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1 – 10 of over 13000Michael Kennedy and Philip Birch
The purpose of this paper is to problematise the application of hegemonic masculinity to police practice and culture.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to problematise the application of hegemonic masculinity to police practice and culture.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper offers a viewpoint and is a discussion paper critiquing the application of hegemonic masculinity to police officers, their practice and culture.
Findings
The paper suggests that a broader conceptualisation of masculinity, offered by scholars such as Demetriou (2001), is required when considering policing and its culture, in order to more accurately reflect the activity and those involved in it.
Research limitations/implications
Writings concerning police practice and culture, both in the media and academic discourse, are questionable due to the application of hegemonic masculinity. The application of hegemonic masculinity can create a biased perception of policing and police officers.
Practical implications
The paper helps to engender a more accurate and balanced examination of the police, their culture and practice when writing about policing institutions and encourage social institutions such as academia to address bias in their examination of policing institutions and police officers.
Originality/value
There has been limited consideration in regards to multiple masculinities, police practice and culture.
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Mohammed Saleh Alosani and Hassan Saleh Al-Dhaafri
Limited use of Kaizen practices in police agencies, together with very few studies that investigated the link between it and police performance, gives a gap and good indication to…
Abstract
Purpose
Limited use of Kaizen practices in police agencies, together with very few studies that investigated the link between it and police performance, gives a gap and good indication to conduct this study. Thus, this study seeks to explore and examine this relationship through the lens of innovation culture as a mediating factor.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper was based on a survey with 352 effective participants, including the head section officers of the Dubai Police in the UAE. A structural equation modelling technique was used for statistical analysis.
Findings
Results indicate that Kaizen was positively associated with police performance. Innovation culture also plays a mediating role in the relationship between Kaizen and police performance.
Originality/value
This paper has theoretical and practical contributions. It is one of the first studies to create and test the direct and indirect associations between Kaizen and police performance, providing evidence on the mediating role of innovation culture with regard to Kaizen and performance in the policing field.
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Lindsey Blumenstein, Lorie Fridell and Shayne Jones
The purpose of this paper is to identify whether officers who adhere to the aspects of the traditional police sub‐culture – authoritarianism, cynicism, and burnout – are more…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to identify whether officers who adhere to the aspects of the traditional police sub‐culture – authoritarianism, cynicism, and burnout – are more likely to use violence against their intimate partner. Intimate partner violence (IPV) is measured in terms of both physical assault and psychological violence.
Design/methodology/approach
A survey was created using existing scales and was given to a sample of police officers from four departments in the southern United States. Both Tobit and logistic regression were utilized to examine the effects of the traditional police sub‐culture on the two types of intimate partner violence.
Findings
The results of the analyses partially supported the link between traditional police culture and police intimate partner violence. The results showed that two aspects of the traditional police sub‐culture, burnout and authoritarianism, were significantly related to psychological IPV. There was no significant relationship between traditional police culture and physical IPV
Research limitations/implications
There are a relatively small number of police officers in the convenience sample and it is not very diverse in its composition.
Originality/value
The results of this study indicate that those who adhere to the traditional police culture are at more risk for engaging in psychological domestic violence than those officers who do not. The research shows that traditional police sub‐culture has an effect on police intimate partner violence. This information is important in that it may provide police agencies with some direction in implementing domestic violence prevention efforts.
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– The purpose of this paper is to explore the organisational cultures of two different parts of the emergency service, the police and the ambulance service.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to explore the organisational cultures of two different parts of the emergency service, the police and the ambulance service.
Design/methodology/approach
Semi-structured interviews with 45 police officers and ambulance staff sought to understand more about the relationships between these two distinctly different professions who work together closely and regularly in often very difficult situations.
Findings
Interviews with police officers and ambulance staff revealed the strong and harmonious working relationship between the two professions and an existence of both shared organisational characteristics and shared cultural characteristics. These cultural characteristics, identified as both explicit and tacit in nature provide the “glue” which not only binds each organisation together but which appears to cement a longer term, tangible link between the police and ambulance services.
Originality/value
This paper reveals a new dimension within cultural analyses of occupational groups by considering the shared cultural characteristics of two groups within the emergency services, police officers and ambulance staff. This potential for cultural boundary crossing is explored in detail.
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Eugene A. Paoline and William Terrill
To examine the extent to which cultural fragmentation among police officers results in differences in searches of suspects and their surroundings during proactive traffic stops.
Abstract
Purpose
To examine the extent to which cultural fragmentation among police officers results in differences in searches of suspects and their surroundings during proactive traffic stops.
Design/methodology/approach
Cluster and multivariate analyses are performed utilizing survey and observational data collected as part of the Project on Policing Neighborhoods (POPN).
Findings
Differences in search behavior among patrol officers are found as a result of variation in cultural alignments. That is, patrol officers that adhere to the culture (in varying degrees) from an attitudinal standpoint are more likely to engage in searches than those who most ardently resist cultural attitudes.
Research limitations/implications
Although the classification scheme captured many of the core attitudes associated with police culture, it did not measure all of them. Also, the departments studied would compare to most American municipal police organizations, but would make poor comparisons to very large urban or small rural agencies, where culture might operate in different ways.
Practical implications
Police administrators can use this information if they wished to alter the rate at which search behavior occurs.
Originality/value
This study fills a research void in policing by examining whether attitudinal variation in cultural commitment results in different behavioral patterns. This work also adds to a larger body of social science research by finding an attitude‐behavior relationship.
