Strategic Policing - Coursework Example

STRATEGIC POLICING Your name: Institution name: Date: The content outline a) Introduction b) Concept of the policing culture c) Police organization and culture d) Organizational reforms and uncertainty e) Education and experience f) Changing the existing management culture g) The future of the policing culture h) New management models i) Recommendations for the better reformative process j) Conclusion Introduction The police cultures have been a barrier to most of the more open and responsive policing organizations and it can looked from a more extensive literature especially when examined from a multidisciplinary aspect of sociology, anthropology, criminology and as well the organizational studies. It is therefore important to note that they have a common argument about the police culture. This police culture has both a unique and problematic position. The police have a good expectation of being able to control the crime and maintaining the public order. They also have the special legal but conferred little or limited, coercive powers to achieve it. This active role in the state, they have adopted or associated with special traits of being signified as danger, conflict, risky and authoritative1 (Balch, 1972). These qualities are in themselves a contradiction in the line of democratic environment. The police environment has therefore been seen as uncertain, risky, reactive and protective occupational and organizational culture. This has been seen as a set of perceived problems which are common and real which has been seen as a barrier to open policing culture. In line with this understanding, the police culture has therefore been described as the set of values shared by a group or attitudes that are agreed by the behavioral norms, the informal dictates or rules that serve as a set of common understanding and informal guides for action. It has also been said that the police culture is the functional or necessary response to a broad, complex and uncertain nature of doing work. This therefore illustrates that the police role is to provide the informal rules of engagement. They also negotiate their way around complex issues in the uncertain working environments in ways that allow them get their work done. The concepts of the policing culture The following core values have been used to describe the police culture. They have the attribute of solidarity which puts emphasis on the shared responsibility and the loyalty to the police officers and as above all the others. They are also said to be authoritarianism which is a strong belief and the willingness to express power over the others. This in most of the cases believed to be occupationally related and as well a personality type. They are in most cases full of suspicion or mistrust that is gained from limited an often negative contact with the public. This is a clear indication of their response to the uncertainty of the environment. They are conservative in the nature of the political and social outlook either is caused by the moral and negative nature of police work.2 They are also said to be prejudicial that has been associated with tendency to make judge other people in advance which is based on the work experience, this is a good characteristic but it can lead to racism and sexism and other negative traits. They always become cynics by the tendency to regard the non police as unreliable, unsympathetic and critics of the police. They are always deemed to be working class group which has also been said to be blue collar jobs. This attributes has been linked to a number of policing problems. Culture has been the key factor that has been identified as the causal factor. This police culture is said to justify the negative police acts and behaviors. The use of the excessive force, corruption and racism have been rationalized as well as protected from their discovery and elimination. This makes them aggressively engaged in them without being seen as a violation of the cultural codes which normalize the codes of work in their line. Outside the political and the public scrutiny and criticism, the police have become resistant to the external form of accountability, influence, regulation and governance.3 The basic reasoning for this is that in the mode of internal proposition of loyalty, solidarity and suspicion work to create some strong resistance to attempts govern and manage police behaviors and in the process, limiting attempts to manage the police behavior. Police organization and culture The police culture is that that is made up of group and the individual phenomenon. It is as well structured into police organizations on the basis of locations. It has been argued that the police work is both a police work and organization. This in a broad perspective gives the context of the occupational culture of the police work. This makes it a military and bureaucratic system as it has been contextualized by the military and bureaucratic model of the police organization. This is the best model that describes the police culture. This is the system that has been there and it traces back in history since the 1800’s. There is some great similarities in the models between the old and the modern policing models. This model offers the police a number of great advantages which includes the organizational stability which is a form of discipline. ‘This creates the police legitimacy, one that is approved, appropriate and effective in response to the circumstances of time4.Bureaucracy is not only a silent way of bringing into the police a measure of the administrative professionalism but as well a means of introducing into the police a mechanism of allowing them to regulate their own affairs, which is free of direct political intervention. The bureaucratic nature and the military attributes created an organization with the following characteristics. It created a rank based authority structure that had both the position and the power. This was a highly centralized administration system in which most of the decisions were made at the top. This system had commands and control models of philosophy in which orders authority was the key by the use of formal orders. In the same system, there was the rule following punishment and violation. The decision making process was hierarchical from the top like the pyramidal system of the caste management system. All this was formalized on communication rules and the procedures and even the policies that governed their daily engagements. To advance these roles, there was need for specialization in many of their operational functions5. Technology enhanced their roles while they were equipped with the techniques making them resistant to the change and portraying them as an inflexible organization. This elaborated the insular and a closed organization that was not going t be moved by any of the outside political and community influence and in the process blocking any legitimate process of coming up with an open policing systems. Organizational reforms and uncertainty The historical image of the police and their role in the policing has been of a very high regard and despite being the most expensive and expansive organizations in the countries and states. The police service has been very slow in accepting propositions for change from its traditional model of bureaucracy of management. They believe in their own prowess as being the best, which is the mostly known mythology6. These has given them enough power politically to be able to fight any major reform pressures. This includes the military policing