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-

New Perspectives in Policing S E P T E M B E R 2 0 1 0 

National Institute of Justice 

The Changing Environment for Policing, 1985-2008 

David H. Bayley and Christine Nixon 

Introduction 

In 1967, the President’s Commission on Law 

Enforcement and the Administration of Justice published The Challenge of Crime in a Free Society. This 

publication is generally regarded as inaugurating the 

scientific study of the police in America in particular but also in other countries. Almost 20 years later, 

the John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard 

University, convened an Executive Session on the 

police (1985-1991) to examine the state of policing 

and to make recommendations for its improvement. 

Its approximately 30 participants were police executives and academic experts. Now, 20 years further on, 

the Kennedy School has again organized an Executive 

Session. Its purpose, like the first, is to combine professional with scholarly appraisals of the police and their 

contribution to public safety. 

So the question naturally arises, what are the differences in the environment for policing between 

these two time periods? Are the problems as well as 

the institution of the police similar or different from 

one period to the next? Our thesis is that policing in 

the mid-1980s was perceived to be in crisis and there 

was a strong sense that fundamental changes were 

needed in the way it was delivered. In contrast, police 

Executive Session on Policing 

and Public Safety 

This is one in a series of papers that are being published as a result of the Executive Session on Policing 

and Public Safety. 

Harvard’s Executive Sessions are a convening of 

individuals of independent standing who take joint 

responsibility for rethinking and improving society’s 

responses to an issue. Members are selected based 

on their experiences, their reputation for thoughtfulness and their potential for helping to disseminate the 

work of the Session. 

In the early 1980s, an Executive Session on Policing 

helped resolve many law enforcement issues of 

the day. It produced a number of papers and 

concepts that revolutionized policing. Thirty years 

later, law enforcement has changed and NIJ and 

Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government are again 

collaborating to help resolve law enforcement issues 

of the day. 

Learn more about the Executive Session on 

Policing and Public Safety at: 

NIJ’s website: http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/nij/topics/ 

law-enforcement/executive-sessions/welcome.htm 

Harvard’s website: http://www.hks.harvard.edu/ 

criminaljustice/executive_sessions/policing.htm 
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2 | New Perspectives in Policing 

are considered to be performing well 20 years later 

by both practitioners and outside observers. Crime 

has been falling for almost 18 years and any new 

challenges, including terrorism, appear to be manageable without the invention of new strategies for 

the delivery of police services. Past experience contains the lessons needed for the future. In our view, 

this assessment may be mistaken, not because existing policies are defective in controlling crime but 

because the institutions that provide public safety 

are changing in profound ways that are not being 

recognized. 

The Policing Environment in 1985 

Policing in the United States was under siege in the 

1980s for two reasons: (1) crime had been rising from 

the early 1960s, and (2) research had shown that the 

traditional strategies of the police were ineffective 

at coping with it. In 1960, the serious crime rate was 

1,887 per 100,000 people. In 1985 it was 5,224, almost 

a threefold increase. This trend peaked in 1990 at 

5,803. Violent crime (i.e., murder, rape, robbery and 

aggravated assault) rose from 161 per 100,000 people 

in 1960 to 558 in 1985, on the way to quadrupling by 

1991 (Maguire and Pastore, 2007). Crime was, understandably, a big issue, feeding what could properly 

be called a moral panic. 

Prompted by the President’s Commission on Law 

Enforcement and the Administration of Justice in 

1967, researchers in universities and private thinktanks began to study the effectiveness of standard 

police strategies. In the ensuing two decades, studies were published showing that crime rates were 

not affected by: 

•	 Hiring	more	police	(Loftin	and	McDowell,	1982;	

Krahn	and	Kennedy,	1985;	Koenig,	1991;	Laurie,	

1970;	Gurr,	1979;	Emsley,	1983;	Silberman,	1978;	

Reiner,	1985;	Lane,	1980).	

•	 Random	motorized	patrolling	(Kelling	et	al.,	

1974;	Kelling,	1985;	Morris	and	Heal,	1981).

•	 Foot	patrols	(Police	Foundation,	1981).

•	 Rapid	response	to	calls	for	service	(Tien,	Simon	

and	 Larson,	1978;	Bieck	and	Kessler,	 1977;	

Spelman	and	Brown,	1981).

