Narratives of legitimacy: police expansionism and the contest over policing
2012; Taylor & Francis; Volume: 23; Issue: 2 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1080/10439463.2012.671820
ISSN1477-2728
Autores Tópico(s)Legal Systems and Institutions
ResumoAbstract This article examines the narratives of legitimacy used by the police to secure their place in the policing arena. A case study of the Montréal (Canada) police service's (SPVM) expansion into the subway system, which had been policed by private security since its inception over 40 years ago, provides insight into the contest over policing. The SPVM's expansion was part of a broad reengineering of its service (e.g. rebranding) and took place against a backdrop of state support for the pluralisation of policing. Justifications provided by the SPVM for its Metro unit were successful in garnering media attention and support, which played a key role in this expansion. This study uses Boltanski and Thévenot's polity model to analyse the police's justifications and adjustment to shifting divisions of policing labour, and provides evidence of a struggle to maintain an image of the police as a communal good in the contest over policing. Keywords: public policeexpansionismnarrative of legitimacypolity model Acknowledgements Thanks to Anthony Doob, Richard Ericson and Ron Levi. Thanks also to Jonathan Jackson, Ben Bradford, Kevin Walby and to the two anonymous reviewers for helpful comments on earlier versions of this article. This research was supported by a scholarship from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada and by a departmental fellowship award from the Centre of Criminology, University of Toronto. Thanks also to those who graciously donated their time and knowledge to this research. Notes 1. Note however that such a weakening of the symbolic link remains an empirical question. It is not suggested here that there is no longer a symbolic link between the state and the public police. Indeed, recent research in Canada suggests that people still hold the public police accountable for local levels of disorder and crime (Doob and Sprott 2009 Doob, A.N. and Sprott, J.B. 2009. The effect of urban neighbourhood disorder on evaluations of the police and courts. Crime and Delinquency, 55(3): 339–362. [Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar] also see Jackson and Bradford 2009 Jackson, J. and Bradford, B. 2009. Crime, policing and social order: on the expressive nature of public confidence in policing. The British Journal of Sociology, 60(3): 493–521. [Crossref], [PubMed], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar] for similar findings in the UK). Moreover, this observation may be less applicable to localities within which the public police still play a primary policing role (e.g. in the UK) (Newburn and Reiner 2004 Newburn , T. and Reiner , R. 2004 . From PC Dixon to Dixon PLC: policing and police powers since 1954 . Criminal Law Review , 50th Anniversary Essay , 601 – 618 . [Google Scholar]). 2. Though in countries such as Canada there are clearly laws which differentiate, and limit the scope of, the policing powers of private and public policing agents. 3. Other purposes described as being exclusive to the public police included maintaining order, declaring legal infractions and conducting criminal investigations. 4. The SPVM officer's fraternity released a memorandum chiding the laxity of the proposed reforms and argued that the Minister's message to the private security industry was clear: ‘[they] can do whatever they want!’ 5. Transit inspectors were instead given a public officer status, a designation made at the municipal level but which provides some Canadian Criminal Code powers and protections as well as provincial powers to enforce laws pertaining to public transportation societies. 6. The official division of policing tasks is related to the STM's two regulation codes: R-036 and R-037. Regulation code R-036, now largely under the auspices of the Metro unit, pertains to public order offences (e.g. loitering, drinking alcohol, getting into altercations, carrying a weapon and vandalism). Whereas regulation code R-037 is largely under the auspices of transit inspectors and pertains mostly to fare evasion and fraud. 7. To reflect some of these ad-hoc changes in policing roles, the initial redistribution of policing tasks between transit inspectors and Metro unit officers was reportedly amended on various occasions. However, according to one transit inspector, the SPVM was reticent to make its unwillingness to fulfil certain roles explicit (i.e. in order to maintain the impression that it is ‘just them policing the subway’). However, the STM required that such a return of responsibilities to transit inspectors be made in writing. 8. Publicised arguments and justifications included transit inspectors’ inability to police the subway, the STM's lack of interest in policing the subway, the importance of the public police's full assumption of its roles and mandate, the need to tackle street gangs, to prevent terrorist attacks in the subway, to quell the public's sense of insecurity, to resolve long-standing tensions between the private and public police and problems related to role-splitting. 9. The Michener Awards Foundation also noted the political influence of this series of articles by underscoring that ‘following publication of the series, the city of Montréal announced that responsibility for security would be taken over by Montréal city police’. 10. CLAC also claims that soon thereafter publication of the article, squatters were evicted by the SPVM and their places of residence were razed by bulldozers. 11. The article ended with a quote from the president of the Montréal police service officer's fraternity who argued that the STM was allowing crime to ‘survive’ ‘because transit inspectors lack the necessary powers to deal with crime’. 12. These requests were denied pursuant to article 28 of the Quebec Access to Information Act (R.S.Q., chapter A-2.1). Due to time constraints, no further action was pursued. However, see Larsen and Piché (2009 Larsen, M. and Piché, J. 2009. Exceptional state, pragmatic bureaucracy, and indefinite detention: the case of the Kingston Immigration Holding Centre. Canadian Journal of Law and Society, 24(2): 203–229. [Crossref] , [Google Scholar]) for strategies to gain access to information under the Canadian Access to Information Act. 13. The SPVM had made several attempts to merge transit inspectors into the police service (e.g. as auxiliary officers). However these earlier attempts appear to have been efforts to counter the STM's requests for increased public police presence in the subway or for increased police powers for its transit inspectors. 14. One transit inspector with over 20 years of experience in transit security claimed that there was indeed a gang problem in the subway. However, he tended to situate the problem at certain subway stations and not to the subway in its entirety, suggesting trickle-down effects from street crime as opposed to a subway-specific crime problem. 15. The STM received over C$16 million from Transit-Secure to implement anti-terrorist security measures. 16. Note however that the perception of police legitimacy is not unanimous across segments of the population and that the credentials described above may be challenged by citizens (see Tyler 2004 Tyler, T.R. 2004. Enhancing police legitimacy. The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, 593(1): 84–99. [Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar], Jackson and Sunshine 2007 Jackson, J. and Sunshine, J. 2007. Public confidence in policing: a neo-Durkheimian perspective. British Journal of Criminology, 47(2): 214–233. [Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar], Ben-Porat 2008 Ben-Porat, G. 2008. Policing multicultural states: lessons learned from the Canadian model. Policing and Society, 18(4): 411–425. [Taylor & Francis Online], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]). 17. Note that the STM's sudden decision to invite the SPVM in the subway was attributed by some interviewees to the results of a report commissioned by the STM on the issue of subway policing; the Gardium report.
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