models, organizational and the administration and operations. In the late 1970’s and early 90’s; there a concern and I the process, there was the development of the community based policing. This occurred across many nations including England, Canada, and even in the United States. This was a genuine concern that was based on the traditional model of the bureaucratic organization model of policing. This was a system to make the policing more open and accountable and responsive to the public which had been required by the people as a new police organization with a new tactic in managerial paradigm. This was a response to the people inspired police reform, the federal groups and the research and policy groups of the nations. Series of well funded conferences and national development projects and pilot programs were put in place to transform the police service. For this to take place, then the right full ideas had to be collected and be used to transform the way forward. This was successful but at very different degrees, this hadto be advanced to a more sophisticated community policing by the addition of various initiatives which were to make it better. This was to be achieved by the changing the highly centralized mode of decision making process and regionalization. Improve the communications internally, decrease the formalization and recruit the more diverse officers and introducing a new model of recruiting the police officers which was to be merit based to enhance the specialization in their roles. To add to the list, there was modernization of the discipline in the police officers by the the use of the alternative dispute resolution process. This was a not very successful as well as it was met with turmoil, confusion and the usual resistance. The reforms were seen as unnecessary. With time, there was a decline in the priority of the new programs that were aimed as being open strategies to policing issues. The issues like the community policing, the restorative justice and regionalization died with time and lost their priority as national issues. This has been replaced by the new model of the intelligence led policing. This has been observed to be a mode of the organized crime within the more centralized decision making framework. The cognitive culture burn in is been a highly perceived wisdom on the police subculture. The new recruits become very highly incorporated into the new recruits as powerful occupational culture with their own ways of seeing. The legal regulation of the police subculture scheme is factor in the institutional inertia. This police inertia has made it difficult to make the differences between the officers, the new complexities. There have been various criticisms especially from ethno-methodologists; they argue that person reduces the human actor to the cultural dope whom their behaviors are determined for him or her by the prior conditioning. There is thus an valid explanation that this is an inadequate accounting for the reflexively and cognitively construct to apply the rules. This can be approached by listing the varying types of the types of the officers. This is analogous but broadly similar which describes the police officers basing on their dominant attitudes towards the public and towards the police. This creates a clearly social category which describes the individual categories where by the cops fix themselves into groups on their psychological relationships that to some extend is too restrictive. This makes less sense of how the group pressures can work on the individual perspective. These categorizations in most of the case fail and create the flexibility of the shifts in the orientation. Therefore cupturing the formal and the informal dynamics of the police as the distinct group while at the same time providing the flexibility to adequately get the internal variations. Culture is thus seen as a common bag of assorted schemes, tools and other frames. This is a new welcome advance of a more complicated and contingent view of culture. This has led to the under-development of this work. This has led to the understanding that policing is the primary focus of the organization. The privileges of certain police work qualities such as the crime fighting, investigative skills and the ‘experienced’ based credentials kills the value of the organization and their associated needs of the fostering leadership and management skills. The lateral entry of the police officers into the positions of the senior management levels is as well very limiting. This process is as well also seen as unacceptable as the progressive process by which one goes through the ranks limits to a great level the potential of utilizing the talent pool that could be of more benefit at the senior management process7. This has as well also led to the mistrust to the forms of the police knowledge, the analysis they do and the dialogue. In most cases, they are seen as irrelevant to the current application of the policing. As a result of these issues, there is very little research that is done in the police. Even in the internal programs are very infrequent and are of very limited scope. This is an indication that there is the lack of the information gathering of the major undertakings in the police and as well the programs monitoring that is coupled to a critical engagement in the analytical dimensions of their own operations. Due and debate therefore does not occur in most circumstances. Education and experience Education has never been seen as necessary especially when considering the uniformed members even especially for the senior members. Even for the senior executives, they have very little motivation that can move a more engaged form of the dialogue in the private and the public managements. This points out to the management problem that faces the police industry that limits the best and the brightest form of the organization. So most of them do not have information that can be of value in the transition of the police to one that is accountable and ore open. This is a very limiting to the changes in the police sector. This has been due to the lack of the basic requirements in the recruiting process as the constables8. More flexible entry levels and upper officer models will enable the police to recruit staff have some professionalism in their training in such programs as law and languages. The current system of the promotion within the police service unit is a big problem which in most case is associated with the lack of the ability to promote and the people that are potential due to the missing requirements in the specialization at the recruiting process. Some of the people that serve the force leave the police service unit before they actually contribute to serving the police at the senior levels9. There is also the closed and the insular culture which is the most favorable trait of the police. The senior position may not work very well with the very highly skilled and learned specialized managers who may be recruited from the private sector. This is because they may not be valued as equals in the police service and as such their services may not be utilized in the police organization10. It is because of these valid considerations that the police may not lead to being believed in the developmental and the very effective management positions11. If this has to be changed completely to one that will be able to win the trust of the people, then they will need to come up with a an improved and expanded policing security mandate that will reform the traditional management practices or that will coerce them