An Analysis of Departmental Policing Style and Its Implications for Police-Community Relations

The following study is an examination of departmental policing style and its implications for police-community relations. I assert that the closer a department\u27s policing style is to being service-oriented, the better its relationship with the community. A department\u27s policing style is composed of two dimensions--administrative style and individual style. For this reason I have devised 2 tests to measure each style. The first is a 9 Question Test derived from the basic tenets of Community Policing, designed to measure the degree of service orientation of a department\u27s administrative style. The second test is composed of 6 Questions aimed at tapping individual police officers\u27 style of policing as measured by their attitudes toward the law and the community. Using these two tests, I conducted interviews with sergeants of Cleveland, Akron, and Portland Police Departments to determine their administrative styles of policing. After eliminating the Akron Police Department as a middle case, I also conducted interviews with 3 officers in the remaining two departments in order to assess individual style. Incorporated into both tests, were questions regarding the community\u27s rating of its department\u27s performance which were used to assess the police\u27s relationship with its respective community from the point of view of the police. My hypothesis was supported. I found that the department with a style of policing close enough to Community Policing to be considered a service-oriented d~partment (PPD), reported a better relationship with the community than did the department that was a long way from being service-oriented (CPD) . I also found inconsistencies in administrative and individual interpretations of police performance of tasks in the CPD, and correspondence in the PPD. The limitations of my study are a too small sample population of police officers , and an interesting but dangerous way of measuring police community relations. This study, meant to be analysis of policing style and its implications for policing-community relations, is sUbjective in nature. The results, therefore, are not very generalizable. Nonetheless, there is some indication--some reason to believe--that policing style does have an affect on police-community relations. For this reason, recommendations for future studies have been included in the conclusion section of Chapter 5