Police & Policing Lecture Notes

PASS Program

  • Arisa, a high-achieving Bachelor of Arts student with majors in Politics, International Relations, and Criminology, promotes the PASS program.
  • Received the ADA Dean's List Award for 2023 and 2024.
  • PASS is similar to a tutorial but more individualized, adapting to students' needs beyond set readings or activities.
  • Offers a less intimidating environment compared to approaching professors or tutors.
  • Arisa shares tactics for excelling in the course, drawing from her experience as a student and her positions in Source or Crimson 10.
  • Students can join any week without committing to every session.
  • A QR code is available for signing up to receive notifications.

Policing: An Overview

  • Focusing on policing as a key state institution of justice and its broader societal impact.
  • Understanding policing is crucial for understanding the rest of the criminal legal system, including courts and prisons.
  • Police function as gatekeepers to the criminal legal system.
  • They have significant discretion in deciding actions like issuing cautions or making arrests.
  • Policing is the largest element in the criminal legal system, accounting for about 70% of state budgets.
  • Police possess powers that would be considered major crimes if committed by ordinary citizens, such as the power to arrest, detain, surveil, and use lethal force.
  • The lecture will serve as a case study exploring various elements within the study of police.
  • Policing will be revisited during the week on human rights, particularly concerning human rights abuses.

Deaths in Custody and Systemic Issues

  • Discussion of Aboriginal people dying in custody, highlighting rallies and statements addressing the issue.
  • Reference to the death of a 24-year-old Aboriginal man who died while being restrained by police in a Coles supermarket in Alice Springs.
  • Mention of Paul Silva, nephew of David Dungay Junior, who died in custody in Long Bay Jail after saying "I can't breathe," which became a rallying cry similar to Black Lives Matter.
  • David Dungay Junior's mother has taken the case to the UN Human Rights Committee due to the lack of disciplinary actions against the guards involved.
  • Statement from 2021, created with the National Aboriginal Legal Service, highlighting issues such as lack of housing and systemic racism.
  • Key demands include implementing recommendations from the Royal Commission, independent police investigations, ending public funding to punitive detention, increasing Aboriginal-led support services, reforming bail laws, and raising the minimum age of criminal responsibility.
  • Australia's bail laws have worsened since 2021, leading to more Aboriginal people in custody.

Lecture Outline

  • Defining police and policing.
  • Examining the history and origins of police in Australia.
  • Identifying the core roles and functions of police.
  • Touching briefly on issues and critiques in policing, with more detailed discussion in tutorials and the Human Rights Week.

Procedural Justice

  • Procedural justice emphasizes the process over the outcome, asserting that fairness, transparency, and equal treatment are more crucial to achieving justice.
  • Controversially, some studies suggest that as long as the process is fair, people prioritize this over the outcome itself.
  • A just outcome reported poorly in the media may still be perceived as unjust.

Police vs. Policing

  • Distinction between "police" as a state institution (e.g., New South Wales Police Force) and "policing" as a set of processes creating social order.
  • Police are a specific organizational entity, while policing is a broader social function that can be carried out through various means.
  • Examples of policing exist outside national and state-based organizations.
  • The university has various examples of policing, such as surveillance, staff and student conduct procedures, and a complaints department.

Research on Police

  • Robert Reiner's quote about the modern formation of policing.
  • Tim Newburn identifies two types of research: criminology for police (administrative criminology) and criminology on police.
  • Criminology for police involves research partnerships with police, while criminology on police is more critical and focuses on the impact of police on society.
  • Criminology is contested, with views ranging from tinkering with policing to drastically reducing the role and powers of police.

Defining "Polis"

  • "Polis" is derived from the ancient Greek word for city or community, sharing etymology with "politics."
  • Police are part of the executive government, with the police commissioner technically part of the executive.
  • The minister of police is part of both the parliament and the executive, illustrating the crossover between politics and police and using law and order as election touchstones.
  • "Police science" refers to internal police procedures and regulations, like forensics or interviewing styles.
  • The rise of democratic states is linked to the creation of police to protect citizens and democracy.
  • PJ Waddington: "Policing is the exercise of the authority of a state over a civilian population"

Historical Origins of Police in Australia

  • Policing is connected to the origins of democracy and the British Empire.
  • Britain brought a military institution to Australia in 1788, using British military officers as police to control convicts and dispossess Aboriginal people.
  • The police force was centralized in Sydney and then spread out.
  • In 1862, the amalgamation of the police force occurred, making New South Wales one of the first places in the world to have a specific police force.
  • Military police were responsible for at least 50% of massacres against indigenous people in the 1820s.
  • Police were responsible for welfare checks of indigenous people that led to genocidal child removal.
  • Police enforced taxes on Chinese immigrants during the gold rush.