to basically adopt the transparent mechanisms that will be strong and very well positioned to handle the changing and dynamic roles of the police by partnering with the right bodies for assistance in creating and enabling the reforms. The future of the policing culture There are basically very easy mechanisms that will enable the transition or the transformation of the police for the current and the future challenges to be resolved. This will call for the following adjustments. One will be in building the status quo; this should be maintained and not be changed. There should reform the existing management and culture, while at the same time trying to rethink the impacts and the essence of the existing models which has to be followed by the creation of the proper culture in terms of the management and the organizational structure. The status quo maintenance means that they basically proceed doing the practices they have been doing in the past but will small change being incorporated in the organizational orientation. But this will have to be proved that some evidence have been provided to show that there is enough evidence for the issues and the analyzed problems that work within the organization and also s an external effect such that the change will be required as the existing mechanisms will not be available to provide a responsible solution. The ideology of the status quo should actually be a system that will need to be dealt way with completely. Changing the existing management culture This is a very low risk option of an organizational reform response mechanism. The reform agenda should able to accept the paramount role of the basic value of the management model within the reform mechanism and try to improve it or refine it. This aspect will help in the avoidance of the large overhaul of the change within the policing culture and instead provide a very nourishing plat form for the refinement and modification of the police culture on a limited effect. But the change and the reformation will have to be continuous and flexible in the context of working within the paradigm of the main policies involved. It is important to recognize the fact that appreciable reformation have already occurred in the policing culture but to a very limited account due to the limited culture of the senior police managements which resists any form of transition by keeping a very slow pace of the reforms. New management models New management models or approaches require that the process goes through the explorative, innovative and developmental systems. The disadvantages of the traditional police management models are that we have elements that are not even useful in the reformation process and which do not need any serious consideration12. Recommendations for the better reformative process There should be a thorough research that should be done to explore and then incorporation to be done on both the new public and the private sectors management. This should positively include the models and the strategies for how such reformations can be achieved13. This can be enhanced further by training, education and further research of the new principle of management foe the policing strategies. This can be based on the past research that was able to work out in other places but still the will be need for the reaffirmation on how they impact on the organizations. They should also be checked for their realistic components in their applications. Merit should as well be the process of the recruiting process as will as well confer the credibility of the transition and on the system itself14. There should also be a system that allows the formation of the officer cadre system. This can be enhanced by creating a high profile recognition that will be able to allow them significant recognition for the highly potential individuals within the departments. This will encourage the people to seek for the advancement in their ability to pursue further levels of education to improve their professionalism alongside their areas of specialties. This will create dynamism in the policing criteria as well enable change to work out in a realistic manner within the organization. The most fundamental concept will basically be to introduce achievements, capability, and potentials which can be augmented with knowledge and skills and their associated abilities15. This should be the key lines of priorities for the position of leadership for the senior management positions. The principles of the organizational learning can as well be made a priority through system that will allow the formation of the intelligence led emphasis on the acquisition, analytical and assessment of intelligence which cuts across in the policing issues Other mechanisms will simply e achieved by the enhancement of research development and innovativeness. The development of the human capacity building through training and educational programs will also be the other way of changing the policing strategies. Conclusion The approaches towards an open and free policing culture will take several mechanisms that will be able to demonstrate the various perspectives of the organization. This should be able to give an indication of the some rejuvenated leadership system that comes with the challenging situations. The new professionalism outlook of the policing culture is a step that needs to take the gradual effect as none can be achieved just all of a sudden. This will therefore call for a thorough understanding of the policing culture of the police system and them coming up with models that will work alongside the traditional models and in the long run killing completely the perceived in adequacies that is limiting to the reformation for the police system. This will be able to cut across the cadre of all the staff of the police and in the due process taking effect and finally winning the confidence of the public. References Balch, RW1972. The police personality: fact or fiction? Journal of Criminal Law, Criminology, &Police Science 63, 106-19 Belkin, A., & McNichol, J2002. Pink and blue: outcomes associated with the integration of open gay and lesbian personnel in the San Diego Police Department. Police Quarterly 5, 63-95. Berkley, GE1969. The democratic policeman. Beacon Press, Boston Barlow, DE. and Barlow, MH2000. Police in a multicultural society.Waveland Press, Long Grove Bittner, E1990. Aspects of police work. Boston: Northeastern University Press. Blasi, GL1995. What lawyers know: lawyering expertise, cognitive science, and the functions of theory. Journal of Legal Education 45, 313-97. Cain, M1993. Some go forward, some go back: police work in comparative perspective. Comparative Sociology 22, 319-24. Carter, DL., & Sapp, AD1990. The evolution of higher education in law enforcement: preliminary findings from a national study. Journal of Criminal Justice Education 1, 59-85. Chan, J1996. Changing police culture. British Journal of Criminology 36, 109-34. Cowper, TJ2004. The myth of the "military model" of leadership in law enforcement. In Q.C Fielding, NG1988. Joining forces: police training, socialization, and occupational competence. Routledge, London Fleming, J., & Lafferty, G2000. New management techniques and restructuring for accountability in Australian police organizations. Policing 23, 154-68. Garland, D2001. The culture of Control. University of Chicago Press, Chicago Goldstein, H1990. Problem-Oriented policing. McGraw-Hill, New York Haar, RN1997. Patterns of interaction in a police patrol bureau: race and gender barriers to integration. Justice Quarterly 14, 53-85. Read More

