Ben Bradford
Datos Biográficos
| ID | 254182 |
|---|---|
| NOMBRE | Ben Bradford |
| NOMBRES | Ben |
| APELLIDO | Bradford |
| FIRMA | BEN BRADFORD |
| AFILIACIONES | University College London |
| ORCID | 0000-0001-5480-5638 |
| VERIFICADO | Sí |
| TOTAL DE OBRAS | 83 |
| TOTAL DE CITAS | 815 |
| TOTAL COMO AUTOR | 83 |
| TOTAL COMO EDITOR | 0 |
| PRIMER AÑO DE PUBLICACIÓN | 1950 |
| AÑO MÁS RECIENTE DE PUBLICACIÓN | 2026 |
| ÍNDICE H | 12 |
Exploring the dynamics of identity, procedural justice and police legitimacy in the context of anti-war demonstrations in the UK
This study explores the role of social identity and group-level processes in shaping public perceptions of police legitimacy and procedural justice during anti-war demonstrations in the United Kingdom. Building on procedural justice theory and extending the findings of Radburn and colleagues, we conducted two studies to examine how social context and identification with protestors influenced evaluations of protest policing. Study 1 investigates t…
Law-framed reasoning process
The increasing involvement of digital devices, such as mobile phones, in criminal activities is adding challenges to police investigators’ capacity to identify and trace associated digital data. Forensic science research has underscored the necessity of understanding the cognitive processes involved in digital data analysis, as contextual information introduces interpretive uncertainties that impact the credibility of evidence. Therefore, this st…
The dual impact of procedural injustice
While procedural justice research has established that uncaring, insensitive or intimidating police treatment is linked to negative mental health outcomes for crime victims, the psychological consequences of exclusion remain underexplored. Using data from an online survey of crime victims who interacted with the police (n = 504), this study tested four hypotheses: the direct harmful effect of procedural injustice on mental health (H1), the negati…
Procedural justice, social identity and public cooperation in post-Confucian societies - A test of group engagement model in Taiwan
This study tests the group engagement model (GEM) in Taiwan, examining whether social identity mediates the relationship between procedural justice, police legitimacy, and public cooperation in a post-Confucian context. Drawing on a stratified random sample survey of 1604 Taipei City residents, the study models pathways from procedural justice and police effectiveness to social identity, legitimacy (duty to obey and normative alignment), and will…
Bystanders’ Intentions to Help in Domestic and Intimate Partner Violence
Domestic and intimate partner violence (DIPV) is a major global issue. While bystander intervention is a key prevention strategy, its drivers are poorly understood outside of Western societies. This study aimed to identify and compare the psychosocial factors affecting bystander intervention intentions among community members in the United Kingdom (UK) and China. A total of 463 adults (221 Chinese, 242 UK) completed a self-report online survey. K…
Sociocultural Influences on Attitudes and Behaviors Related to Domestic and Intimate Partner Violence
Domestic and intimate partner violence (DIPV) remains pervasive, yet most evidence on social norms and community responses is drawn from Western populations. This study addresses this critical gap by examining how sociocultural norms shape recognition of, and responses to, DIPV across British and Chinese contexts, representing Western and East Asian sociocultural settings. Focus group interviews were conducted with 24 participants (12 males, 12 f…
Responsibility in Context
Domestic and intimate partner violence (DIPV) is a global health crisis that remains vastly underreported, making community bystanders a critical avenue for prevention. Understanding what shapes individuals’ sense of responsibility to intervene is essential, yet bystander research has been dominated by Western theory. This study examines how culture moderates the bystander effect on perceived responsibility in DIPV situations and explores psychos…
Why do people cooperate with the police and criminal courts? A test of procedural justice theory in 30 countries
This article presents a cross‐national test of the portability of procedural justice theory (PJT). Drawing on nationally representative survey data from 30 diverse social, political, and legal contexts across Europe and beyond, we find that the theory travels well across national borders and that its psychological purchase is particularly pronounced in societies where fair policing is considered the norm. First, in most countries, a normative acc…
Establishing the validity of a Volunteered Geographic Information mapping approach for measuring the spatial and social distribution of police stop experiences in a large urban area
Police-recorded stops and stop experiences reveal a similar social distribution. • Stop experiences are spatially correlated with police-recorded stops. • Stop experiences are spatially correlated with crime, and social deprivation. • Participatory mapping is a valid approach to measure police stop experiences
Policing and mental health
