Shifting Gears or Slamming the Brakes? A Review of Police Behavioural Change in a Post-Apartheid Police Unit

Bibliographic Data

ID14985231
AuthorsMonique Marks (0000-0002-4926-6972, Australian National University, corresponding author)
Year2003
Volume13
Issue3
Pages235-258
Publication date2003-01-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenuePolicing & Society (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1043-9463 • E-ISSN: 1477-2728
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/10439460308031
OpenAlexW2089140131
LanguageEN
Citations received8
References cited27

Since the mid-1990s, the state police agency in South Africa has embarked on programmes to "transform" itself into a service that is suited to a democratic political dispensation in South Africa. This has meant that policing has had to become more tolerant, community-oriented and democratic. This article attempts to appraise this transformation process by looking at the conduct of the Public Order Police (POP), a unit of the South African Police Service (SAPS), in recent years. Observations of the unit and interviews with members of all ranks demonstrate that significant change in police responses toward the public has taken place. However, members of the unit repeat past behaviour despite organizational reform processes. Drawing on the work of Janet Chan and Edgar Schein, resistance to change is explained in terms of deeply held assumptions, attitudes and values

Community policing · Criminal justice · Criminology · Democracy · Law enforcement · Police science · Political science · Politics · Social science · Sociology · State police · Crime Patterns and Interventions · Engineering · Law · Legal Issues in South Africa · Policing Practices and Perceptions · Psychology · Public Administration

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