Community/Neighbourhood/Problem-Oriented Policing

Sometimes linked to restorative values, these approaches to policing emphasize strong relationships between police officers and community members with an orientation toward helping the community solve problems.

The Rise and Fall of Restorative Justice on Boulder’s University Hill

Thomas Russell provides background to the initiation and decline of a restorative justice programme in Boulder, Colorado. His description provides lessons for restorative justice implementation.

Martin, Margaret E. Community Policing: Restoring Justice?

Community policing, the new term for problem-solving, accountable to community policing, now the dominant paradigm of policing in the United States is rapidly becoming a preferred policy of policing internationally. This policing approach has been employed in Australia, Canada, Great Britain, India, Kenya, Northern Ireland, Malawi, Sierra Leone, the Solomon Islands, South Africa, Trinidad, Zambia, and more. (excerpt) Multiple policing practices which are essentially anti-bureaucratic, decentralized, responsive to the public, attentive to crime prevention and problem-solving have become known as "community policing." The theory and method followed early disparate practices. Although many suggest that this approach is essentially a return to earlier forms of policing, some argue that this represents a heightened stage of the modern evolution of policing. Nonetheless, begun in various jurisdictions in the United States and quickly embraced by the National Institute of Justice, this style of policing has rapidly replaced previous types of policing activity in the United States to the level that more than 85 percent of the US population is now served by some type of community policing force. But important questions need to be asked. How will this new paradigm of policing survive export? How does community policing fit for the special challenges of policing divided societies? And importantly, is community policing congruent with or contradictory to principles of restorative justice?

City programs honored during excellence awards' 20th anniversary

from the press release by Cherie Duvall Jones: The Awards for Municipal Excellence will be celebrating 20 years of success as it honors eight innovative city programs during [the National League of City's] Congress of Cities and Exposition, this week in San Antonio. “These eight Awards for Municipal Excellence cities have improved the quality of life for their citizens by developing creative solutions to pressing local problems,” said Donald J. Borut, NLC executive director. “I congratulate them for establishing model programs that can serve as positive examples for other cities.”

Settles, Tanya Lynne. Community Policing and Community Adjudication: Toward a Theory of Organizational Co-Evolution in Criminal Justice Administration

This study examines how and why police agencies that engage in community policing strategies interact with judicial agencies that utilize community adjudication, including restorative justice, community courts, community prosecution, and similar tactics. This study investigates the interaction between community policing and community adjudication to determine organizational and intergovernmental strategies that permit both types of agencies to achieve common goals in a way that is responsive to the communities they serve. Author's abstract.

True community policing means restorative justice

from the entry by Macleay for Oakland Mayor 2010: Community Policing has become one of those "assumed good things" that we all are supposed to support. But what do we mean by community policing? Does it mean we should be happy with just having a police officer at a community meeting, or on the street? Is a beat cop the whole story? Is there a role for the community beyond being informants? My view of Community Policing has to do with merging community values and existing statues. Local communities need to be involved in helping community youth become aware and understand what is acceptable and what is not.

Pranis, Kay. Building support for community justice: Principles and strategies

Declaring that the current criminal justice system is in crisis, Pranis advances the potential of restorative justice theory and practice as a comprehensive alternative.

Fagan, Jeffery. Attention Felons: Evaluating Project Safe Neighborhoods in Chicago

This research uses a quasi-experimental design to evaluate the impact of Project Safe Neighborhood (PSN) initiatives on neighborhood level crime rates in Chicago. Four interventions are analyzed: (1) increased federal prosecutions for convicted felons carrying or using guns, (2) the length of sentences associated with federal prosecutions, (3) supply-side firearm policing activities, and (4) social marketing of deterrence and social norms messages through justice-style offender notification meetings. Using an individual growth curve models and propensity scores to adjust for non-random group assignment, our findings suggest that several PSN interventions are associated with greater declines of homicide in the treatment neighborhoods as compared to the control neighborhoods. The largest effect is associated with the offender notification meetings that stress individual deterrence, normative change in offender behavior, and increasing views on legitimacy and procedural justice. Possible competing hypotheses and directions for individual level analysis are also discussed. (author's abstract)

Martin, Margaret E. Restoring Justice Through Community Policing: The Northern Ireland Case.