Existing evidence suggests exposure to police activity negatively impacts the mental health of the policed. But research on whether, and why, police activity is correlated with the prevalence of mental health challenges among individuals and in specific areas remains piecemeal. We conducted a Rapid Evidence Assessment (REA) of the literature examining the association between policing and mental health, with a focus on investigating whether people…
Inescapable objects? Automobility and everyday disorder in an English town
In our study of everyday security in one English town (Macclesfield in north-west England), numerous sources of data suggest that annoyance about cars—their volume, speed, (bad) parking, presence at the school gate, and overall effect on the quality and character of everyday life in the town—loom large in the preoccupations of local people. It has been common in work on public insecurities—including, we should add, our own study of the same town …
Seeing disorder’ in an English town
Perceptions of low-level social and physical disorder loom large in criminological theory and research. When disorder seems high, trust in authorities is eroded, concerns about crime precipitated, and a general sense of unease develops. In this article, we use fine-grained survey data from a medium-sized town in the north of England to consider why some people experience their environment as disorderly while others do not. People are more likely …
A Systematic Review Exploring Cultural Variables Related To Bystander Intentions, Interventions and Attitudes in the Context of Domestic and Intimate Partner Violence
PURPOSE: Domestic and intimate partner violence (DIPV) remains a pervasive global issue, disproportionately affecting people in socioeconomically and culturally vulnerable contexts. While bystander intervention has shown promise in preventing DIPV, cultural factors critically shape individuals’ attitudes and willingness to act. This systematic review examines empirical studies investigating the influence of culture on public attitudes and bystand…
Should I Call the Police?’ Exploring Public Views on Whether to Invoke Police in Incidents Involving People with Vulnerabilities
This study explores people’s thresholds and reasons for calling the police in response to incidents invoking uncertainty. It draws upon focus group deliberations and a nationally representative survey in which participants were presented with scenarios invoking vulnerability via depictions of disorderly behaviour and potentially harmful activity. People want and expect police to respond rapidly in situations where vulnerable people are identified…
The Greening of Environmental Criminology
Grounded in a detailed local study of everyday security, in this paper we set out a path for bringing together environmental and green criminology. Revisiting an old research site, Macclesfield in north-west England, we encountered marked shifts in the local meanings of disorder that seem to have developed since we were last there in the mid-1990s. Residents described ‘chronic harms’ that focussed on various forms of ‘litter’ (e.g. drugs detritus…
Relational In/Justice Journeys
Procedural justice theory has much to say about police-citizen interactions, but the high-stakes, long-duration and quite specific nature of police investigations involving rape and sexual assault victims compel us to re-examine and re-conceptualize some of its core propositions. We draw on data from the largest national survey of rape and sexual assault victims’ experiences of the police in the United Kingdom. We find that negative officer behav…
To whom am I speaking?’; Public responses to crime reporting via live chat with human versus AI police operators
Driven by social and technological change and the imperative to enhance efficiency, police have in recent years adopted various technologies to transform their interactions with the public. In the UK, these initiatives often fall under "transformation" agendas, promoting "channel choice" strategies to facilitate public interactions through various technologically mediated platforms, such as reporting crimes online using form-based or chat functio…
What service should police provide? Towards a minimum policing standard
Public confidence in the police
On many accounts British policing is currently experiencing a legitimacy crisis, a claim frequently evidenced by data from opinion surveys. Such surveys have been in the field for more than half a century, generating a wealth of data demonstrating the waxing and waning of 'trust and confidence' in police. Yet, few nationally representative surveys field items that cover the full range of public attitudes towards police. In this paper, we present …
Rethinking the policing of homelessness
This paper considers interactions between police and individuals \nexperiencing homelessness, a fundamental aspect of contemporary \nurban dynamics. The challenges and vulnerabilities faced by the ‘street \npopulation’ intersect with policing priorities in ways that prompt reevaluation of conventional policing methods. Beginning with an \nexploration of existing research, Section 1 analyses police interactions \nwith the street population, illumi…
Introduction
Against the backdrop of what seems like a perpetual cycle of crisis for policing in modern day England and Wales, this introduction synthesises some of the core challenges facing the police. A catalogue of crimes committed by serving officers, missed opportunities for reform, and a scathing review of the internal culture of the Metropolitan Police culminating in a recommendation for a ‘complete overhaul’, might initially leave some readers with t…
