Case Study Practitioner–Researcher Collaboration in Policing: A Case of

number of law enforcement agencies in the USA and have published several articles on organizational democracy in policing. In this article, the authors argue that collaborations between police practitioners and academic researchers are challenging due to differences in perspective, method and culture. Consequently, such collaborations are infrequent and tenuous, thereby inhibiting knowledge sharing between the two fields. The authors ’ experience is that while these relationships can prove innovative and rewarding, they can also occur in unplanned ways and may have unexpected outcomes. The methodology of action research, which equally values the perspectives of practitioners and researchers as they jointly analyze and address problems, can be a useful tool for managing the inherent challenges of collaborative inquiry. This paper describes a case study that used this approach for a police organizational development project and serves as an illustration of its implementation and outcomes. Encounters with animate beings, possibly with an intelligence of a different order from ours, give a new dimension to our atavistic fear of the unknown. It brings with it the specter of competition for ter-ritory, loss of planetary hegemony--- fear