•	 Routine	criminal	investigation	(Laurie,	1970;	

Burrows,	 1986;	 Greenwood,	 Petersilia	 and	

Chaiken,	1977;	Eck,	1982;	Royal	Commission	

on Criminal Procedure, 1981). 

These conclusions, despite challenges to some of 

them on methodological grounds, were considered 

authoritative. They were so well accepted, in fact, 

that	Bayley	could	say	in	1994	that	“one	of	the	best	

kept secrets of modern life” was that the police do 

not	prevent	crime.	“Experts	know	it,	the	police	know	

it,	and	the	public	does	not	know	it”	(Bayley,	1994:	3).

No wonder, then, that the first Executive Session 

concluded that fundamental changes were needed 

in police strategies. The Session took the lead in 

developing and legitimating a new model for the 

delivery of police services — community policing. 

The key recommendation was that police needed 

to be reconnected to the public in order both to 

enhance their crime-control effectiveness and 

to increase public respect. The strategy for doing 

this was community policing, including problemoriented	policing	(Trojanowicz	and	Bucqueroux,	
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Changing Environment for Policing, 1985-2008 | 3 

1990;	Goldstein,	1990).	Of	the	17	studies	published	by	

the first Executive Session as Perspectives on Policing, 

eight	featured	“community”	or	“community	policing” in the title, and several others discussed the 

importance of community. George Kelling and Mark 

Moore, members of the session, argued that the evolution of American policing could be described as 

movement from a politicized system to professionalism, then to constitutionalism, and ultimately to 

community policing (Kelling and Moore, 1988). 

The first Executive Session also encouraged a new 

management style for policing, namely, one based 

on the analysis of crime and disorder problems and 

the evaluation of remediation programs. This process of description and analysis was to be carried 

out	jointly	by	police	and	outside	experts,	such	as	

academic scholars and management consultants. 

The Policing Environment in 2008 

When the second Executive Session met in January 

2008, crime in the United States had declined dramatically since 1990. The serious crime rate (Part 

I crimes) had fallen to 3,808 per 100,000 people by 

2006, a decline of 34 percent (Maguire and Pastore, 

2007).1 Even though the violent crime rate was still 

three times higher in 2006 than in 1960 (474 versus 

161 per 100,000 people), it had declined by 37.5 percent since its peak in 1991, a huge change for the 

better. The police, in particular, feel that the decline 

vindicates their crime-control efforts, notably the 

strategy	attributed	to	Bill	Bratton	of	New	York	City,	

of the strict enforcement of laws against disorder 

and the management technique known as zero tolerance,	managed	through	COMPSTAT	(Bratton	and	

Knobler,	1998;	Eck	and	Maguire,	2000).	

The decline has been so dramatic that it offset the 

continued questioning by analysts of the importance of police action in controlling crime (Eck 

and Maguire, 2000). Furthermore, there are now 

positive findings about the efficacy of certain 

police strategies. The most authoritative summary 

of this research comes from a panel of the National 

Research Council (Skogan and Frydl, 2004). 

Reviewing all research conducted since the 

President’s Commission (1967) and available in 

English, the panel reaffirmed the findings of the 

1970s and 1980s that the standard practices of 

policing — employing more sworn officers, random 

motorized patrolling, rapid response and criminal 

investigation — failed to reduce crime when applied 

generally	throughout	a	jurisdiction.	It	should	be	

noted that most of the research on these topics, 

except for analysis of the effect of the number of 

police employees on crime, dated from the earlier 

period. At the same time, the panel found that police 

could reduce crime when they focused operations 

on particular problems or places and when they 

supplemented law enforcement with other regulatory and abatement activities. 

The strongest evidence for effectiveness was some 

form of problem solving, especially when focused 

on	“hot	spots,”	 that	is,	locations	accounting	for	

a high volume of repeat calls for police service. 

1 The FBI, which provides the statistics on crimes known to the 

police, stopped calculating a rate for the entire Part I index after 

2001. It did, however, continue to publish rates for both violent and 

property crime, from which a total rate for all Part I crime can be 

calculated. 
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

4 | New Perspectives in Policing 

Nonenforcement options included changing the 

physical design of buildings and public spaces, 

enforcing fire and safety codes, providing social 

services to dysfunctional families, reducing truancy 

and providing after-school programs for latch-key 

children. 