Trust in the Police
Trust in the police in England and Wales has diminished steadily over the past decade. Police still enjoy levels of trust that other some institutions might envy, so calling this a crisis risks over‐statement. Yet, declining trust and intense media, political and social pressure on police—symbolised by a number of high‐profile instances of police failure and malpractice—certainly makes many working in and around policing feel like it is a crisis.…
Policing and Sense of Place
Much policy discourse concentrates on the contribution police make to keeping people safe. Often, this means minimizing fear of crime. Yet, more expansive accounts stress the extent to which deeper-rooted forms of security and belonging might also be important ‘outcomes’ of police activity. Using data collected from a survey of residents of a mid-sized English town, Macclesfield in Cheshire, we consider the extent to which evaluations of policing…
Police visibility, trust in police fairness, and collective efficacy
Areas high in collective efficacy – where residents know and trust one another and are willing to intervene to solve neighbourhood problems – tend to experience less crime. Policing is thought to be one antecedent to collective efficacy, but little empirical research has explored this question. Using three waves of survey data collected from London residents over three consecutive years, and multilevel Structural Equation Modelling, this study te…
Centering race in procedural justice theory
OBJECTIVE: We assessed the factors that legitimized the police in the United States at an important moment of history, just after the police killing of George Floyd in 2020. We also evaluated one way of incorporating perceptions of systemic racism into procedural justice theory. HYPOTHESES: We tested two primary hypotheses. The first hypothesis was that perceptions of police procedural justice, distributive justice, and bounded authority were imp…
Why do People Comply with the Law
This paper extends Tyler’s procedural justice model of public compliance with the law. Analysing data from a national probability sample of adults in England and Wales, we present a new conceptualization of legitimacy based on not just the recognition of power, but also the justification of power. We find that people accept the police’s right to dictate appropriate behaviour not only when they feel a duty to obey officers, but also when they beli…
Contact and confidence
Public confidence in policing has become an important issue in the UK. The police rely on legitimacy and public support, and initiatives to improve levels of confidence are currently underway. The point of contact between citizens and officers is vital in any such endeavour. But how are encounters judged and how important for public confidence are assessments of the quality of contacts? We draw upon data from the 2005/2006 Metropolitan Police Pub…
Crime, policing and social order
Public confidence in policing is receiving increasing attention from UK social scientists and policy-makers. The criminal justice system relies on legitimacy and consent to an extent unlike other public services: public support is vital if the police and other criminal justice agencies are to function both effectively and in accordance with democratic norms. Yet we know little about the forms of social perception that stand prior to public confid…
Policing and social identity
Accounts of the social meaning of policing and of the relationship between police and citizen converge on the idea that police behaviour carries important identity-relevant information. Opinions of and ideas about the police are implicated in the formation of social identities that relate to the social groups it represents – nation, state and community. Procedural justice theory suggests that judgements about the fairness of the police will be th…
What price fairness when security is at stake? Police legitimacy in South Africa
The legitimacy of legal authorities – particularly the police – is central to the state's ability to function in a normatively justifiable and effective manner. Studies, mostly conducted in the US and UK, regularly find that procedural justice is the most important antecedent of police legitimacy, with judgments about other aspects of police behavior – notably, about effectiveness – appearing less relevant. But this idea has received only sporadi…
Monopolizing force? Police legitimacy and public attitudes toward the acceptability of violence
Why do people believe that violence is acceptable? In this paper we study people’s normative beliefs about the acceptability of violence to achieve social control (as a substitute for the police, for self-protection and the resolution of disputes) and social change (through violent protests and acts to achieve political goals). Addressing attitudes towards violence among young men from various ethnic minority communities in London, we find that p…
Officers as Mirrors
Encounters with the criminal justice system shape people's perceptions of the legitimacy of legal authorities, and the dominant explanatory framework for this relationship revolves around the idea that procedurally just practice increases people's positive connections to justice institutions. But there have been few assessments of the idea -central to procedural justice theory -that social identity acts as an important social-psychological bridge…