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John K. Cochran and Max L. Bromley
This study examines empirically the extent to which there is evidence of an endemic sub‐culture of policing among a sample of sheriffs’ deputies. While failing to observe…
Abstract
This study examines empirically the extent to which there is evidence of an endemic sub‐culture of policing among a sample of sheriffs’ deputies. While failing to observe widespread adherence to the sub‐cultural norms and values suggested in the literature, such adherence is observed among a subset of our sample. Advanced statistical techniques (i.e. cluster analysis and discriminant function analysis) are then used to create, replicate, and validate a numerical taxonomy of policing. The taxonomy reveals three types of law enforcement orientations: “Sub‐Cultural Adherents,” “COP Cops,” who represent a nouveau sub‐culture strongly committed to public service, and “Normals,” who, on average, are quite average and are not especially committed to either sub‐cultural form.
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Heidi Paesen, Jeroen Maesschalck and Kim Loyens
Combining insights from the traditional literature on police culture with insights from the broader literature on organisational culture and on grid-group cultural theory…
Abstract
Purpose
Combining insights from the traditional literature on police culture with insights from the broader literature on organisational culture and on grid-group cultural theory (Douglas, 1970), the purpose of this paper is to introduce a new 15-dimensional framework of “organisational culture in the police” and test this framework via a survey instrument. This new conceptualisation is broader than the traditional police culture concept and allows for comparisons of the police with other organisations.
Design/methodology/approach
A newly developed instrument to measure the 15-dimensional framework, called the “Leuven Organisational Culture Questionnaire (LOCQ)”, was tested in 64 local police forces in Belgium (n=3,847).
Findings
The hypothesised 15-dimensional model is largely confirmed by confirmatory factor analysis. Assessments of between-unit variation show that the LOCQ is sufficiently sensitive to identify differences between work units in police organisations. The authors also find that traditional police culture characteristics tend to vary slightly less between units than the other characteristics. Also, there is less variation for characteristics related to police work (e.g. law enforcement orientation and citizen orientation) than for characteristics associated with the unit level (e.g. weak supervisory support and internal solidarity) or the organisational level (e.g. rule orientation and results orientation).
Originality/value
This paper expands the traditional “police culture” concept to a more generic and theory-driven conceptualisation of “organisational culture in the police”. The survey instrument offers a standardised way to map and compare culture within police organisations, and to compare it with the culture of other organisations both within and outside law enforcement.
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Daniela Gutschmidt and Antonio Vera
Many authors describe police culture as a relevant determinant of officers' health, policing behavior and reaction to change. Investigation of such relationships requires an…
Abstract
Purpose
Many authors describe police culture as a relevant determinant of officers' health, policing behavior and reaction to change. Investigation of such relationships requires an appropriate instrument for measuring police culture.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper proposes a questionnaire containing 20 values that are characteristic of police culture (e.g. masculinity, loyalty, solidarity). In an online survey, 153 German police officers described their last workgroups in terms of how typical these values are. Besides conducting item and factor analyses, multiple regression models were tested to explore the effect of group characteristics on police culture.
Findings
A four-factor solution, comprising (1) conservative-male culture, (2) institutional pride culture, (3) team culture and (4) diligence culture, seems to fit the data best. Significant predictors of the police culture total score are percentage of male officers, average age of the group and service in a problematic district.
Research limitations/implications
Overall, the results indicate that police culture is a measurable multidimensional construct, which substantially depends on the composition and the operational area of the workgroup. A limitation of the study is the retrospective and subjective assessment of cultural values.
Originality/value
The questionnaire presented in this paper depicts the culture of police workgroups in a differentiated way and is able to detect cultural variation within the police. Future research could draw on the questionnaire to investigate determinants and consequences of police culture.
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Silas Patterson and William R. King
This study aims to bridge the police culture and the police employee well-being literature by demonstrating significant linkages between the two.
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to bridge the police culture and the police employee well-being literature by demonstrating significant linkages between the two.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors examined the effects of culture on the well-being of officers in one police agency in the western United States during the summer of 2020. Using individual-level data, the authors model the association between officer perceptions of occupational culture and personal well-being for 125 sworn employees.
Findings
The results indicate that, for individual sworn officers, their adherence to elements of culture is related to well-being; specifically, burnout (BO) exhaustion, BO disengagement, job satisfaction and organizational commitment. Additionally, the cultural attitudes of administration, and citizens in the population, are both consistent predictors of officer well-being.
Originality/value
This study provides an important linkage between the police culture and police well-being literature, which to date has been given limited attention.
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The study aims to examine the effect of organizational socialization into police culture on officers' attitudes toward community policing in South Korea.
Abstract
Purpose
The study aims to examine the effect of organizational socialization into police culture on officers' attitudes toward community policing in South Korea.
Design/methodology/approach
The study sampled 694 Korean police officers. Policy implication and direction for future research is discussed.
Findings
The results indicate a positive relationship between the degree of organizational socialization and police officers' attitudes toward community policing, contrary to hypothesized directions. Police officers who report higher levels of socialization into police culture are more likely to support the philosophy of community policing and line officers' autonomy/participation, and to perceive a positive relationship with citizens. The findings may indicate that police culture in Korea is fundamentally different from those of other countries, even though the Korean police share some common characteristics of police culture (i.e. machismo, isolation, or conflict with citizens) with its counterparts.
Originality/value
The study provides useful information on the effect of organizational socialization into police culture on officers' attitudes toward community policing.
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