DOI: 10.3886/icpsr02629
title: Police Corruption in Thirty Agencies in the United States, 1997
title: Archival Version

description: This study examined police officers' perceptions of and
 tolerance for corruption. In contrast to the popular viewpoint that
 police corruption is a result of moral defects in the individual
 police officer, this study investigated corruption from an
 organizational viewpoint. The approach examined the ways rules are
 communicated to officers, how rules are enforced by supervisors,
 including sanctions for violation of ethical guidelines, the unspoken
 code against reporting the misconduct of a fellow officer, and the
 influence of public expectations about police behavior. For the
 survey, a questionnaire describing 11 hypothetical scenarios of police
 misconduct was administered to 30 police agencies in the United
 States. Specifically, officers were asked to compare the violations in
 terms of seriousness and to assess the level of sanctions each
 violation of policies and procedures both should and would likely
 receive. For each instance of misconduct, officers were asked about
 the extent to which they supported agency discipline for it and their
 willingness to report it. Scenarios included issues such as off-duty
 private business, free meals, bribes for speeding, free gifts,
 stealing, drinking on duty, and use of excessive force. Additional
 information was collected about the officers' personal
 characteristics, such as length of time in the police force (in
 general and at their agency), the size of the agency, and the level of
rank the officer held.
description: This study examined police officers' perceptions
 of and tolerance for corruption. Much attention has been devoted to
 the discussion of causes of police corruption -- the abuse of authority
 by an officer for personal gain. The intent of this research was to
 answer questions that are crucial to the
 organizational/occupational-culture theory of police corruption and
 practical police administration. These questions are: (1) What is the
 level of knowledge of organizational rules governing corruption? (2)
 How strongly does the occupational culture condemn behavior that those
 rules prohibit? (3) What punishment is expected for violation of those
 rules? (4) To what extent does occupational culture support punishment
 of the violation? and (5) To what extent are the views of the
 individual officer different from the norm of the occupational
 culture? These issues were addressed by examining officers' responses
 to questions based on 11 hypothetical scenarios of police
 misconduct. The study objective in using hypothetical scenarios was to
 obtain a more realistic report of officers' views on corrupt
 activities than would have been obtained if officers were asked about
their own or fellow officers' activities.
description: The project was designed to be a cross-national
 study of police integrity both among and within nations. However, this
 collection only contains the data from the 30 agencies examined in the
 United States. A police officer liaison at each agency distributed and
 collected questionnaires from willing participants. Questionnaires
 presented 11 brief scenarios describing practices that would be
 recognizable to police in any modern, industrial society. Included in
 the 11 scenarios were nine that described behavior generally regarded
 as corrupt, one that described an incident of intentional use of
 excessive force, and another that described a behavior -- conducting
 an off-duty, security business -- that is permitted by some police
 agencies and prohibited in others. For each scenario, officers were
 asked to rate the seriousness of the misconduct described, the extent
 to which they would support agency discipline of it, and their
willingness to report such behavior.
description: Respondents were asked several questions about each
 of the 11 scenarios. For each scenario, two questions focused on the
 seriousness of the behavior described, two asked officers about the
 appropriate and expected discipline for the behavior, and two
 questions asked officers about their willingness to report the
 behavior. Scenarios of police corruption included issues such as
 off-duty private business, free meals, bribes for speeding, free
 gifts, stealing, drinking on duty, and use of excessive
 force. Additional information was collected about the officers'
 personal characteristics, such as length of time in the police force
 (in general and at their agency), the size of the agency, and the
level of rank the officer held.
description: Response Rates: 55.5 percent
description: Presence of Common Scales: Several Likert-type scales were used.
description: A convenience sample.
description: Datasets: 
DS1: Police Corruption in Thirty Agencies in the United States, 1997
description: All police officers in the United States.
description: The user guide, codebook, and data collection instrument
 are provided as a Portable Document Format (PDF) file. The PDF file 
 format was developed by Adobe Systems Incorporated and can be accessed
 using PDF reader software, such as the Adobe Acrobat Reader. Information 
 on how to obtain a copy of the Acrobat Reader is provided through the 
ICPSR Website on the Internet.