Corruption and Police Legitimacy in Lahore, Pakistan
Police legitimacy is an important topic of criminological research, yet it has received only sporadic study in societies where there is widespread police corruption, where the position of the police is less secure, and where social order is more tenuous. Analysing data from a probability sample survey of adults in Lahore, Pakistan, we examine the empirical links between people’s experience of police corruption, their perceptions of the fairness a…
Self-legitimacy, Police Culture and Support for Democratic Policing in an English Constabulary
When do police officers feel confident in their own authority? What factors influence their sense of their own legitimacy? What is the effect of such ‘self-legitimacy’ on the way they think about policing? This article addresses these questions using a survey of police officers working in an English Constabulary. We find that the most powerful predictor of officers’ confidence in their own authority is identification with their organization, itse…
Can police enhance public confidence by improving quality of service? Results from two surveys in England and Wales
Public opinions of the police have been a fixture at the top of the policy agenda in England and Wales in recent years, with successive governments stating they wish to see improvements in 'trust and confidence'. But significant doubts remain as to how this might be done, and even if it is possible for police to enhance public confidence in any straightforward way. Indeed, it often seems that it is much easier for police to damage public opinion …
When is policing fair? Groups, identity and judgements of the procedural justice of coercive crowd policing
Procedural justice theory (PJT) is now a widely utilised theoretical perspective in policing research that acknowledges the centrality of police ‘fairness’. Despite its widespread acceptance this paper asserts that there are conceptual limitations that emerge when applying the theory to the policing of crowd events. This paper contends that this problem with PJT is a result of specific assumptions that are highlighted by two studies using a novel…
Dispute Resolution Outside of Courts
Attitudes toward legal authorities based on theories of procedural justice have been explored extensively in the criminal and civil justice systems. This has provided considerable empirical evidence concerning the importance of trust and legitimacy in generating cooperation, compliance, and decision acceptance. However, not enough attention has been paid to attitudes towards institutions of informal dispute resolution. This paper asks whether the…
Does Stop and Search Deter Crime? Evidence From Ten Years of London-wide Data
In this article, we used ten years of police, crime and other data from London to investigate the potential effect of stop and search on crime. Using lagged regression models and a natural experiment, we show that the effect of stop and crime is likely to be marginal, at best. While there is some association between stop and search and crime (particularly drug crime), claims that this is an effective way to control and deter offending seem mispla…
Triggers of change to public confidence in the police and criminal justice system
Accounts of public ‘trust and confidence’ in criminal justice agencies often fall into one of two camps. Instrumental accounts suggest that people trust police and the criminal justice system (CJS) when they believe them to be effective in fighting crime and reducing offending. Expressive or affective accounts, by contrast, suggest people place as much or more emphasis on the social meaning of justice institutions as on their instrumental activit…
Social identity and support for defunding the police in the aftermath of George Floyd’s murder
In the spring and summer of 2020, police in the United States killed Breonna Taylor, George Floyd, and other unarmed people of color. In one of the largest social movements in the nation’s history, thousands engaged in public protests and called to defund or abolish the police. Debate about police racism and the need for reform intensified, with public opinion polls showing how polarized public attitudes were along traditional political lines. An…
Influencing Trust and Confidence in the London Metropolitan Police
Enhancing trust and confidence has moved to the centre of policing policy in England and Wales. The association between direct encounters with police officers and confidence in the police is well-established. But is it possible for the police to increase confidence among the general population including those people who do not routinely come into direct contact with police officers? This paper presents the findings from a quasi-randomised experim…
Affect and trust as predictors of public support for armed police
Police in England, Scotland and Wales operate largely unarmed and have done since the formation of the London Metropolitan Police in 1829. However, recent terror attacks and concern over serious violent crime have prompted increased funding for armed officers and even calls for routine arming of police. In this paper, we present results from the first in-depth study of public attitudes towards the arming of more police. Starting from the assumpti…
Convergence, Not Divergence
