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The purpose of this paper is to assess officer perceptions of consolidation of law enforcement agencies under three specific models: contracting, merger and a hybrid of regionalization and contracting.

A survey was administered to 139 officers employed by four agencies using one of the models of interest. The survey asked officers their views on consolidation and how it has affected organizational and employment characteristics.

Officers generally support consolidation, but views vary by agency type. Officers in the contracting agencies, for example, generally viewed consolidation as less cost effective than officers in other agencies viewed it, but were more likely to say crime decreased and job security and workload improved after consolidation. Officers in the hybrid agency were less positive about changes in some employment and organizational characteristics.

The sample size and response rates are low, and no comparison to other agencies is available, but the examination offers new information and lessons.

Communities considering police consolidation must consider a specific model and how to communicate changes to officers. This research illuminates officer perspectives on each.

This is the first investigation of views of shared services by specific model of consolidation. Such work is particularly valuable given increased interest in consolidation in recent years.

The purpose of this paper is to review officer support for the consolidation of law enforcement agencies.

The current study surveys 139 officers employed by four agencies that have recently undergone a consolidation of police services. The survey asked officers their level of support for consolidation of services as well as their views of how consolidation has affected employment conditions, organizational characteristics, and the delivery of police services.

While officers generally support consolidation, views on the effects of shared services vary significantly by level of support. Officers who most strongly support consolidation are also most likely to view it as leading to improvements in some working conditions (e.g. job satisfaction, morale), elements of organizational capacity (e.g. professionalism, investigative/intelligence capacity, recruitment), and the delivery of services (e.g. cost-effectiveness, quality and efficiency of services, and reductions in crime).

The sample size and response rate are low. Still, the study offers insights into officer views of consolidation not previously available.

This research offers insights to communities considering the consolidation of police services regarding what organizational, employment, and service conditions are most likely to appeal to officers, whose support is necessary for successful implementation.

While single case studies previously considered officer attitudes on these issues, this work is the first to comparatively examine views of shared services across varying levels of support for consolidation.

Employs a quasi‐experimental design to assess the operational costs and benefits of a consolidated department. Northern York County Police Department, the experimental group, was consolidated in 1972. Uses a comparison group consisting of eight police departments in a contiguous county in rural Pennsylvania to compare the outcome variables. Finds that whereas reducing costs may be the expected benefit of consolidation other benefits such as more opportunity for training and the use of specialized units were evident.

To assess whether a programme of “crackdown and consolidation” could lead to measurable and sustainable reductions in domestic burglary.

In 1998 the Home Office reducing burglary initiative was launched in England and Wales. Phase I comprised 63 projects; the evaluation of one such project based on crackdown and consolidation is considered here. The aim was to crack down on known burglary recidivists, and then consolidate any gains by engaging the local community and implementing various prevention measures. The article considers the background to the project, the history of the method and how it was applied in this instance. The plausibility of the view that this action led to reductions in offending is examined.

The project did not follow its original plan of a continuous cycle of crackdown and consolidation. However, the approach undoubtedly has the potential to work, although in this instance the consolidation served only to prolong the impact of the initial crackdown, rather than offer a sustainable solution.

There are financial and staffing implications of adopting a cycle of crackdown and consolidation. There also needs to be neighbourhood buy‐in – especially for the crackdown element – and early warning of changes in the burglary trend.

Whilst the concept of crackdown and consolidation has existed for some years, published accounts of it are limited. This article goes some way towards filling that gap by providing an evaluation of the method within an operational police setting.

The purpose of this paper is to assess the effects of officers’ perceptions of complexity in merging organizational change components (culture, mission, values, decentralization, policies and procedures, administrative reporting practices, weapons, contract, pay, benefits, patrol boundaries, equalization of workload, size of boundaries, communications, 10-codes, and car numbers) during a major metropolitan police department consolidation.

The current study utilizes data collected from 390 sworn officers from two agencies in Kentucky that were merged, the Louisville Division of Police and the Jefferson County Police Department. Statistical inquiry included factor analysis and a series of bivariate and multivariate logistic regression analysis (controlling for demographic measures).

Results revealed a noteworthy, positive effect on support for consolidation related to the complexity of three factors: benefits, mission, and policies.

