Overview

This book demonstrates the unique contribution police ethnographies make to our understanding of policing cultures and practices in a variety of international settings. It features contemporary examples of police ethnographies that demonstrate the continuing value of ethnographic work to our understanding of policing. The first section of the book focuses on the police and Anglo-American policing. The second section is international in scope and seeks to enrich our understandings of policing ‘beyond’ the police. Chapters explore police interactions during a stop and search and at a carnival. They peer behind the scenes at the control room and at the use of intelligence. We listen in to the experiences of new recruits and the stories told in canteens. They also take us into the world of private security agencies, to Kenya and to Vietnam. The book explores the position of ethnographers asking: whether we do too much with rather than on the police; and whether our work reveals more about us as academics than them as officers. Together, they are revealing of a changing policing landscape. Ethnography and the Evocative World of Policing demonstrates the unique value of ethnographic work in the fields of policing studies and criminology. It will be a key resource for scholars and researchers of policing, criminology, sociology, law, and research methods.The chapters in this book were originally published in two special issues of Policing and Society.

Full Product Details

Author:   Matthew Bacon (University of Sheffield, UK) ,  Bethan Loftus (Bangor University, UK) ,  Mike Rowe (University of Liverpool, UK)
Publisher:   Taylor & Francis Ltd
Imprint:   Routledge
Weight:   0.460kg
ISBN:  

9781032595894

ISBN 10:   1032595892
Pages:   234
Publication Date:   06 May 2025
Audience:   College/higher education ,  Tertiary & Higher Education
Format:   Paperback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   In Print  
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Table of Contents

Police ethnography: An introduction to the craft Part 1 – Exploring the craft of policing 1. Officer strategies for managing interactions during police stops 2. Police interaction and Notting Hill Carnival 3. Cops in crisis?: ethnographic insights on a new era of politicization, activism, accountability, and change in transatlantic policing 4. Precautionary policing and dispositives of risk in a police force control room in domestic abuse incidents: an ethnography of call handlers, dispatchers and response officers 5. Making sense of policing identities: the ‘deserving’ and the ‘undeserving’ in policing accounts of victimisation 6. Ethnography and narrative Part 2 – Developing a wider perspective 7. ‘Playing the man, not the ball’: targeting organised criminals, intelligence and the problems with pulling levers 8. ‘Arms for mobility’: policing partnerships and material exchanges in Nairobi, Kenya 9. Customer is king: promoting port policing, supporting hypercommercialism 10. Researching the policed: critical ethnography and the study of protest policing 11. A Southern policing perspective and appreciative inquiry: an ethnography of policing in Vietnam 12. Constructing tales of the field: uncovering the culture of fieldwork in police ethnography

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Author Information

Matthew Bacon is Senior Lecturer in Criminology at the University of Sheffield, UK. His research broadly focuses on policing and drug policy. He is the author of Taking Care of Business (2016), an ethnography of police detectives, drug law enforcement, and proactive investigation. Bethan Loftus is Reader in Criminology and Criminal Justice at Bangor University, UK. Her research interests lie in the areas of policing and security. Bethan is the author of Police Culture in a Changing World (2009) and articles in major Sociology and Criminology journals. Mike Rowe is Lecturer in Public Sector Management at the University of Liverpool, UK. He is the author of Disassembling Police Culture (2023).

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