Public trust and confidence are vital to the police function. There has been much comment and debate about the apparent decline in confidence in the British police since the 1950s, most frequently evidenced by data from the British Crime Survey (BCS). Yet, there has been relatively little in-depth interrogation of the data at the heart of the discussion. Pooling data from 11 sweeps of the BCS (1984 to 2005/06), this paper shows a homogenization o…
Fear and legitimacy in São Paulo, Brazil
We examine consensual and coercive police-citizen relations in São Paulo, Brazil. According to procedural justice theory, popular legitimacy operates as part of a virtuous circle, whereby normatively appropriate police behavior encourages people to self-regulate, which then reduces the need for coercive forms of social control. But can consensual and coercive police-citizen relations be so easily disentangled in a city in which many people fear c…
A golden thread, a presence amongst uniforms, and a good deal of data
This article discusses how four authors came together to create – inside a police service – a specific approach to public ‘trust and confidence’. We have had many theoretical debates – about the nature of public understanding of policing, police culture, procedural justice and public trust in public institutions in a democracy. Also, while we continue to debate, we wade through mounds of data gathered routinely through the Metropolitan Police's o…
Identity, legitimacy and cooperation with police
Social identity is a core aspect of procedural justice theory, which predicts that fair treatment at the hands of power holders such as police expresses, communicates, and generates feelings of inclusion, status, and belonging within salient social categories. In turn, a sense of shared group membership with power holders, with police officers as powerful symbolic representatives of “law-abiding society,” engenders trust, legitimacy, and cooperat…
Building Immigrants’ Solidarity with Police
Some immigrants can be reluctant to cooperate with the police due to experiences of social exclusion and discrimination. Procedural justice scholars argue that people cooperate with police when they feel the police are just and fair because such treatment motivates identification with social categories that police represent. In this paper, we consider whether immigrants in Australia respond favourably to procedurally just treatment from police be…
Trust in the Police
Trust in the police in England and Wales has diminished steadily over the past decade. Police still enjoy levels of trust that other some institutions might envy, so calling this a crisis risks over‐statement. Yet, declining trust and intense media, political and social pressure on police—symbolised by a number of high‐profile instances of police failure and malpractice—certainly makes many working in and around policing feel like it is a crisis.…
Developing core national indicators of public attitudes towards the police in Canada
Police departments regularly conduct public opinion surveys to measure attitudes towards the police. The results of these surveys can be used to shape and evaluate policing policy and practice. Yet the extant evidence base is hampered when people use different methods and when there is no common data standard. In this paper we present a set of 13 core national indicators that can be used by police services across Canada to ensure measurement qual…
The anatomy of police legitimacy
In a series of recent influential papers, Anthony Bottoms and Justice Tankebe make the case for a ‘dialogic model’ of police legitimacy, wherein legitimacy is envisaged as emergent in a process through which the police, as power-holders, make claims to authority which are, in turn, responded to by audiences. Our aim in this article is to analyse this model. We argue that while it has the potential to direct legitimacy research along paths hithert…
Keep up high quality
Contact and confidence
Public confidence in policing has become an important issue in the UK. The police rely on legitimacy and public support, and initiatives to improve levels of confidence are currently underway. The point of contact between citizens and officers is vital in any such endeavour. But how are encounters judged and how important for public confidence are assessments of the quality of contacts? We draw upon data from the 2005/2006 Metropolitan Police Pub…
Crime, policing and social order
Public confidence in policing is receiving increasing attention from UK social scientists and policy-makers. The criminal justice system relies on legitimacy and consent to an extent unlike other public services: public support is vital if the police and other criminal justice agencies are to function both effectively and in accordance with democratic norms. Yet we know little about the forms of social perception that stand prior to public confid…
Procedural Justice, Trust, and Institutional Legitimacy
This paper summarizes ‘procedural justice’ approaches to policing, contrasting these to the more politically dominant discourse about policing as crime control. It argues that public trust in policing is needed partly because this may result in public cooperation with justice, but more importantly because public trust in justice builds institutional legitimacy and thus public compliance with the law and commitment to the rule of law. Some recent …
What is Trust and Confidence in the Police?