To date, the relevance of complexity on support for organizational change and, more specifically, police consolidation, is unknown. With this study, the authors aim to add to the discussion.

The purpose of this study isto synthesize recent empirical research investigating memory of stressful critical incidents (both simulated and occurring in the field) among law enforcement officers.

The study used the approach of systematic state-of-the-art review.

In total, 20 studies of police and military officers show reduced detail and accuracy of high- versus low-stress incidents, especially for peripheral versus target information. Decrements in memory performance were mediated by the extent of physiological stress responses. Delayed recall accuracy was improved among officers that engaged in immediate post-incident rehearsal, including independent debriefing or reviewing body-worn camera footage.

Most studies were not found through systematic database searches, highlighting a need for broader indexing and/or open access publishing to make research more accessible.

By understanding how stress physiology enhances or interferes with memory encoding, consolidation and recall, evidence-based practices surrounding post-incident evidence gathering are recommended.

The current review addresses common public misconceptions of enhanced cognitive performance among police relative to the average citizen.

The current work draws from scientific knowledge about the pervasive influence of stress physiology on memory to inform existing practices surrounding post-incident evidence gathering among police.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate whether the nature of policing services allows for economies of scale to be realized. It is also a replication of Southwick (2005).

This study replicates the methodology used by Southwick (2005) to estimate police production and demand in order to determine whether there are economies of scale among police departments in a western state. Southwick’s (2005) method is unique in that it incorporates measures of market power to predict police efficiency. The present study is unique in that it involves data from a low-density, low-population western state.

Southwick’s results for New York State are markedly different from the results found for Idaho, thus questioning the external validity of Southwick’s model as applied to a relatively low-population state. The findings also indicate that, controlling for relevant variables, crime in Idaho is highly correlated with population, suggesting that police departments in low density/population states would not achieve efficiency gains through consolidation.

The implications of this study include validating police performance measures and evaluating applicability of market power to police departments.

No evidence was found to support the contention that consolidation of police departments results in efficiency gains.

This is the first study of economies of scale in policing to use data from a low-density, low-population western state.

The purpose of this paper is to review the evidence about the factors shaping the police workforce, commissioned by the Scottish Police Authority and Scottish Institute for Policing Research.

The paper uses the theory of strategic fit to assess the available evidence relating to reshaping the police workforce and brings together the most relevant recent reviews of police organisations and empirical studies on these issues. The use of the theory enabled the strategies that have been adopted by police agencies in recent years to be evaluated in relation to the current political and economic environment.

The authors find that here is considerable uncertainty and while there has been previous discussion on the benefits of larger or smaller forces there is not robust evidence that a particular force size is optimal for either efficacy or efficiency, although very small forces may struggle in some ways. There is also mixed evidence about whether increasing police organisation resourcing to allow more officers to be employed reduces crime levels, and there is a relative lack of evidence about the impact this has on the other areas of community life in which police are involved.

There are major weaknesses in research relating to police organisational reform: there is no accepted theory of police reform, no accepted method as to how such a reform should be evaluated nor have there been any comparative studies of earlier police civilianisation programs (Braithwaite, Westbrook and Ledema, 2005).

Previous work on this topic often focuses on which organisational structure – whether in terms of workforce mix or size – is most efficient or effective. This research takes an alternative perspective and argues for a shift in the research agenda to take account of the friction involved in processes of organisational change, both in order to build a stronger research understanding of these important aspects of change and to more effectively inform policy. The paper provides a basis for the development of theories for understanding police reform in general – and workforce restructuring in particular – alongside appropriate methods for researching it.

Change is a feature of the liberal democracies. Despite its ubiquitous nature, however, one key factor in these democracies, the police, has been noted for its conservatism. This bastion of traditionalism, this upholder of the law of the land, has changed little in structure or purpose over the first half of this century but it has not been the case during the latter half. Change now appears to be manifesting itself in new organisational structures and forms; modifications to role and focus; and, in accommodating revised views on the need for agencies whose composition reflects gender equity and minority representation, as authorities struggle to satisfy the array of demands on contemporary police services. This paper speculates as to what may have prompted change to the police, examines what it considers to be some of the main areas of change, and then postulates the consequences for police and policing.