They are conservative in the nature of the political and social outlook either is caused by the moral and negative nature of police work.2 They are also said to be prejudicial that has been associated with tendency to make judge other people in advance which is based on the work experience, this is a good characteristic but it can lead to racism and sexism and other negative traits. They always become cynics by the tendency to regard the non police as unreliable, unsympathetic and critics of the police.

They are always deemed to be working class group which has also been said to be blue collar jobs. This attributes has been linked to a number of policing problems. Culture has been the key factor that has been identified as the causal factor. This police culture is said to justify the negative police acts and behaviors. The use of the excessive force, corruption and racism have been rationalized as well as protected from their discovery and elimination. This makes them aggressively engaged in them without being seen as a violation of the cultural codes which normalize the codes of work in their line.

Outside the political and the public scrutiny and criticism, the police have become resistant to the external form of accountability, influence, regulation and governance.3 The basic reasoning for this is that in the mode of internal proposition of loyalty, solidarity and suspicion work to create some strong resistance to attempts govern and manage police behaviors and in the process, limiting attempts to manage the police behavior. Police organization and culture The police culture is that that is made up of group and the individual phenomenon.

It is as well structured into police organizations on the basis of locations. It has been argued that the police work is both a police work and organization. This in a broad perspective gives the context of the occupational culture of the police work. This makes it a military and bureaucratic system as it has been contextualized by the military and bureaucratic model of the police organization. This is the best model that describes the police culture. This is the system that has been there and it traces back in history since the 1800’s.

There is some great similarities in the models between the old and the modern policing models. This model offers the police a number of great advantages which includes the organizational stability which is a form of discipline. ‘This creates the police legitimacy, one that is approved, appropriate and effective in response to the circumstances of time4.Bureaucracy is not only a silent way of bringing into the police a measure of the administrative professionalism but as well a means of introducing into the police a mechanism of allowing them to regulate their own affairs, which is free of direct political intervention.

The bureaucratic nature and the military attributes created an organization with the following characteristics. It created a rank based authority structure that had both the position and the power. This was a highly centralized administration system in which most of the decisions were made at the top. This system had commands and control models of philosophy in which orders authority was the key by the use of formal orders. In the same system, there was the rule following punishment and violation.

The decision making process was hierarchical from the top like the pyramidal system of the caste management system. All this was formalized on communication rules and the procedures and even the policies that governed their daily engagements. To advance these roles, there was need for specialization in many of their operational functions5. Technology enhanced their roles while they were equipped with the techniques making them resistant to the change and portraying them as an inflexible organization.

This elaborated the insular and a closed organization that was not going t be moved by any of the outside political and community influence and in the process blocking any legitimate process of coming up with an open policing systems.

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