One of the first actions of the new Home Secretary was to scrap public confidence as the single performance indicator of policing in England and Wales. Yet public trust and confidence will remain important to policing policy and practice. Trust and confidence can (a) encourage active citizen participation in priority setting and the running of local services, (b) make public bodies more locally accountable and responsive, and (c) secure public co…
Influencing Trust and Confidence in the London Metropolitan Police
Enhancing trust and confidence has moved to the centre of policing policy in England and Wales. The association between direct encounters with police officers and confidence in the police is well-established. But is it possible for the police to increase confidence among the general population including those people who do not routinely come into direct contact with police officers? This paper presents the findings from a quasi-randomised experim…
Developing European indicators of trust in justice
A social indicators approach to trust in justice recognizes that the police and criminal courts need public support and institutional legitimacy if they are to operate effectively and fairly. In order to generate public cooperation and compliance, these institutions must demonstrate to citizens that they are trustworthy and that they possess the authority to govern. In this paper we first outline the conceptual roadmap for a current comparative a…
Voice, neutrality and respect
Public confidence in the criminal justice system (CJS) is a topic of perennial concern across the United Kingdom, particularly in light of the relatively low levels of confidence reported in the British Crime Survey (BCS) and elsewhere. Recent work on policing has stressed that the experience of procedural fairness is an important influence on ‘user-satisfaction’, trust and legitimacy. Yet it is unclear whether this emphasis on fairness applies t…
Can police enhance public confidence by improving quality of service? Results from two surveys in England and Wales
Public opinions of the police have been a fixture at the top of the policy agenda in England and Wales in recent years, with successive governments stating they wish to see improvements in 'trust and confidence'. But significant doubts remain as to how this might be done, and even if it is possible for police to enhance public confidence in any straightforward way. Indeed, it often seems that it is much easier for police to damage public opinion …
Convergence, Not Divergence
Public trust and confidence are vital to the police function. There has been much comment and debate about the apparent decline in confidence in the British police since the 1950s, most frequently evidenced by data from the British Crime Survey (BCS). Yet, there has been relatively little in-depth interrogation of the data at the heart of the discussion. Pooling data from 11 sweeps of the BCS (1984 to 2005/06), this paper shows a homogenization o…
Just Authority?
What does it mean to trust the police? What makes the police legitimate in the eyes of the policed? What builds trust, legitimacy and cooperation, and what undermines the bond between police and the public? These questions are central to current debates concerning the relationship between the British police and the public it serves. Yet, in the context of British policing they are seldom asked explicitly, still less examined in depth. Drawing on …
Policing and social identity
Accounts of the social meaning of policing and of the relationship between police and citizen converge on the idea that police behaviour carries important identity-relevant information. Opinions of and ideas about the police are implicated in the formation of social identities that relate to the social groups it represents – nation, state and community. Procedural justice theory suggests that judgements about the fairness of the police will be th…
A golden thread, a presence amongst uniforms, and a good deal of data
This article discusses how four authors came together to create – inside a police service – a specific approach to public ‘trust and confidence’. We have had many theoretical debates – about the nature of public understanding of policing, police culture, procedural justice and public trust in public institutions in a democracy. Also, while we continue to debate, we wade through mounds of data gathered routinely through the Metropolitan Police's o…
Why do People Comply with the Law
This paper extends Tyler’s procedural justice model of public compliance with the law. Analysing data from a national probability sample of adults in England and Wales, we present a new conceptualization of legitimacy based on not just the recognition of power, but also the justification of power. We find that people accept the police’s right to dictate appropriate behaviour not only when they feel a duty to obey officers, but also when they beli…
Overcoming cop culture? Organizational justice and police officers’ attitudes toward the public
Purpose The purpose of this paper is to test theories of organizational justice in the context of a police agency. Design/methodology/approach Structural Equation Modelling (SEM) was used to analyze data from a survey of officers in a police force in England. Findings The SEM showed that organizational justice was associated with positive attitudes towards serving members of the public. This relationship was mediated by commitment to elements of …