By	2008,	police	executives	could	feel	much	happier	

about their efforts to control crime than they had 

20 years before. Scholars, too, agreed that strategies 

used since the 1980s were efficacious, by and large. 

This is not to say that police leaders currently feel 

that they can rest on their laurels nor that the environment for policing is entirely benign. Police 

executives understand that they are confronting 

several challenges, some new and some old: 

•	 Declining budgets and the rising cost of 

sworn police officers. The cost of policing has 

quadrupled between 1985 and 2005, according 

to	the	Bureau	of	Justice	 Statistics	(GascÓn	

and	Foglesong,	2009).	The	causes	are	rising	

labor costs for both sworn officers and civilian 

personnel, increased demand for police services 

and the growing complexity of police work. As 

a result, police budgets are increasingly at risk, 

with some cities reducing the number of police 

officers per capita. 

•	 Terrorism. The primary impact of the Sept. 11 

terrorist attack on state and local policing in the 

United States has been to improve their capacity 

for risk assessment of local vulnerabilities and 

first-responding in the event of terrorist incidents 

(Bayley	and	Weisburd,	2009).	Although	threat	

assessment and first-responding are understood 

to be core responsibilities of local police, 

their role with respect to counterterrorism 

intelligence gathering and analysis is more 

problematic. At the moment, most intelligence 

about terrorism comes from federal sources. 

Some observers take the view that local law 

enforcement, especially in the United States 

with its radically decentralized police system, 

does not have the personnel or skills to collect 

operational intelligence in a cost-effective 

way. Others argue, however, that local generalduties police who work among the population 

are essential for detecting precursor terrorist 

activities and building cooperative relations with 

the	communities	in	which	terrorists	live	(Bayley	

and Weisburd, 2009). Many police executives 

are critical of the federal government, therefore, 

for downgrading its law enforcement attention 

from nonterrorist crime and for reducing its 

support for local community-responsive and 

crime-prevention activities. 

•	 New immigrants, both legal and illegal. Until 

recently, most American police departments 

took the view that enforcing immigration was 

a federal rather than a local responsibility. They 

took this view, in part, because they wanted 

illegal immigrants to feel free to approach police 

when they were victims of crime, particularly 

when they were exploited by employers. Police 

executives felt that even people who were in the 

country illegally deserved protection under the 

law. Recently, however, driven by growing antiillegal	immigration	feelings	in	their	jurisdictions,	

some police departments have begun to enforce 
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Changing Environment for Policing, 1985-2008 | 5 

immigration regulations. As anticipated, this •	 Intensified accountability. Oversight of police 

has alienated these communities at the very 

moment when the importance of connecting 

with immigrants — legal as well as illegal 

— has become imperative as a response to 

terrorism. Not only may foreign terrorists 

take cover in immigrant communities but 

these communities, especially if they are 

disadvantaged and marginalized, may 

produce their own home-grown perpetrators. 

Great	 Britain	 and	 France	 have	 both	

experienced	 this	phenomenon.	Thus,	 the	

threat of terrorism raises difficult questions 

about the scope, intensity and methods of law 

enforcement in immigrant communities. 

•	 Racial discrimination. Charges of unequal 

treatment on the basis of race have been a 

continual problem for police since the rise 

of civil rights consciousness in the 1960s. 

Concerns raised about the substantial amount 

of discretion possessed by frontline police 

was one of the first issues taken up by police 

researchers more than 40 years ago. Various 

aspects of policing have been implicated — 

arrests, use of force, shootings, street stops, 

search and seizure, offense charging and 

equality	 of	 coverage	(Fridell	 et	 al.,	 2001;	

Skolnick	and	Fyfe,	1993;	Walker,	2003).	Not	

only is racial discrimination an enduring 

issue for police executives to manage but 

its potential for destroying the reputation of 

police agencies and the careers of officers is 

hard to exaggerate. It is the allegation that 

every police chief dreads. 

performance, with regard to effectiveness in 

controlling both crime and personal behavior, 

has grown steadily in the past few years. The 

monitoring of institutional performance has 

been part of a governmentwide movement to 

specify measurable performance indicators. 

External oversight of individual behavior has 

involved complaints commissions, citizen 

review panels and ombudsmen. Many would 

argue that the quality of policing with respect 

to crime control and personal behavior has 

improved over the last half of the 20th century 

as a result of these developments. The public, 

however, seems more skeptical, especially 

with respect to the behavior of individual 

officers. At least that would be a fair reading of 

the fact that in the United States as well as other 

English-speaking countries, the demand for 

greater oversight of police behavior continues 

to grow, fed by the media’s insatiable appetite 

for stories about police misdeeds. 

