CSSRG Seminar 23-11-11
KATJA M. HALLENBERG
CENTRE FOR CRIMINOLOGY AND CRIMINAL JUSTICE
SCHOOL OF LAW, UNIVERSITY OF MANCHESTER
Today’s Presentation
1.
Overview of the police research in the UK: why,
what, when, who?
2. My PhD research: Investigative skills training,
academisation and professionalisation
Why Police Research?
 Brown (1996)
1.
Accountability function
2.
Professionalising function
3.
Efficiency measurement function
4.
Change function
Innes (2010)


Police research as a ‘mirror’ and a ‘motor’
Types of Police Research
 Innes (2010)
1.
Research by the police
2.
Research on the police
3.
Research for the police
4.
Research with the police
Development of Police Research
 Reiner (1992, 2010)
1.
Consensus
2.
Controversy
3.
Conflict
4.
Contradiction
5.
Crime control

‘Happy rapprochement’ (Reiner, 1994)
Who Conducts Police Research?
 Reiner (2010)
 Sources of police research: academia, police, Home Office,
journalists, think-tanks, government and independent
research organisations
 Brown (1996)
1.
Inside insiders
2.
Outside insiders
3.
Inside outsiders
4.
Outside outsiders
My PhD Research
 Scholarly Detectives: Police Professionalisation via
Academic Education
 Aims:
1.
2.
3.
To provide a picture of the current state of investigative skills
training in England and Wales,
To explore the relationship between police and academia in
general and in terms of academic police training in
particular,
To explore the process of ‘police professionalisation’ within
the framework of sociology of professions, and with emphasis
on the role of academic education.
‘Story of the research’
 24 semi-structured
interviews
 14 participants, trainers
and training co-ordinators
from two forces and NPIA
 Building a framework
through theory and
empirical data
Use of
psychology in
police covert
operations/
investigative
skills training
Increasing cooperation between
academia and police
training
Academisation of police training
as an indication of police
professionalisation
Police and Academia
“I think there’s no doubt that policing has moved much closer to academic ability than
practical ability, or both hand-in-hand.” (Participant 5, Force Crime Training)
 ‘Degree in Policing’ – police forces linking with
universities
 Changing relationship:
 From individual to organisational
 From extraordinary to routine
 From high-end only to all levels of the organisation
Professionalisation via Academisation

The ‘missing ingredient’: systematic body of theory, instructional abstractions,
qualifications



“I suppose the missing bit is that kind of what public perceive as the training, qualification type
of thing.” (Participant 1, National Training Design, NPIA)
“We talk about professionalising investigation, but we’re not a professional, we’re not a
profession. Because a profession has certain aspects that make it a profession. You got to have
awarding bodies, you got to have academic literature. We’ve no integrated academic literature.
You got to have some kind of registration system, people can be stroke off. You know, all those
kinds of things that make a profession work. We’re kind of in between the idea of profession.”
(Participant 4, National Training Design, NPIA)
From experience to expertise, legitimising the knowledge claim, external recognition


“And it has benefits for the service as well in relation to how people outside will see the police
service now. Whether we can actually now say we’re professionals because we’re attaching
qualifications, academic qualifications to the training that we deliver? So I think it’s benefit to
the service in how the public perceive us in the future.” (Participant 6, Force Crime Training)
“It’s going to be more and more difficult to fight the corner for police officers with regards to
government and pay and conditions and stuff like that, without I think, without that
professional academic qualification behind us.” (Participant 7, Force Crime Training)
Benefits and Challenges
 Potential benefits





Standardisation
Externally recognised qualifications and career flexibility
Personal development and improved self-image
Professionalisation and relationships with the public, Other
Professions and Government
Broader knowledge and deeper understanding
 Potential challenges





Competing demands: time and money
Acceptance, engagement, support
Plurality of options
Control and management
‘Two worlds thinking’
Social Change
Social Change
Professionalisation
Higher Education
Ontological Shift?
 Changing cultural truisms and new structured situations (Sciulli, 2009)
“The demands of 21st century policing, with counter-terrorism, with technologyenabled crime, with all of those new arenas of… how do I put it? Not even a
physical landscape. It’s an electronic landscape to police. We start talking about
child exploitation online. And all those kinds of things. That’s the response, the police
response. We can’t, you know you don’t get a Bobby to go to that. That’s
somebody sitting down, with some skills who will be able to identify where those
offences are taking place, to be able to target those offences. That requires skills to do
that and requires training. [...] We’re dealing with that kind of environment, and to
deal with that we got to be more professional, more skilled policing
service for the public. I think that needs a much more professional institute. I think
the whole idea of two-year probation, to be able walk out in the street and be the
master, the jack of all trades but master of none – I think we are coming to a close
and I think 21st century policing requires a different approach...”
(Participant 4, National Training Co-ordinator, NPIA)
 A new narrative of the police profession?