Policing racially motivated crime: attitudes and experiences of the police service of Northern Ireland

In recent years, the changing face of Northern Ireland (NI) has witnessed a multi-cultural shake-up, albeit a proportionately small one, meaning that the make-up of its black minority ethnic (BME) population is not only growing but also widening in variety. The increased visible presence of BME people has served to create somewhat of a ‘moral panic’ (Cohen, 1972) amongst the white majority. This unfounded racialised panic has led to an increase of racist incidents, committed against both the newly situated and older established black minority ethnic communities. One key area of concern with the increase in racist incidents is the response of criminal justice agencies, such as the police. In discussing the findings of data gathered from a series of interviews with serving officers carried out between the period of October 2007 and March 2008, this paper will consider racist incidents in Northern Ireland and the response of the PSNI. It seeks to offer an insight into Senior level changes as well as the lived experiences and attitudes of operational officers in their policing of duties in matters relating to race, racism and racist incidents. In doing so, a number of issues were considered which included: the perceptions held about racialised crime; difficulties in the execution of duties when policing racist incidents; and, the usefulness of the MacPherson Report (1999) and other anti-racist policing tools. The paper presents key themes, and makes several recommendations for police best practice in how to move forward with the policing of racist incidents in Northern Ireland