There are two aspects to what is being asked 

for: (1) holding the police to account for performing the services for which they were 

created — crime prevention and criminal 

investigation and (2) disciplining officers 

who behave improperly in the course of their 

duties.	Today,	more	than	100	of	America’s	

largest cities have some sort of civilian oversight of police behavior compared with only 

a handful in the early 1990s (Walker, 2003). 

Independent civilian review of complaints 

against the police has been established in 

the	last	three	decades	in	Great	Britain,	New	

Zealand,	Australia	and	Canada.	But	 this	
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

6 | New Perspectives in Policing 

is only the most visible tip of a larger iceberg. 

Oversight has also intensified in the form 

of tighter financial auditing, performance 

indicators mandated by governmental and 

quasi-governmental bodies, enactment of more 

stringent legal standards and federal consent 

decrees. This is in addition to what seems to 

police to be an unappeasable media appetite 

for revelations about police, and even ex-police, 

misbehavior. 

•	 Police unions. While acknowledging the 

reasons that led to the growth of police unions, 

police executives complain about its impact 

on management. In particular, they criticize 

the reflexive defense of work rules that inhibit 

strategic innovation and organizational change, 

the elaborate procedures required to discipline 

poorly performing officers, and the inculcation 

of an occupational culture preoccupied with 

tangible rewards. 

Although all of these current challenges certainly 

complicate their work, police executives do not view 

them as a crisis for policing as was the case in the 

mid-1980s. These challenges are complex and difficult but manageable within the competence of 

experienced executives. With the arguable exception of terrorism, they do not require a shift in the 

strategies of policing. 

Embedded in this sense of achievement among 

police professionals is frustration with the gap 

between	objective	measures	of	public	safety	and	

public perceptions. Although crime may have 

declined, the public’s fear has not. Police commonly 

attribute this discrepancy to the exaggeration of 

crime by the media and the failure to give credit 

where credit is due. 

The Looming Watershed 

We believe that policing may be approaching, if not 

well into, a period of change that will significantly 

affect what police do and how they do it. It may be as 

significant as the period after 1829 when Sir Robert 

Peel created the London Metropolitan Police. The 

choice of 1829 as the reference point is not rhetorical. This year marked the beginning of the gradual 

monopolization of the police function by government. Starting in 1829, governments in Anglo-Saxon 

countries, much earlier in Europe, assumed responsibility for policing — for hiring, paying, training 

and supervising. What is happening now is the 

reverse of that: nation-states are losing their monopoly on policing. 

The pressures eroding the monopoly of governments 

within national boundaries to create and manage 

policing come from three directions: 

•	 The	internationalization	of	policing.

•	 The	devolution	of	policing	to	communities.

•	 The	growth	of	private	policing.

In short, policing is being pushed up, down and sideways from its traditional mooring in government. 

The Internationalization of Policing 

Policing has shifted away from national governments because of the development of a genuinely 

international police capacity and increased international collaboration in law enforcement. The United 
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Changing Environment for Policing, 1985-2008 | 7 

Nations now has more than 11,000 police recruited 

from about 118 countries and deployed in 13 missions. The United States currently contributes 268 

police to UNPOL (formerly CIVPOL). Although 

UNPOL’s	primary	mission	is	“to	build	institutional	

police capacity in post-conflict environments” 

(Kroeker, 2007), its officers have been armed in 

Kosovo,	Timor-Leste	and	Haiti	and	enforce	laws	

alongside the local police. It is worth mentioning that this is part of a broader development of 

international	institutions	of	justice,	including	the	

development of a portable international criminal 

code, courts and tribunals authorized to try individuals, and prisons for persons both convicted 

and under trial. 

