Where`s the intelligence in the UK`s National Intelligence Model?

Editorial Note: this article is a much reduced version of a Master’s level dissertation submitted by the author as part of the course requirements while reading for an MSc in International Police Science at the University of Portsmouth, UK. The submitted dissertation was the winner of the 2006 Vathek Postgraduate Dissertation Prize.This article investigates the status of community intelligence within The National Intelligence Model (NIM) in the UK. The study included focused interviews with 23 intelligence practitioners across the UK police service, combined with open-ended interviews with academics and persons working to implement the NIM. The results indicate that police officers and informants are the most trusted and the most used sources of intelligence, and that the use of community intelligence is marginal. A combination of police culture, lack of knowledge within management and police officers, the absence of a general definition of ‘intelligence’, a lack of guidance around community intelligence and the secrecy surrounding intelligence, stand out as factors that may explain the low status and use of community intelligence