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The purpose of this paper is to reflect on the opportunities and challenges provided by the introduction of Police and Crime Commissioner (PCC), and particularly the prospects for enhanced public accountability of policing as a result. It considers how the new accountability framework might work in practice and in comparison with the existing arrangements of Police Authorities and highlights the key accountability relationships on which success is likely to depend.

The paper draws on a range of published research on public accountability and applies the key ideas to the particular context of police governance and accountability.

While the plans for directly elected PCCs have proved controversial, the overall view is that the new approach to police governance deserves its chance because it seems to offer at least some potential for stronger public accountability. Much depends on the three key accountability relationships and probably it will take some time for clear, significant and lasting impacts to show themselves. But in four years time, when the next round of elections are due, the nature of the challenge of injecting more effective public accountability into policing will be better understood.

The paper offers conceptual insights on the governance and accountability framework for policing, both as currently exists and as is intended with directly elected PCCs. It also highlights the three key accountability relationships which lie at the heart of the new arrangements and upon which success, to a large extent, will depend.

This paper explores diverse practices of the giving and demanding of democratic accountability within a case of conflict around deep-sea petroleum exploration in Aotearoa New Zealand. These practices include submissions and consultations, partnership between Indigenous Peoples and a settler-colonial government and dissensus. These are theorised through the political thought of Jacques Rancière.

A single case study approach is employed that seeks to particularise and draws on interview, documentary and media materials.

By examining a case of conflict, the authors find that as opportunities for participation in democratic accountability processes are eroded, political dissensus emerges to demand parts in the accountability process. Dissensus creates counter forums within a wider understanding of democratic accountability. In this case, individuals and organisations move between police (where hierarchy counts those with a part) and politics (exercised when this hierarchy is disrupted by dissensus) to demand parts as police logics become more and less democratic. These parts are then utilised towards particular interests, but in this case to also create additional parts for those with none.

This study privileges demands for accountability through dissensus as fundamental to democratic accountability, rather than just account giving and receiving. That is, who is or who is not included – who has a stake or a part – is crucial in a broader understanding of democratic accountability. This provides democratic accountability with a radical potential for creating change. The study also advances thinking on democratic accountability by drawing from Indigenous perspectives and experiences in a settler-colonial context.

The purpose of this paper is to compare the specific institutional arrangements for realizing democratically accountable policing in England & Wales and the Netherlands. It assesses each accountability system against a set of “democratic criteria” and considers the implications for democratic policing of the current reform trajectories in both jurisdictions.

The paper adopts a cross‐national approach exploring the relationship between policing and democratic institutions by comparing the democratic credentials of the police governance systems in England & Wales and the Netherlands.

Current reforms to the police governance system in England & Wales aim to increase local elected influence over policing. By contrast, the Dutch system deliberately limits the degree of local electoral control over policing. The paper argues that there is a range of elements to democratic policing, and that “democratic accountability” should not be conflated with control of policing by elected bodies. Whilst the trajectories of reform in England & Wales and the Netherlands are going in opposite directions, each raises a number of “democratic” concerns.

The research is limited to only two developed European parliamentary democracies in the European Union. Further comparative research on democratic policing is required to expand the analysis to a wider variety of democratic contexts.

To date, there has been little attention paid by policy makers or by academics to the form and nature of police governance in continental European countries. By drawing comparisons between England & Wales and the Netherlands, the paper aims to provide a democratic assessment of the two police accountability systems (and their current reform trajectories) and discuss some broad policy implications for police governance in each jurisdiction.

Comparative analysis of police accountability in both England and Wales and the Netherlands provides potential for policy learning in each jurisdiction. The analysis suggests that both systems, in different ways, are currently at risk of over‐emphasizing particular democratic criteria (such as electoral participation, or delivery of service) to the exclusion of others (such as concerns with equitable and fair policing and the protection of minority rights).

Recently public interest in the police service in Australia has emanated from extensive media coverage and from rising public accountability expectations. In light of this, the current paper explores how far the accounting, accountability and performance management systems within “new public management” ideals have evolved within the Australian police services. More specifically, it explores the accountability framework, information for performance evaluation and public sector reform implications for an Australian state police service as a whole, and an individual police station, in particular. The findings suggest that the police service in Australia has a rigid accountability structure and is continuously subject to performance evaluations. Further, it has been found that there is considerable rise of “new public management” ideals within the police services in Australia. It was apparent that the reforms in the police service had a dual purpose – legitimizing the police service to the electorate and ordinary citizens, while encouraging efficiencies of resource use.

