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Given the tumultuous history of policing in South Africa, the historic relationship between the police and the public, and the continuous rising crime rates, it is perplexing that little quantitative research has been conducted on legitimacy and the SAPS. The current study assesses public confidence in police in South Africa by analyzing data from a more than three-decade-old public opinion survey. The purpose of this paper is twofold: first, to examine changes in public confidence since 1981; and second, to determine factors that cause variations in confidence during a given period.

To achieve the objectives, the authors analyzed longitudinal data collected from 1981 to 2014 as part of the world Value Survey program. ANOVA and multivariate regression analyses were conducted.

Findings indicate that confidence in SAPS was highest during the period immediately after apartheid and then dwindled from 1999 onwards. Moreover, race, happiness and education have historically influenced public confidence in the police.

These findings provide information that could be useful for transforming the SAPS, especially in developing viable strategies to strengthen the police’s relationship with citizens. Additionally, the manuscript provides an original contribution to the study of public attitudes toward the police and police legitimacy, especially in a non-western society.

To find out how much confidence the Turkish public have in the police, how that confidence is compared with other relevant countries in the world, and how to interpret the confidence in the police in Turkey.

Data from national representative samples were analyzed to compare the levels of public confidence in the police between Turkey and the member states in the European Union, between Turkey and its neighboring countries, and between Turkey and several Muslim societies.

This paper found that public confidence in the Turkish police was quite high when compared to member states of the EU, neighboring countries, and with selected Muslim nations.

The findings fill an existing void in the criminological literature assessing the Turkish public's confidence in its police. The results should be interpreted in light of the following realities: that Turkey remains a nation with a collectivistic orientation, the possible undifferentiated concepts between the effectiveness of the police and confidence in the police, and the unidimensional measure that was employed to examine public confidence.

To re‐test the hypothesis that that the public in Japan have a higher confidence in the police than their counterparts in the USA.

Data from the national representative samples were analyzed to compare the levels of confidence in the police between the USA and Japan. The new analysis addressed four methodological limitations found in the previous study.

With more updated data and more appropriate method, the results confirmed the previous study that the US public have a significantly higher confidence in the police than the Japanese public.

Many qualitative studies have found or argued that the public in Japan have higher confidence in their police than their counterparts in the USA. Only one quantitative analysis has found the opposite. One safeguard against overgeneralization in social science is through replication of the inquiry. The duplication of the previous research findings is important because a strong scientific conclusion is based on the one that examines the theoretically deduced hypothesis at one of the indefinitely large number of times and places that it could be tested, and because duplication is critical in social sciences based on cross‐sectional surveys which are time‐dependent and time‐sensitive.

The purpose of this paper is to test the dual frames of reference theory. For the test, the reference point hypothesis examines whether the difference in the quality of social conditions between the home and host countries determines the variations of immigrants’ trust in the institutions of their host country.

By using hierarchical linear modeling analysis, the current study examines whether “difference of homicide rate from South Korea” or “difference of level of democracy from South Korea” influences immigrants’ confidence in the police. Using data collected from nine different immigrant groups in South Korea, the current study examined both country-level factors as well as individual-level factors.

According to the analysis results, the difference of level of democracy from South Korea significantly influenced immigrants’ confidence in the South Korean police. Specifically, when immigrants came from democratically under-developed countries, they showed a relatively high level of confidence in the South Korean police.

Confidence in the police among the first generation of immigrants has recently attracted increasing attention. However, no previous studies have examined immigrants’ confidence in the police within an Asian country. Thus, the current study might contribute to generating better police performances toward first-generation immigrants who tend to be discriminated against and are also vulnerable to various forms of victimization because of their new status in a new society.

Neighbourhood policing is central to supporting public confidence in England and Wales. However, the delivery of neighbourhood policing models is increasingly fragmented and under pressure from austerity measures and from changes to demand and priorities. This research aims to understand the current state of neighbourhood policing in the county of “Rackhamshire” and its ability to support public confidence.

The authors conducted six focus groups, three with officers who were part of Community Policing Teams (CPTs) and three with members of the community who were actively engaged with community policing and local concerns. These were supplemented by two interviews with senior officers (35 participants in total).

Austerity-driven changes to policing in Rackhamshire have damaged the capacities of CPTs and residents have begun to lose confidence in the ability of the police to respond to their fears. The authors argue that reforms intended to make policing more efficient and effective appear to have the opposite effect on community policing, by preventing it from working in a way that can support public confidence and that this could have longer-term consequences.

The effects of austerity on the mechanisms by which neighbourhood policing supports confidence have been relatively neglected. By exploring the state of these mechanisms in one English constabulary, this research has exposed serious weaknesses in the way that community policing is able to support public confidence and suggests practical operational responses. In light of these findings, this study argues for the urgent reinstatement of earlier models of neighbourhood policing.