The United States now collaborates widely with 

law enforcement agencies abroad. As of February 

2010,	the	FBI	has	offices	in	70	cities	overseas	and	

the	DEA	has	offices	in	almost	90	(see	FBI	and	DEA	

home pages). The United States trains more than 

10,000 police a year at its four International Law 

Enforcement	Training	Academies	 (located	in	

Budapest,	Bangkok,	Gaborone	and	San	Salvador)	

and brings many more trainees to the United 

States. The United States also participates in a 

host of international task forces and ad hoc law 

enforcement operations that focus on drugs, terrorism, trafficking in people and, more recently, 

cyber-crime, including pornography. The United 

States has also encouraged — some would say 

“pressured”	—	countries	to	bring	their	laws	into	

conformity with American practice, for example, 

with respect to wiretapping, the use of informants, 

asset forfeiture, and the Racketeer Influenced 

and	Corrupt	Organizations	Act	(Nadelman,	1997;	

Snow, 1997). American influence, direct and indirect, has been so powerful that Chris Stone says 

there	has	been	an	“Americanization	of	global	law	

enforcement”	(Stone,	2003).	The	United	States,	

furthermore, has begun to create a reserve force of 

police	and	other	criminal	justice	experts	that	can	

be deployed at short notice to countries emerging 

from conflict. 

If policing is a fundamental attribute of government, along with external defense, then the world 

has begun to create a world government of sorts. 

Although seeds of this movement preceded the 

first	Executive	Session,	a	major	impetus	was	the	

fall	of	the	Berlin	Wall	in	1989	and	the	subsequent	

implosion	of	the	Soviet	Union	(Bayley,	2006).

The Devolution of Policing to Communities 

The attitude of police generally in the Western 

world, but especially in its English-speaking 

democracies, toward collaborating with members of the public who act voluntarily to improve 

public	security	has	undergone	a	major	change	

since the 1980s. No longer viewed as nuisances or 

dangerous vigilantes, these people are now seen 

as	“co-producers”	of	public	safety.	This	transformation of view is attributable in large part to the 

acceptance of community policing, which the first 

Executive Session was instrumental in promoting. Police in democratic countries now actively 

encourage citizen participation by sharing information, training volunteers, consulting the public 

about priorities, mobilizing collaborative crimeprevention programs, enlisting the public as 

informants in problem solving, and soliciting help 

from city planners, architects and the designers 
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

8 | New Perspectives in Policing 

of products to minimize criminal opportunities. 

Neighborhood Watch is probably the best known 

police–citizen	partnership.	Others	include	Business	

Improvement	Districts,	mobile	CB-radio	patrols,	

and private-sector programs for providing equipment and professional skills to police departments. 

It has become axiomatic in policing that the public should be encouraged to take responsibility for 

enhancing public safety. As police themselves now 

recognize,	they	cannot	do	the	job	alone.	Public	participation is seen by police and academics alike as a 

critical contributor to police effectiveness and thus 

to public safety. 

The Growth of Private Policing 

Policing is being pushed sideways by the growth 

in the private security industry. Estimates of its 

strength	are	not	exact	because	“private	security”	

covers a wide range of activities — e.g., guarding, 

transporting valuables, investigating, installing 

protective technology and responding to alarms 

— and is supplied by companies commercially to 

others as well as by businesses to themselves. The 

U.S.	Department	of	Labor	estimated	that	there	were	

slightly more than 1 million private security guards 

in	2005	(U.S.	Bureau	of	Labor	Statistics,	2005).	That	

would be 49 percent more than the number of fulltime sworn police officers in the same year (673,146) 

(Maguire and Pastore, 2005, table 1.68). A report 

issued by the International Association of Chiefs of 

Police (IACP) and the Community Oriented Police 

Services (COPS) Office estimated, however, that in 

2004, the number was about 2 million (IACP, 2005). 

If that were true, there would be almost three times 

as many private security personnel as full-time 

police officers. The discrepancy between figures 

of	 the	Department	of	Labor	and	 those	of	 IACPCOPS may have arisen because the larger estimate 

includes in-house security provided by private organizations,	whereas	the	Department	of	Labor	figures	

only include the personnel of companies providing 

security services commercially. The larger figure is 

the one most often cited in commentaries on private	policing	(Cunningham	and	Taylor,	1985;	Singer,	

2003). 

The growth of private security appears to be a phenomenon of the last quarter of the 20th century 

(Nalla and Newman, 1991). It was first documented 

in The Hallcrest Report: Private Security and Police 

in America	(Cunningham	and	Taylor,	1985),	which	

estimated the number at 1.5 million. This was more 

than twice the number of public police at that time. 