Police technology fundamentally shapes the police role, and the adoption of technology is even linked to the success of police reforms. Police adoption of emerging technological tools changes the way police interact with citizens. The change in police citizen interactions can then have serious implications for the social control that police have over citizens, the civil liberties citizens enjoy, police accountability, and the legitimacy that the police hold in contemporary American society.

While technology impacts these critical issues in policing, not all technology adopted by the police is likely to influence their relationship with the public. As such, this chapter closely examines the ways that several emerging technologies adopted by the police (i.e., body-worn cameras (BWC), aerial surveillance, visual surveillance, social media, mapping and crime prediction, and less lethal force technology) impact issues related to social control, accountability, and legitimacy. The current literature seems to indicate that some innovations such as BWCs enhance police accountability and legitimacy, and also expand social control. Other technologies such as aerial surveillance and conducted energy devices increase social control, and display a complicated or unclear influence over police legitimacy.

The purpose of this paper is to study police powers and accountability from a comparative perspective in both China and Hong Kong.

This paper compares and contrasts police powers and accountability.

The implications are many, including different political systems in which China is more authoritarian or paternalistic whereas Hong Kong is more pluralistic; checks and balances mechanisms in Hong Kong are far greater than in China; and the concept of accountability to the public is different in that Hong Kong police are accountable to members of the public but the mainland Chinese police force has a limited and top-down concept of accountability.

An original comparative approach to policing in Hong Kong and China.

This paper examines the implementation of new management techniques in Australian police services since the late 1980s, within an international context of demands for greater public sector efficiencies and accountability. Through an examination of police organisations in Queensland and New South Wales, the paper demonstrates that the impetus for organisational change, particularly in the context of employment practices has largely been driven by revelations of entrenched corruption and police misconduct. As a result, organisational goals of accountability and cultural change have been the critical influences on the restructuring agenda. The paper argues that management strategies should be suited to the specific organisational settings within which they are being applied. It suggests that the process of restructuring and the emphasis on changing employment practices have led to greater potential for conflict between management and police officers.

The themes of accessibility and accountability have come to dominate the police reform agenda in the UK. They are evident, especially, in the rhetoric of ‘neighbourhood policing’, which has been delivered across England and Wales, and in the ‘policing pledge’, which sets out a series of commitments regarding what the public can expect from their local police service. This paper is concerned with exploring these themes and their application in neighbourhood policing. It examines how officers in two police services have sought to implement the requirements of neighbourhood policing and the policing pledge in terms of improving accessibility and accountability of local policing. In doing so, it focuses on arrangements for consulting with members of the public, providing updates regarding their actions and outcomes in addressing local problems and on the provision of data and maps about crime problems. Practice implications are identified.

The purpose of this paper is to partially replicate and extend the work of Klockars et al. and others on police integrity by examining how individual, organizational, and ecological factors affect police supervisors’ perceptions of police misconduct and willingness to report fellow officers’ misconduct.

Surveys containing 17 scenarios developed by Klockars et al. (2000, 2004, 2006) were administered to 553 ranking officers attending training at the Bill Blackwood Law Enforcement Management Institute of Texas from June 1, 2009 to March 1, 2010 and employed by municipal police departments, county sheriff’s departments, and constable agencies.

Results suggest that individual and organizational factors affect supervisor willingness to blow the whistle on underling misconduct, although their effects varied by seriousness of the behavior.

The current project partially replicates and extends prior studies of factors affecting police integrity by surveying supervisors, measuring their willingness to whistle blow, and including variables in statistical models that prior studies have not included.

Citizen review of complaints against police officers is an important new aspect of policing which takes many different forms. Explains the reasons leading to the usage of this term in preference to similar terms. Analyzes official documents related to the 65 citizen review (CR) procedures currently in force in the USA. Highlights the problematic relationship between the goals of CR and administrative features. Finds that existing procedures do not always guarantee an independent review of complaints. Suggests additional research on procedures, more critical assessment of the assumptions underlying CR, and rigorous comparative evaluations of complaint review systems, also of the relationship between CR and other innovations such as community policing.