After describing the theory, practice, and values of restorative justice, this article examines them in relation to community policing ideology and practice under the police reforms in Northern Ireland. Central to the ideals of restorative justice are the accountability of offenders in consultation with their victims in order to repair the harms done to the victims and to the community, followed by correction of offender behaviors in order to prevent future harms. In a jurisdiction where conflict among residents and between residents and police has been intense, these restorative justice principles are relevant. Police and citizens must consult with one another in efforts to remedy harms, and reform behaviors so as to change the quality of future interactions. Community policing has been promoted as reflective of the democratic principles of accountability, transparency, and sensitivity to the security needs of all community residents. In examining the links between community policing and restorative justice, this article discusses the expressed goals or ideology of each paradigm, the values promoted, and the practices and processes used. By conducting this discussion in the context of Northern Ireland's police reforms, which have incorporated the values of community policing, this article shows how community policing can heal previous conflicts through the application of restorative justice principles, i.e., attention to addressing the harms suffered by all citizens while listening to the community's complaints about where the police have failed to address various public safety needs, followed by the formulation of new behaviors in cooperative actions between police and the community to ensure public safety. Abstract courtesy of National Criminal Justice Reference Service, www.ncjrs.org.

Jeavons, Robert. Community Policing, Manx-Style

The Isle of Man is a small independent island of around 73,000 people in the middle of the Irish Sea. Robert Jeavons is Chair of the Isle of Man Police Consultative Forum. As Jeavons states, in response to public demand, renewed efforts have been made in the last several years to reestablish community policing – an approach to policing emphasizing local initiatives and solutions within broad national policies and priorities. Jeavons describes the process of public consultation in the development of community policing, and he speculates on the potential benefits of this approach for the people of the Isle of Man.

Royal Canadian Mounted Police. RCMP First Nations Community Policing Service

The First Nations Policing Policy, announced by the Canadian government in 1991, provides First Nations communities with greater control over the delivery and management of policing services in their communities. This document is an information booklet from the Royal Canadian Mounted Police to supplement the First Nations Policing Policy booklet produced by the Ministry of the Solicitor General of Canada. It outlines the major elements of the RCMP First Nations Community Policing Service, including accountability to the community, community justice initiatives, funding, management, and other aspects of this policing.

Bucqueroux, Bonnie. Community criminal justice: Building on the lessons that community policing teaches.

As Bucqueroux notes, proponents of community policing believe that it has the potential to serve as the model for dramatic reform of the entire criminal justice system. At the same time, the history of community policing reveals lessons about the problems involved in implementing a community criminal justice system. In this context, Bucqueroux explores both the opportunities and the obstacles in community policing. Her article covers traditional policing and its limitations, principles of community policing, and a vision for a community criminal justice system.

Wong, Kam C.. Philosophy of Community Policing in China

Part I of this article states the focus and justifications of this research, which is an effort to contrast American and Chinese community-policing philosophy and practice. Part 2, which serves both as a literature review and a comparative context for the study of China's community policing philosophy, reviews the evolution of the American approach to community policing. Part 3 then describes the philosophy of Chinese community policing, past and present, compared with the Western mode. Part 4 discusses the lessons learned through this investigation of Chinese community policing philosophy. The article notes that the Chinese social control system is based in three broad principles: reformation of the offender, restoration of the social relationship, and reintegration of the offender into the community. The philosophy of Chinese policing, conceptually and operationally, is determined by Communist political ideology that has been incrementally refined through time and variously interpreted by different leaders. The Chinese leadership has advocated that the people, or the mass, is the master of its own destiny. Practically and operationally, this means the police must view social control from the people's perspective, seek their support, and be amenable to their supervision. Any policing detached and isolated from the people would not be effective in identifying local problems and detecting hidden criminality. In the United States, social control is imposed externally and formally. Social control is organized, bureaucratized, and legalized, and it is applied by and through the police. The police engage and involve the public only when required. Community policing as developed in the United States means that the police are the dominant social control agents, albeit with the indispensable help and mandatory supervision of the people.

Pollard, Charles.. "If your only tool is a hammer, all your problems will look like nails."

Pollard maintains that a fundamental limitation in policing has been that the police only had the traditional criminal law and criminal justice processes to deal with a wide range of problems in communities, many of which would be better addressed through other approaches. Restorative justice, raising fundamental questions about the traditional criminal justice system, presents the possibility of a shift in police culture to a more problem-oriented, community style of policing. With this in mind, Pollard looks at policing and problem-solving in a civil society, the evolution of restorative justice in the Thames Valley Police, community safety and the limitations of the formal criminal justice system, limitations in the formal trial system, community safety and restorative justice, and prospects for advancing restorative justice in the national and international spheres.

Nicholl, Caroline G. "Making the links between community policing and community justice."

Noting the challenges posed by crime rates and traditional responses to crime, Nicholl examines the potential in community policing and the risks to this approach. With this in mind, Nicholl relates the background to community policing in a section of London. This leads to a consideration of the nature of community policing, followed by discussion on problems in developing community policing. Nicholl concludes by connecting all of this with community justice and projecting future opportunities and threats for community justice.

Bazemore, Gordon and Cole, A W. "Police in the 'Laboratory' of the Neighborhood: Evaluating Problem-Oriented Strategies in a Medium-Sized City."