Although the use of private security was certainly 

visible to police officials in the 1980s, the number of 

commercial private security personnel has grown by 

as much as two-thirds. Their number rose sharply 

immediately after the Sept. 11 attack, fell in 2003 

(although not to pre-Sept. 11 levels) and has continued	to	increase	(U.S.	Bureau	of	Labor	Statistics,	

2007). It is reasonable to assume that the number 

of in-house private security personnel has also 

increased, though perhaps not as much. 

Worldwide, there are now more private police than 

government-run police: 348 versus 318 per 100,000, 

according	to	a	survey	by	Jan	Van	Dijk	(2008).	The	

highest rates are in the United States, Canada and 

central	Europe.	Britain	and	Australia	also	have	

slightly more private security personnel than public	police	(Australian	Bureau	of	Statistics,	2006;	
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Changing Environment for Policing, 1985-2008 | 9 

European Union, 2004). In the European Union, 

only	Britain	and	Ireland	have	more	private	than	

public police (European Union, 2004). Statistics 

are not available for Latin America, Africa, and 

South and Southeast Asia, but private security is 

certainly very visible there. 

The point to underscore is that worldwide, and 

dramatically in the United States, there has been 

a	steady	growth	in	the	number	of	private	“police.”	

If visible guardians are a deterrent to crime, as the 

routine-activities theory of crime asserts and as 

police themselves strongly believe, then one reason for the decline in crime in the United States 

since the early 1990s might be the growth in private security. As far as we are aware, analyses of 

the crime drop in the United States have not tested 

for this possibility. 

The effect of these three changes in the environment for policing is to diversify the providers of 

public safety. Governments, especially countrybased governments, no longer direct or provide 

public safety exclusively. The domestic security 

function has spread to new levels of government 

but, more important, to nonstate actors, volunteers and commercial providers. The police role 

is now shared. This is not simply saying that there 

are now both public and private police. Public and 

private policing have blended and are often hard 

to distinguish. Governments hire private police 

to	supplement	their	own	police;	private	entrepreneurs hire public police. We are in an era of what 

Les Johnston refers to as hybrid policing (Johnston, 

1992). 

Until now, assessments of the police have focused 

on two questions: How can they be made more 

effective, and how can the behavior of individual officers be improved? Now, we suggest, a 

third question has arisen: Who is responsible for 

policing? 

Changes Within Public Policing 

Not only are changes occurring in the environment that may affect the structure of policing but 

police themselves are in the process of changing the way they work. The factors driving this 

are (1) the threat of terrorism, (2) intelligenceled	policing	and	(3)	DNA	analysis.	Each	of	these	

developments transfers initiative in directing 

operations to specialists who collect and analyze 

information and away from both general-duties 

police and the public. Ironically, these changes 

could undo the signature contribution of the 

1980s — community policing. 

The Threat of Terrorism 

Although many anti-terrorism experts understand 

the importance of working with communities, 

especially immigrant ones, counterterrorism 

centralizes decision making, shifting it upward in 

police organizations and making it less transparent. In the aftermath of Sept. 11, a new emphasis 

has been placed on the development of covert 

intelligence gathering, penetration and disruption. In the United States, the development of 

covert counterterrorism capacity has been 

unequally distributed, being more pronounced 

in larger police forces. Where it occurs, important 

questions arise about legal accountability as well 

as operational payoff. These issues are familiar to 
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

10 | New Perspectives in Policing 

police, having arisen before in efforts to control illegal narcotics and organized crime. 

Intelligence-Led Policing 

Intelligence-led policing2 utilizes crime mapping, 

data mining and the widespread use of closedcircuit television monitoring, which all rely on 

analysis based on information collected from 

impersonal sources. It thereby empowers senior 

commanders to develop their own agendas for law 

enforcement rather than consulting with affected 

communities. 

DNA Analysis 

DNA	analysis	allows	crimes	to	be	solved	without	

witnesses or confessions. Research in the 1970s 

showed that the identification of suspects by victims 

and witnesses was essential to the solving of most 

crimes (Greenwood, Petersilia and Chaiken, 1977). 

Detectives,	contrary	to	their	fictional	portrayals,	

work from the identification of suspects by the public back to the collection of evidence to prove guilt. 

DNA	changes	that,	emphasizing	forensic	evidence	

over human testimony, promising a technological 

solution to criminal identification. 

