Police and the Policed

Language and Power Relations on the Margins of the Global South

Danielle Watson

• Publisher: Palgrave Pivot
• Year: 2018
• Print ISBN:
  9783030008826
• eBook ISBN:
  9783030008833
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Sociolinguistics
• Index: Social Sciences

This book examines communication between police and residents of a designated crime 'hotspot' community in the Global South. It looks at communicative realities within a marginalised community in the twin island republic of Trinidad and Tobago and explores how police and the individuals that they police purposefully assign categories to each other before, during and after interactions. It also examines the relations between the police and the community and how power is manifested through authored or assigned labels, stigmas and stereotypes. Overall, it suggests alternative strategies to address problematic police and community relations and provides another standpoint from which communicative redress between police and residents of marginalized communities in the Global South can be approached.

© The Author(s) 2019

Danielle WatsonPolice and the Policedhttps://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-00883-3_1

Begin Abstract

1. Introduction

Danielle Watson¹

(1)

University of the South Pacific, Suva, Fiji

Danielle Watson

Abstract

Police/community relations in high-crime communities have been a common topic for criminologists and policy makers across the globe. In societies with diasporic histories and culturally unique positions on crime and criminality, the challenge for individuals tasked with the responsibility of devising strategies to address identified problems is more a matter of understanding social spaces set apart from mainstream positions informing outsider policies and practices intended to address insider issues. This chapter provides a context for understanding the realities of police and the policed from a marginalized community in Trinidad and Tobago, the country with one of the highest crime indexes in the world. It prepares readers for further discussions about problematic police/community interactions.

Keywords

PolicingPolice/community relationsTrinidad and TobagoMainstream

End Abstract

Police/community relations in high-crime communities have been a common topic for criminologists and policy makers across the globe. A common position taken by policy makers has been the identification of high-crime communities as problematic spaces in need of improved policing strategies intended to address identified problems. In societies with diasporic histories and culturally unique positions on crime and criminality, the challenge for individuals tasked with the responsibility of devising strategies to address identified problems is more a matter of understanding social spaces set apart from mainstream positions informing outsider policies and practices intended to address insider issues (Harcourt 1998; De Sardan 1999; Watson and Kerrigan 2018). Policy reform, citizen security programs and crime-fighting tactics are common strategies derived to address issues of crime on the margins (Nordstrom 2007). Such initiatives do not acknowledge residents of marginalized communities as partners in the crime-fighting process. Instead, there is an initial othering working in the disservice of all strategies intended to action positive change. Police and the Policed offers a glimpse into the realities of police and the policed from a marginalized community in Trinidad and Tobago, the country with one of the highest crime indexes in the world. I offer insight into the communicative realities of residents from the community and officers charged with the responsibility of policing the community to highlight the problematic nature of police/community relations borne of a history of problematic interactions underscored by force-to-fit policies more symptomatic that practically suited to addressing the problem.

While I acknowledge that marginalized communities across the globe bear similarities and the discretionary nature of policing allows for shifts to accommodate what is required in different situations and context, my position is that it is important to acknowledge and understand the intricacies accounting for the uniqueness of different social spaces. It is also useful to understand the impact of different perspectives and constructed positions about groups of individuals if policing is to be effective. Assumptions about international, regional or national similarities work in the disservice of communication between groups with a history of problematic relations. What is discussed in this book is one aspect impacting communicative realities—imposed or assigned categories. I do not make claims specific to addressing all police/community relations in high-crime communities but instead highlight how branding affects how police interact with members of a particular community and how members of the community respond to the police. It is also useful to note that judgments about crime and criminality are not my focus here as my aim is to emphasize the influence of opinion formations on interactions and the skillful navigation of interactive terrains. My contemplation on issues pertinent to the topics discussed in the chapters should in no way be viewed as absolute. Much of what is presented to show the impact of labels, stigmas and stereotypes on police/community relations is highly suggestive of the difficulty to communicate with members of ‘othered’ groups and I acknowledge that reality.

Methodological Approach

The Qualitative Study

Data were drawn from a larger project on representations of power in the discourses of police and community residents in a high-crime community in northern Trinidad (Watson 2016). I examined interview transcripts from 40 of the 93 police officers assigned to, or having been previously dispatched to, the community and 40 residents from the community. All officers interviewed have had reason to interact with the community’s residents at some point, whether during patrol, responding to calls for assistance, taking reports or during casual encounters. All community members had prior interaction with police. Police participants included 10 Charge Room Officers, 25 Task Force Officers and 5 Guard and Emergency Branch Officers. Community members included 27 individuals branded suspects and 13 individuals labeled victims based on prior interaction with the police. All individuals were selected based on their willingness to participate in the study and their availability. Further information on participant selection can be sourced from Watson 2016.

Structured interviews were conducted from July to September 2013. These were coordinated by the principal researcher on the larger project with the help of two trained research assistants. Police officers and members of the community were approached by the principal researcher requesting a brief interview and outlining the purpose of the meet. They were made aware that their contributions were being included as part of a study about police/community interaction in a designated crime hotspot.

The interview protocol for both police and the policed comprised 20 questions geared toward eliciting responses about police/community relations and the labels, stigmas and stereotypes evidenced in their discourses about each other. For the last question, both groups were shown samples of recordings taken from civilian recorded footage uploaded to YouTube of police officers—two of whom were under investigation for misuse of force in the line of duty—and asked their opinions about what was depicted. The study relied on the analysis of transcribed interview data.

Chapter Structure

The book has eight chapters. Each chapter presents an area pertinent to police and community relation in branded communities. The idea behind the organization of the chapters was to begin by establishing a context for understanding the communities within which police operate before moving to discussions about policing in action. This decision was informed by a desire to move beyond general force-to-fit descriptions of policing marginalized communities to show that contextualization reveals much about social spaces that usually gets taken for granted or become the product of arbitrary or convenient grouping based on minimal points of similarities. The chapters move from international and regional to local ideas about policing the margins. A further context is also provided to discuss and reevaluate positions relating to police/community relations.

Each chapter moves from a general introduction of the focal area to discussions about policing contexts or policing in context. Each chapter problematizes an aspect of either policing of police/community relations in a crime hotspot. Scholarly literature specific to each chapter is discussed as a point of departure from which the topic under discussion is elaborated upon. Earlier chapters present power relations on the margins in a broader sense, while the latter chapters focus specifically on manifestations of power evidenced in police and community discourses. Ideas about community branding are presented and special emphasis is placed on how labels, stigmas and stereotypes impact police relations with residents of a marginalized community in the Global South. While the initial ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Front Matter
• 1. Introduction
• 2. Policing Marginalized Communities in the Global South: Examining Contextual Realities
• 3. Community Profiles: Initial Thoughts on Positioning the Police and the Policed
• 4. Assigning the Brand: Police Labeling and its Impact on Police/Community Relations
• 5. Branding Babylon: How the Policed see the Police
• 6. Police Typecasting and the Power Dichotomy
• 7. Stigmatizing and Stereotyping the Police: Communicative Realities for the Policed
• 8. Negotiating Labels, Stigmas and Stereotypes: Discussions for the Future of Policing
• Back Matter