A study evaluates the Lawrence (MA) Police Department's use of problem-oriented policing in a densely populated, high-crime area. Data were gathered in 1990-92 from pre- and post-program citizen surveys. Overall, the community policing initiative shows initial signs of at least partial success. General, though not conclusive, support emerged for the hypothesis that the intervention had a positive impact in the target neighborhoods on perceptions of fear and disorder. Contrary to expectations, citizen perceptions of police in the target neighborhood did not improve significantly relative to the rest of the city.

Nicholl, Caroline G. "Toolbox for implementing restorative justice and advancing community policing."

This document – styled as a toolbox by the author to emphasize its practical nature – is a guide to police departments interested in starting a restorative justice program. It is not a definitive examination of restorative justice, nor is it a training manual for facilitators of restorative justice processes. Nevertheless, it covers a number of key topics organized into seven parts: (1) values of restorative justice (e.g., repairing harms); (2) addressing victims’ needs (e.g., victim advocates); (3) holding offenders to account (e.g., positive shaming); (4) building community capacity (e.g., restorative community service); (5) developing a program (e.g., resources and funding); (6) benchmarks for evaluation (e.g., testing how restorative a program is); and (7) exploration of unresolved issues (e.g., police role in restorative justice). Please note that the toolbox is designed as a complement to a companion publication by the same author: Community Policing, Community Justice, and Restorative Justice: Exploring the Links for the Delivery of a Balanced Approach to Public Safety. This companion publication can be found online by going to this address: http://www.usdoj.gov/cops/cp_resources/pubs_ppse/restorative_justice.htm

Nicholl, Caroline G. Community Policing, Community Justice, and Restorative Justice: Exploring the Links for the Delivery of a Balanced Approach to Public Safety

Community policing has become a significant feature of modern policing, yet its meaning and implementation vary depending on where you are and with whom you speak. The future of community policing could be vulnerable to any sudden increase in the crime rate (provoking a renewed emphasis on the traditional model of professional policing) or the removal of funding support. Although there may be disagreement on how far community policing has come, and its fragility, one thing is clear: the challenges of the 21st century—violence, intercultural conflict, social and economic injustice, resource shortages, substance abuse—require us to think broadly and even more creatively about the future. To begin breathing life into a new vision for sustaining and advancing positive change, policing needs to be examined in light of (1) how crime is defined, and (2) its tie to a justice system that frustrates victims, alienates whole communities, and fuels skyrocketing financial and moral costs of punishment. Current developments in community and restorative justice are helping to shape ideas and thinking about what policing and the administration of justice could look like in the year 2019. Twenty years is probably about right to achieve more widespread understanding that current problems and paradoxes are often of our own making—and to learn that the methods we are using to offer protection and safety are reinforcing divisions in society, thus exacerbating the conditions that promote crime, fear, and disorder. The emerging paradigm of restorative justice might seem so alien, so naive, and so impractical that we miss the opportunity for a fundamental reappraisal of the values on which policing and justice should be founded. But starting with small changes, as suggested in this report, can make an enormous difference in how we think, speak, practice, and promote the meaning of community policing.

Parks, William R., II.. Community Policing, a Foundation for Restorative Justice

Community policing is a new philosophy of policing based on the concept that the police and citizens working together in creative ways can solve contemporary community problems related to crime, fear of crime, social and physical disorder and general neighborhood conditions. The philosophy is predicated on the belief that achieving these goals requires the police to develop a new relationship with citizens, allowing them the power to set local police priorities and involving them in efforts to improve the overall quality of life in their community. Community policing (CP) shifts the focus of police work from handling random crime calls to addressing community concerns. Community policing and restorative justice share the common characteristics of local action, local solutions, community standards and local control. Most importantly they seek to solve the problems by preventing, reforming and dealing with each individual and each problem as unique.

If Your Only Tool is A Hammer, All Your Problems Will Look Like Nails

Pollard maintains that a fundamental limitation in policing has been that the police only had the traditional criminal law and criminal justice processes to deal with a wide range of problems in communities, many of which would be better addressed through other approaches. Restorative justice, raising fundamental questions about the traditional criminal justice system, presents the possibility of a shift in police culture to a more problem-oriented, community style of policing. With this in mind, Pollard looks at policing and problem-solving in a civil society, the evolution of restorative justice in the Thames Valley Police, community safety and the limitations of the formal criminal justice system, limitations in the formal trial system, community safety and restorative justice, and prospects for advancing restorative justice in the national and international spheres.

Pfeifer, Jeffrey. "Developing Effective Community Policing Programs Through a Therapeutic Jurisprudence Model"

This article suggests that there is a growing disconnect between the practice of community policing and the specific examination and evaluation of the concept. Specifically it is suggested that there is little empirical evidence available regarding the effectiveness of community and policing initiatives and that, as a result, concerns have been raised regarding the development of these programs. The major challenges to developing community policing programs are received and a therapeutic jurisprudence model is proposed as guidance for the development of future programs.