This study attempts to determine how political legitimacy and regime change affect the level of public confidence in the Mexican police. The current study also aims to examine to what extent socioeconomic and attitudinal factors are associated with levels of police confidence among Mexican citizens.

The data used in this study were obtained from two Mexican surveys conducted as part of the World Value Surveys (WVS) in 1996 and 2005. Owing to the nature of the dependent variable, a series of ordinal logistic regression analyses was employed to examine the effects of political legitimacy, regime change, attitudinal, and socioeconomic factors on public confidence in the Mexican police while controlling other relevant factors.

Consistent with prior research, results confirmed that public confidence in the police was positively associated with political legitimacy (i.e. support for regime institutions and system support), happiness, life satisfaction, marital status, and religious activity. Yet, age, education, and size of the town were negatively related to public confidence.

Since the current study used secondary data, the availability of information was limited. Only one nation was studied which limits the generalizability of the findings. Future research may attempt to study other Latin‐American nations, including Mexico, in order to address the issue of public confidence in policing on a greater scale. Further, as the police alone cannot take full credit in the public's perception of law enforcement, it is imperative that future studies also examine other government agencies (i.e. courts, prosecutors) that may lend more information on this subject.

While the police and some governing agencies may not be able to change most of the factors studied in this research, they can strive to cultivate better trust among the citizenry and seek to improve quality of life in neighborhoods which may lead to greater happiness and life satisfaction factors that may then increase the level of confidence in the police.

Considers the impact of a range of variables on confidence in the police, including those given little or no previous attention, e.g. measures of crime experience and of conservative political orientation. Draws data from a larger study of urban crime‐prevention issues based on Cincinnati, Ohio. Finds that respondents’ race is not a significant determinant of confidence in the police; the most important determinant being the community context. Suggests that neighborhood social integration may provide a supportive context which could encourage positive evaluation of formal institutional arrangements. Finds that attitudes toward the police (ATP) are regulated by the social context and that much of the existing research, which excluded contextual variables, may have been wrong in making race a significant variable. Notes that confidence in the police is higher in women than in men, but this may be due to a lower rate of antagonistic contact between police and women (not measured here).

The purpose of this paper is to differentiate clearly between three frequently used concepts found in the research literature on public perceptions of the police: confidence in the police, satisfaction with the police and trust in the police.

Systemic literature review and thematic analysis are employed to assess each key term in the official English language dictionary and in the research literature. Their individual origins, their evolvement and their current usages are examined with great care.

The findings of the study suggest that the three phrases are indeed distinct in their connotation. It is concluded that “confidence in the police” is the preferred choice when we survey the citizenry about the level of support for the police and when the police is evaluated as a political institution.

Given that most criminologists believe that we are doing scientific research, it is our duty to be attentive to the pitfalls of lack of conceptual clarity.

The essay advances the conceptual clarification of one of the popular themes in the study of the police.

The purpose of this paper is to better understand the concept of “confidence”, to assess its relationship with customer contact and to identify the dimensions and triggers of “confidence” in an important organisation with which many people may have only limited contact.

The research was commissioned by the Northamptonshire Police in the UK and was based on data collected through focus groups held in the area. The groups were split into individuals who had limited contact with the police and individuals who had traumatic dealings with the police (e.g. had been the victim of a serious crime).

The findings supported earlier research which suggested that there was a fall in confidence after contact with the police. The analysis of the discussions revealed four key dimensions of confidence (i.e. what made people feel confident). Several types of confidence triggers were also identified, over some of which the police have control, pre‐contact, during contact and post‐contact.

The research focused on one public sector organisation using a small number of focus group interviews.

Organisations can influence, at least to some extent, consumer confidence before use. The research also questions whether some organisations should assess confidence rather than, or in addition to, satisfaction.

The determinants of the fear of crime have been extensively investigated over the past three decades, yet few studies are comparative, include data from developing countries or use attitudes toward the police as explanatory variables. Understanding how perceptions of police performance influence fear of crime is essential to developing strategies which will reduce citizens’ isolation and reluctance to exert informal social control in their communities. Such lack of engagement creates opportunities for increased crime and disorder and heightens fear of crime. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

This study examines the mediating effect of perceived confidence in the police on citizens’ fear of crime in seven developing Caribbean region countries using structural equation modeling. The data were collected in a 2011 United Nations survey from representative samples in each nation.

The results indicate that confidence in the police plays a significant and partial mediating role in explaining fear of crime and that community- and individual-level characteristics influence the level of confidence and independently affect fear of crime as well.

This is one of the few studies that employs comparative victimization data in the Caribbean to examine the role that confidence in the police has on fear of crime. The findings of this study will contribute to fill the gap in the understanding of the drivers of fear of crime in developing countries.