able to conduct deeper investigations on situations that cause law enforcement dilemma. Duty may involve situations where a law enforcer feels that certain obligations are a waste of time or inconvenient. Other duties that are of interests to the study are duties that put the life or health of law enforcers at risk. In such situations, a law enforcer will be faced with the dilemma of not knowing the best action. Although duties provide a good basis through which researchers can establish their research findings on the subject, they are variable factors. This is because the duty of law enforcers varies within countries and ranks of the officers. Lack of uniformity in duties undertaken by different officers proves that duties cannot be relied on as the basis of literature for the subject. This indicates that future research studies that will be established on duties either need to refine the definition of duties of have different categories of analysis. Future research studies also need to avoid some basic assumption of duties in relation to situation that cause law enforcement dilemmas. The objective of studying ethical dilemmas among law enforcers is to eliminate the dilemmas or reduce situations that lead to dilemma among law enforcers. Most researchers are involved with studying the subject with the objective of establishing a solution for the issue. This implies that most researchers are concerned with establishing the problem and appropriate solution. This method or approach is essential to the subject since it enables researchers to investigate the issue from a realistic perspective. The main disadvantage of this method is that it assumes that all situations leading to a dilemma are disadvantageous. This is not the case since; some situation may be beneficial to the officers. This approach denies investigator the chance to analyze the positive aspect of dilemmas in law enforcement. The approach also leaves many unanswered questions concerning unavoidable dilemmas. Researchers in this field are also involved with investigations on law enforcement programs. It is evident that most training programs lack to incorporate ethics since they concentrate on accomplishment of law enforcement duties. In this relation, most researchers recommend the inclusion of ethics in in-service training programs for law enforcers. Conclusion Law enforcers encounter dilemmas in their daily operations and execution of duties. The available literature on the issue categorize law enforcement dilemma into three categories that include discretion, duties and expectations. The literature also indicates that available literature for law enforcers lacks critical link between theoretical aspects of dilemma and reality. Lack of proper training program for law enforcers is the basis of ethical dilemmas in law enforcement. To study the subject effectively different researchers make some basic assumption and definitions to enable them have conclusive analysis on the subject. Most researchers study law enforcement dilemmas with prospects of creating recommendation to solve or reduce the problem. References Barker, T. & D. Carter (1994). A Typology of Police Deviance. Journal of Police Science and Administration, 6(3), 264-272. Banks, C. (2009). Criminal Justice Ethics: Theory and Practice. London: Sage. Carter, D. (1994). “Theoretical Dimensions in the Abuse of Authority by Police Officers.” Cincinnati: Anderson. Delattre, E.J. (198 9). Character and Cops: Ethics in Policing. Journal of Criminal Justice , 18, 65-70 Kleinig, J. (1990). Teaching and Learning Police Ethics: Competing and Complementary Approaches. Journal of Criminal Justice, 18, 1-1 8. Pollock, J. (1994). Ethics in Crime and Justice: Dilemmas and Decisions, 2nd ed. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth. Pollock, J. M. (2007). Ethical Dilemmas and Decisions in Criminal Justice. London: Cengage learning. Swift, A., J. Houston & R. Anderson (1993). “Cops, Hacks and the Greater Good.” Presented at the Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences, Kansas City, MO, March 1993. Read More