The Activities of the United States in the Fight against Terrorism - Case Study Example

Ethics, Terrorism, and the Future of Policing Impact of terrorism on police mission in the United s The police mission has been to protect and serve but since the wake of terrorism, the mission has focused more on fighting terrorism and neglect of traditional policing duties. The threat of terrorism has led to change of the organization strategies and development of new tactics in the police agencies. In the United States, the new policies and programs have been adopted rapidly in response to terrorism (Feucht et al., 2009). The 9/11 attacks challenged policing and brought up a new set of problems that had little connection to the previous innovations. For example, community policing may have reintroduced strong links between the public and the police, however, its origin has no link with the terrorist cells identification and terrorist attack prevention. The role of hot spot policing has changed from dealing with crimes at particular places to dealing with threats of terrorism (Feucht et al., 2009). In a nutshell, the innovations in the police force in the past decades have specifically developed for particular types of crimes and problems and have little or no connection with the threats of terrorism. Some scholars argue that terrorism is a crime like the other crimes and should be dealt with the same way. This might be the case but the high policing functions in response to terrorism may undermine the efforts of police in traditional activities such as the control of disorder and crime (Feucht et al., 2009). What disagreements exist regarding the appropriate law enforcement behavior which fights terrorism but maintains personal liberties? Little is asked about the activities of the United States in the fight against terrorism. These activities include the intelligence collection which is regarded as spying, domestic intelligence and counterintelligence regarded as snooping and the use of covert action which is regarded as dirty tricks. These activities have overstepped the mandate of United States and have shifted the balance between the secrecy and openness that the United States has so much embraced in the fight against terrorism and the protection of national security. The Americans have shown to be very much willing to compromise their democratic freedom for them to feel protected from the threats and adapt to the concept of liberty. This only happens to some extent. Any comprise to the freedom is directly linked to the level of threat being perceived by the United States leaders and citizenry at any particular time. When the threat is perceived to be significant, a response is quickly initiated by the United States political process; they move quickly and decisively with a significant cohesion. As the threat retreats from the collective consciousness, the collective cohesion starts to wipe away. Questions rise as to the wisdom used when the political process acted in haste rather than after thorough deliberation. Concerns become significant as the shared danger becomes prominent (Clark, 2007). What role does social stigma play in police ethics? Research that has been conducted reveals that authoritarianism and cynicism are key traits among the police force. While this is the case, it is not clear what brings out these traits. The police subculture is brought about by formation of homogenous group within the police, an equal stressful working environment, and participation in a closed social system. The police in the United States share similarities in their racial, cultural and economical originality. Police consider themselves to be similar than the public they serve. The homogenous social group develops a group think in which everyone agrees to the group values and beliefs. Those who do not conform to the group risk being an outcast (Pollock, 2008). Police work life is characterized by unpleasant experiences and danger. The working hours are very unusual making them experience social stigma to some extent. Their social life tends to revolve around the other police officers. This in turn leads to legitimization and closed view point of the sub cultural values (Pollock, 2008). There are some instances where the police department does not use the premonitory control to identify police corruption. These departments allow corruption and it goes unpunished expect in cases where the corruption activity will draw public attention. The social structure of the police department plays a crucial role in determining its corruption premonitory control by the external forces. Corruption is enhanced by the formation of informal rules by the corrupt police department. The rules are meant to minimize any possible threat from the external controls. The rules also encompass the mode of dividing the money collected through corruption and it helps in the minimization of frictions and threats from an unfulfilled officer (Sherman, 1978). Are the ethical forces behind police corruption the same as those involved in police abuses of force? Corruption is at the core of the ethical problem in the police department. The causes are the same and they involve the following factors; intrinsic factors related to the policing job, police organizations nature, the police culture, corruption opportunities created by the task and political environment, and the effort and nature of controlling corruption. A police department may allow corruption to prevail and will not punish any act of corruption unless it seems to draw the public attention (Sherman, 1978). This kind of behavior is attributed to the nature of the police organization. In some cases, the police departments make rules that offer protection against possible prosecution because of corruption. These rules make it difficult for the external control to mobilize themselves against the corrupt police department. This is because of the nature of the police organization and the police culture in that particular organization. The possibilities of an internal person reporting the matter to external forces are minimized through these rules. Clear rules are made on the method of dividing the money collected through corruption to minimize the risks of being reported by a disgruntled police officer (Sherman, 1978). The rules made in most cases do not govern anyone in the police department, thus, knowing the person who is governed by these rules is difficult. Not all police officers will participate in the corruption and their mode of engagement in corruption varies within the police department. So as not implicate one another with corruption, silence plays a crucial role in the corruption deals (Sherman, 1978). Individual conscience and police assignments Individual conscience may be described as the habits that motivate good policing. It is common for police officers to be in dilemma of what to do when they find their partners mistreating suspects and it is their duty not to tolerate such actions. It will be difficult for the officer to justify the case when he or she allows the other officer to abuse the trust of the public office. Sometimes the police officers do not want to be assigned duties that go contrary to their moral and religious principles. Not every request to conscience merit moral acceptance. Every human being is capable of believing anything and conscience in any case can not dictate the police assignments although there are some considerations (Delattre, 2002). Training offers invaluable knowledge in handling matters whether hard or simple in the police line of duty. Among the benefits that the police officers get in training is conflict resolution skills, verbal crisis intervention, problem recognition and investigation and response to incidents (Miller, 2006). After the training, the officers will be capable of handling ethical matters and they will be in a better position to offer solutions when faced with ethical dilemmas. References Clark, J. R. (2007). Intelligence and national security: A reference handbook. Westport, CT: Greenwood Publishing Group. Delattre, E. J. (2002). Character and cops: Ethics in policing. Washington, DC: American Enterprise Institute. Feucht, T. E., Hakimi, I., Mock, L. F., Perry, S. & Weisburd, D. (2009). To protect and to serve: Policing in an age of terrorism. New York, NY: Springer Science+Business Media. Miller, L. (2006). Practical police psychology: Stress management and crisis intervention for law enforcement. Illinois: Charles C. Thomas Publisher Ltd. Pollock, J. C. (2008). Ethical dilemmas and decisions in criminal justice. Belmont, CA: Cengage Learning. Sherman, L. W. (1978). Scandal and reform: Controlling police corruption. CA: University of California Press. Read More