The	effect	of	 these	developments	—	 the	 threat	

of	terrorism,	intelligence-led	policing	and	DNA	

analysis — impels the police to rely more on their 

own intellectual and physical resources and on 

centralized decision making for agendas and 

strategies. It lessens the importance of consulting 

with and mobilizing the disaggregate resources 

2 Intelligence-led policing may be confused with evidence-based 

policing. Intelligence-led policing refers to the targeting of operations on the basis of specific information, whereas evidence-based 

policing refers to shaping of operational strategies on the basis of 

evaluations of their efficacy. 

of communities. It also favors enforcement as the 

tool of choice over preventive strategies of regulation and abatement. These changes in orientation 

may be necessary and may raise police effectiveness, 

but they also represent a return to the sort of insular 

professionalism that characterized policing before 

the 1980s. 

The Challenges of Change 

The changes described both inside and outside the 

established police structures and functions create issues that will have to be confronted. With the 

expansion of private policing, public safety may 

become more inequitably distributed on the basis 

of economic class. The affluent sectors of society, 

especially its commercial interests, may be more 

protected, and the poor sectors less protected 

(Bayley	and	Shearing,	2001).	This	trend	could	be	

exacerbated if the tax-paying public at the same 

time withdraws its support from the public police 

in favor of private security. There are indications that 

this has already occurred in public education, where 

people with the means to pay for private schools 

are increasingly reluctant to support public education. If this should occur in policing, a dualistic 

system could evolve — responsive private policing for the affluent, and increasingly underfunded 

public	policing	for	the	poor	(Bayley	and	Shearing,	

2001). The political consequences of this could be 

calamitous. 

Furthermore, who is to hold private policing to 

legal and moral account? Public police in the 

United States and other democracies have been 

made accountable in many ways. Public police 

executives themselves often argue that they are 
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Changing Environment for Policing, 1985-2008 | 11 

too accountable, meaning they are scrutinized 

too closely, too mechanically and at a substantial cost in reporting. Private policing, however, 

is imperfectly regulated and it is unclear whether 

existing law provides sufficient leverage (Joh, 

2004;	Prenzler	and	Sarre,	2006).	

So, an ironic question arises: Is there a continuing role for government in ensuring an equitable 

and lawful distribution of security at the very time 

that government is losing its monopoly control? 

Should it accomplish by regulation what it no longer can by ownership? If so, how should this be 

done? In particular, what agency of government 

would be responsible for it? 

The internationalization of policing also raises 

issues of control and legitimacy. Simply put, 

whose interests will be served by policing under 

international auspices? Will it be collective 

interests articulated by constituent states and 

powerful organized interests, or by the needs of 

disaggregate populations represented through 

participative	institutions?	Democratic	nationstates emphasize the needs of individuals in 

directing police. It is not at all clear that international institutions will do the same, although they 

have taken impressive steps on paper to articulate 

comprehensive standards of police conduct (U.N. 

High Commissioner for Human Rights, 1996). 

Finally, we submit that policing may be facing 

a clash of cultures as the public increasingly 

demands participation in the direction and operation of policing while at the same time police 

agencies become more self-directing and selfsufficient in their use of intelligence resources. 

This	issue	is	not	new.	It	is	the	same	issue	that	

policing faced in the 1980s and that was tackled 

in the first Executive Session. How important is 

public legitimacy for police effectiveness and 

public safety? How can the support of the public be maintained while police take advantage 

of powerful new technologies that may decrease 

interaction with them? 

Conclusion 

In the United States and other developed democracies, changes are occurring that may undermine 

the monopoly of state-based policing as well as 

its community-based paradigm. In pointing out 

these changes between 1985 and 2008, we are 

not	making	value	judgments	about	them.	These	

changes may have made the police more effective at providing public safety without infringing 

human rights in unacceptable ways. We call attention to these changes because their potential 

effects are enormous and largely unappreciated. 

They constitute an invisible agenda as consequential as the problems discussed in the 1980s. 

