title: What’s consent got to do with it? An examination of legitimacy, trust, and the police-public relationship in Scotland, United Kingdom
Creators: name: Cotton, W. Bradley
Publisher: name: The University of Edinburgh
Year: 2025
Subjects: subject: Police
subject: Policing
subject: Policing by consent
subject: Police and Public
subject: Relationships
subject: Legitimacy
subject: Confidence
subject: Trust

description: In the years since 1829 and the creation of “The New Police” in London under the leadership of Sir Robert Peel and Commissioners Charles Rowan and Richard Mayne, police services in the United Kingdom have often struggled with the principles that underpin their ability to prevent and detect crime. Many negative incidents have plagued police organisation efforts to operate legitimately including the criminal acts of serving police officers and the admission of decades of organisational racism, bias, and misogyny. Further, the closing of police stations and subsequent withdrawal from neighbourhoods and communities for all but the most serious of calls have fractured police relationships with the public, impacting and decreasing public confidence, and trust even more. This thesis critically explores the police-public relationship from the perspective of the widely recognised, traditional British policing model of policing by consent, examining if it is a way to repair and renew trust and legitimacy in the police service. An extensive literature review examined the historical foundations for policing by consent, before exploring the concept of consent. The literature then interrogated legitimacy, trust, and social exchange before revealing gaps in the understanding of the intersection of policing by consent with these concepts. Specifically, this review focused on the status of the current relationship police have with the public, the extent to which that relationship is characterised or underpinned by the theory of policing by consent, and the impact of trust, confidence, and legitimacy. These foci framed the question regarding policing by consent as being the most appropriate model to repair the relationship. The research draws on the in depth, semi-structured interviews of fifty participants including government, police, partner, and service user segments in Scotland, United Kingdom from 2022 to 2023. The research questions explored the nature of the police-public relationship and the key factors that influenced that relationship. The findings contribute to the understanding of the police-public relationship in four key areas. Firstly, the findings confirmed the fragility and brokenness of the current police-public relationship but also reveal the willingness of both the police and the public to work to make it better. This underscored the value of the police-public relationship to both sides and revealed its importance to the ability of the police to function effectively in society. Secondly, the findings explored the nature and importance of trust in the police and how it is shaped in the community context. Trust was found to be a foundational concept for relationships with the police and was dependant on strong connections to procedural justice and visibility. These factors combined to create positive effects in communities and their ability to function with collective efficacy to reduce crime and decrease police demands. Thirdly, the status of police legitimacy was examined through sincerity, shared interests, communication, and procedural justice. Impact in this area was especially felt as it related to gender and socio-demographic bias, racism, and fear. The overarching contribution this thesis makes to the literature is the examination of the problematic aspects of the theory of policing by consent which are explored with a particular focus on the manner consent is obtained and the ability to withdraw consent. Most significantly, while policing by consent has traditionally been lauded as the policing ideal, underpinning police effectiveness and providing the method by which police can operate in Britain, the findings revealed major limitations in the concept assisting police organisationally or operationally. The findings showed that the ability to police by consent is an outcome of legitimacy, trust, confidence, and positive relationships, not the means by which these goals are to be attained. This realisation led to the proposal of a new Theory of Relational Policing as a vehicle for police services and governments to repair the connection with the public, increasing trust, legitimacy, and confidence. The thesis argues that relational policing better connects the historical roots of traditional policing in the United Kingdom and the goals of both police and the public using an established literature base and evidence from the respondents in this thesis. The findings support that positive, non-enforcement-based relationships between the police and the public are essential, and that through them, the proposed Theory of Relational Policing could help repair the fractured relationship between the police and the public, driving additional community benefits preventing crime, increasing community and individual wellness, and improving neighbourhood collective efficacy where other models have not been effective.