Functions of Police

  • White and Peyronie identify various core functions of the police, including traffic management.
  • Prevention is preventing crime before it occurs, while enforcement is enforcing the law once a crime has occurred.
  • Police can create criminalization through over-policing and overcharging.
  • Provision of social services may be contradictory depending on the action.
  • Main\;function: talking\;to\;people
  • Mission statements of police forces:
    • New South Wales Police: to work with the community and reduce violence, crime, and fear.
    • VicPol: to keep everyone safe.
    • WA Police: to provide trusted and valued policing for Western Australia.
    • Queensland Police: prevent, disrupt, respond, and investigate.
      • ACT Police: to keep the peace.
      • AFP: Protecting lives, protecting livelihoods, fostering trust in community
  • New South Wales Police Force is the largest in the country, with around 23,000 sworn and unsworn officers.

Structure

  • The Commissioner of Police heads New South Wales Police, which is split between Operation Command for Metropolitan, Operation Command for Regional New South Wales, and Investigations and Counterterrorism.
  • Corporate services include HR, communications, IT, and finance.

Misconceptions

  • Policing is not just reactive; there's a push towards proactive policing.
  • Policing focuses on offences already committed, but it also tries to stop offences before they are committed.
  • The offence is not always immediately clear, and police need to understand the legislation and gather evidence.
  • Police are not trying to uncover the truth, but they are trying to gather the evidence towards a charge.
  • Most of the work isn't carried out by detectives or about clues, but about paperwork and talking to people.
  • The main role for the lowest ranking officer is to talk to people.

Statistics

  • Most calls relate to minor low-level disturbances.
  • Tim Newburn found that most police calls weren't crime related, but minor disputes
  • Small number of calls are emergency situations
  • From a UK study, only about 18% of the contact between police and public involved any crime.
  • On individual shift, might face an incident of a serious assault on average every two shifts
  • 9% is actually crime related work.

Powers

  • Powers included are: Investigation of offenses, search and seizure of property, arrest and questioning, prosecution of summary offenses e.g police prosecutors.

Oversight

  • Oversight on police by introducing some elements of the, independent as well as within police, integrity commissions.

Styles of Policing

  • Community policing: Community policing is something that started to become very popular in the eighties. Police wanted to actively, and some people in gay and lesbian community also wanted to actively, have better relationships with police, and so they developed this thing called community policing.
  • Community policing is a philosophy that promotes community based problem solving, where police work with community members to deal with a whole range of problems within the community, not just crime.
  • A few examples of community policing can be going to schools and educating young adults.
  • Unique example: indigenous led community oriented policing, WA.
  • Learnt language and built trust from all the community. This isn't something that is recognised in Australia.
  • Problem oriented policing: where a particular problem has been identified in an area. Traffic cameras is an example and hot spot policing.
  • Problem oriented is police of problems before a crime.
  • Intelligence led policing: linked to problem oriented policing, but it is generally on a much larger scale.
    • Example: The investigation of a whole series of linked events and incidences, and one of the problems with intelligence led policing with something like a whole series of linked crimes and incidences is that there's so much noise in the massive collection of police and government data,
  • Public order policing: police dressed in military gear.
    • Examples:
      • Commonwealth Games in Gold Coast.
      • APEC special police powers.
    • COVID border shutdowns.
  • Zero tolerance policing: we the core of this is we we need to treat even the most minor offenses with the same vigor as the most serious forms of criminality, and this is from what's called broken windows theory.
    • This caused displacement effect, so moving crime from one location to another. This is known as the Sydney lockout laws.
  • Copaganda: a portmanteau word meaning cop and propaganda. TikTok is known for this. Used for recruitment of police officers.