Twenty	years	ago,	policing	was	in	the	throes	of	

what is now regarded as a revolution in its operating approach. It shifted from a philosophy of 

“give	us	the	resources	and	we	can	do	the	job”	to	

realizing the importance of enlisting the public in the coproduction of public safety. Policing 

today faces much less obvious challenges. Current 

strategies and technologies seem to be sufficient 

to deal with foreseeable threats to public safety, 

with the possible exception of terrorism. If this 

is so, then policing will develop in an evolutionary way, fine-tuning operational techniques 
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

12 | New Perspectives in Policing 

according to experience, particularly the findings 

of evidence-based evaluations. If, however, changes 

in the environment are reshaping the structure and 

hence the governance of policing, and adaptations 

within the police are weakening the connection 

between police and public, then we may be entering 

a period of evolutionary discontinuity that could be 

greater than that of the 1980s, perhaps even of 1829. 

Both	the	role	of	police	in	relation	to	other	security	

providers and the soul of the police in terms of how 

it goes about its work may be in play today in more 

profound ways than are being recognized. 

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Author Note:	David	H.	Bayley	is	Distinguished	

Professor in the School of Criminal Justice 

at	the	 State	University	 of	New	York,	Albany.	

Christine	Nixon	is	APM	Chair,	Victorian	Bushfire	

Reconstruction and Recovery Authority, and 

State Commissioner of Police, Victoria, Australia 

(Retired).	The	authors	acknowledge	valuable	

research	assistance	provided	by	Baillie	Aaron,	

Research Assistant, in the Program in Criminal 

Justice and Police Management, John F. Kennedy 

School of Government, Harvard University. 
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Washington, DC 20531 

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Members of the Executive Session on Policing and Public Safety 

Colonel Rick Fuentes, Superintendent, 

New Jersey State Police 

Chief George Gascón, San Francisco 

Police Department 

Mr. Gil Kerlikowske, Director, Office of 

National Drug Control Policy 

Chief Cathy Lanier, Washington D.C. 

Metropolitan Police Department 

Ms. Adrian Nicole LeBlanc, 

Visiting Scholar, New York University 

Professor Tracey Meares, Walton Hale 

Hamilton Professor of Law, Yale Law School 

Chief Constable Peter Neyroud, Chief 

Executive, National Policing Improvement 

Agency (UK) 

Christine Nixon, Chair, Victorian Bushfire 

Reconstruction & Recovery Authority 

(Australia) 

Chief Richard Pennington, Atlanta Police 

Department 

Mayor Jerry Sanders, City of San Diego 

Professor David Sklansky, Professor of 

Law, Faculty Co-Chair of the Berkeley Center 

for Criminal Justice, University of California, 

Berkeley, School of Law 

Mr. Sean Smoot, Director and Chief Legal 

Counsel, Police Benevolent & Protective 

Association of Illinois 

Professor Malcolm Sparrow, Professor of 

Practice of Public Management, Kennedy 

School of Government, Harvard University 

Chief Darrel Stephens, CharlotteMecklenburg Police Department (retired) 

Professor Christopher Stone, Guggenheim 

Professor of the Practice of Criminal Justice, 

Kennedy School of Government, Harvard 

University 

Mr. Jeremy Travis, President, John Jay 

College of Criminal Justice 

Mr. Rick VanHouten, President, Fort Worth 

Police Association 

Professor David Weisburd, Walter E. Meyer 

Professor of Law and Criminal Justice, 

Director, Institute of Criminology, Faculty 

of Law, The Hebrew University and 

Distinguished Professor, Department of 

Criminology, Law, and Society, George Mason 

University 

Dr. Chuck Wexler, Executive Director, 

Police Executive Research Forum 

Chief Anthony Batts, Oakland Police 

Department 

Professor David Bayley, Distinguished 

Professor, School of Criminal Justice, 

State University of New York at Albany 

Dr. Anthony Braga, Senior Research 

Associate, Lecturer in Public Policy, 

Program in Criminal Justice Policy and 

Management, Kennedy School of 

Government, Harvard University 

Chief William J. Bratton, Los Angeles 

Police Department 

Chief Ella Bully-Cummings, Detroit Police 

Department (retired) 

Ms. Christine Cole (Facilitator), Executive 

Director, Program in Criminal Justice Policy 

and Management, Kennedy School of 

Government, Harvard University 

Commissioner Edward Davis, Boston 

Police Department 

Chief Ronald Davis, East Palo Alto 

Police Department 

Chief Edward Flynn, Milwaukee 

Police Department 

Learn more about the Executive Session at: 

NIJ’s website: http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/nij/topics/law-enforcement/executive-sessions/welcome.htm 

Harvard’s website: http://www.hks.harvard.edu/criminaljustice/executive_sessions/policing.htm