Monopolizing force? Police legitimacy and public attitudes toward the acceptability of violence
Why do people believe that violence is acceptable? In this paper we study people’s normative beliefs about the acceptability of violence to achieve social control (as a substitute for the police, for self-protection and the resolution of disputes) and social change (through violent protests and acts to achieve political goals). Addressing attitudes towards violence among young men from various ethnic minority communities in London, we find that p…
Why do ‘the law’ comply? Procedural justice, group identification and officer motivation in police organizations
How can police officers be encouraged to commit to changing organizational and personal practice? In this paper we test organizational justice theories that suggest that fair processes and procedures enhance rule compliance and commitment to the organization and its goals. We pay particular attention to (a) tensions between the role of group identity in organizational justice models and classic concerns about ‘cop culture’; and (b) the danger of …
Triggers of change to public confidence in the police and criminal justice system
Accounts of public ‘trust and confidence’ in criminal justice agencies often fall into one of two camps. Instrumental accounts suggest that people trust police and the criminal justice system (CJS) when they believe them to be effective in fighting crime and reducing offending. Expressive or affective accounts, by contrast, suggest people place as much or more emphasis on the social meaning of justice institutions as on their instrumental activit…
Self-legitimacy, Police Culture and Support for Democratic Policing in an English Constabulary
When do police officers feel confident in their own authority? What factors influence their sense of their own legitimacy? What is the effect of such ‘self-legitimacy’ on the way they think about policing? This article addresses these questions using a survey of police officers working in an English Constabulary. We find that the most powerful predictor of officers’ confidence in their own authority is identification with their organization, itse…
Corruption and Police Legitimacy in Lahore, Pakistan
Police legitimacy is an important topic of criminological research, yet it has received only sporadic study in societies where there is widespread police corruption, where the position of the police is less secure, and where social order is more tenuous. Analysing data from a probability sample survey of adults in Lahore, Pakistan, we examine the empirical links between people’s experience of police corruption, their perceptions of the fairness a…
Officers as Mirrors
Encounters with the criminal justice system shape people's perceptions of the legitimacy of legal authorities, and the dominant explanatory framework for this relationship revolves around the idea that procedurally just practice increases people's positive connections to justice institutions. But there have been few assessments of the idea -central to procedural justice theory -that social identity acts as an important social-psychological bridge…
What price fairness when security is at stake? Police legitimacy in South Africa
The legitimacy of legal authorities – particularly the police – is central to the state's ability to function in a normatively justifiable and effective manner. Studies, mostly conducted in the US and UK, regularly find that procedural justice is the most important antecedent of police legitimacy, with judgments about other aspects of police behavior – notably, about effectiveness – appearing less relevant. But this idea has received only sporadi…
Compliance and Legal Authority
Theorizing the role of ‘the brand’ in criminal justice
The rise of branded programmes and interventions is an important, but largely under-explored, development in criminal justice. This article draws on findings from a study of a British Integrated Offender Management (IOM) scheme to ground a broader theoretical discussion of the meaning and implications of the increasing centrality of such ‘brands’. This article focuses primarily upon the ways in which criminal justice practitioners might draw upon…
A Leap of Faith? Trust in the Police Among Immigrants in England and Wales
It is often assumed that immigrants in countries such as the United Kingdom will report lower levels of trust in the police. Immigrant communities are thought ‘difficult to police’, and minority groups frequently experience problematic relationships with police. Yet, there has been little empirical investigation of this issue in the United Kingdom. In this paper, data from the Crime Survey of England and Wales are used to explore the relationship…
Political science (64 obras) · Policing Practices and Perceptions (62 obras) · Crime Patterns and Interventions (57 obras) · Law (55 obras) · Psychology (54 obras) · Criminology (52 obras) · Sociology (44 obras) · Social Psychology (41 obras) · Procedural justice (32 obras) · Criminal Justice and Corrections Analysis (31 obras)