MAY CONTAIN MARKUP

Sonny Shiu-Hing Lo

"The Politics of Policing in Greater China" delves into the intricate relationship between law enforcement and state power in the diverse regions of China. Through a comprehensive analysis, this book explores the historical development, organizational structures, and contemporary challenges facing police forces in Mainland China, Hong Kong, Macau, and Taiwan.

Examining the cultural, political, and legal dynamics shaping policing practices in Greater China, the authors navigate through the complexities of maintaining social stability, enforcing laws, and addressing issues of corruption and human rights. From the traditional models of policing rooted in Confucian principles to the modern adaptations in response to globalization and technological advancements, this book offers a nuanced understanding of the evolving landscape of law enforcement in the region.

"The Politics of Policing in Greater China" presents a thought-provoking narrative that uncovers the intersection between state authority, social control, and the protection of individual rights within the unique contexts of Greater China. A must-read for scholars, policymakers, and anyone interested in the intricacies of policing in a rapidly evolving society.

Palgrave Macmillan. 2016. 329p.

By Chandra Childers

Summary: Southern politicians claim that “business-friendly” policies lead to an abundance of jobs and economic prosperity for all Southerners. The data actually show a grim economic reality.

Key findings

The share of prime-age workers (ages 25–54) who have a job is lower than the national average in most Southern states.

• Median earnings in nine Southern states are among the lowest in the nation, even after adjusting for lower cost of living in the South.

• Poverty rates in most Southern states are above the national average. In Louisiana and Mississippi, nearly 1 in 5 residents live in poverty.

• The child poverty rate in the South is 20.9%—higher than in any other region.

These statistics reflect an anti-worker economic model whose signature policies are low wages, low taxes, few regulations on businesses, few labor protections, a weak safety net, and vicious opposition to unions.

Why this matters

A long history of anti-worker policies in the South—rooted in a racist agenda—has had devastating consequences for its residents. Business interests and the wealthy have stoked racial divisions to maintain power and ensure access to cheap labor—at the expense of working people.

How to fix it

We must begin to reverse 150 years of anti-worker policymaking in the South—starting with raising minimum wages and protecting workers’ right to organize. We also need to enforce appropriate regulations on business practices, reform a broken tax structure, and strengthen the safety net for Southerners.

The Impacts of Implicit Bias Awareness Training in the NYPD

By Robert E. Worden, Sarah J. McLean, Robin S. Engel, Hannah Cochran, Nicholas Corsaro, Danielle Reynolds ,Cynthia J. Najdowski, Gabrielle T. Isaza

In February of 2018, the New York City Police Department (NYPD) began inservice training on implicit bias for its 36,000 sworn personnel, using the Fair and Impartial Policing (FIP) curriculum. A team of researchers from the John Finn Institute for Public Safety and the IACP/UC Center for Police Research and Policy partnered with the NYPD to conduct evaluation research on the impacts of the training. The evaluation concentrated on the effects of the training among patrol officers assigned to commands in the Patrol Services Bureau, Transit Bureau, and Housing Bureau, whose training commenced in May, 2018 and concluded in April, 2019. We assessed the immediate effects of the training on officers’ beliefs and attitudes: their knowledge about the science of implicit bias and the potential implications for policing, and their attitudes about the salience of bias and discrimination as a social problem, and the importance of policing without prejudice. A survey was administered on the day of FIP training, either prior to or following the training on alternating days. We drew inferences about immediate training effects from the differences in pre- and post-training survey responses. The effect of the training on officers’ knowledge about implicit bias was of moderate magnitude, though many officers’ comprehension of the science of bias was limited. The effects of the training on officers’ attitudes toward discrimination, and their motivation to act without prejudice, were fairly small, though prior to the training, most officers considered discrimination a social problem and felt individually motivated to act without bias. Officers regarded the training as beneficial: 70 percent reportedly gained a better understanding of implicit bias and more than two-thirds reportedly learned new strategies and skills that they expected to apply to their work. Nearly half rated the likelihood of using all five biasmanagement strategies as either a 6 or 7 on a 7-point scale anchored at 7 as ‘very likely.’ We conducted a follow-up survey about officers’ beliefs and attitudes and their actual utilization of FIP strategies, which was administered from June through August of 2019, ranging from 2 to 13 months following the training. Asked whether they attempted “to apply the FIP training in your duties over the last month,” 42 percent said they had not, 31 percent said they attempted to use the bias-management strategies sometimes, and 27 percent said they attempted using them frequently. Comparing the follow-up survey responses to those on the days of training, we also detected some decay in the immediate effects of the training on officers’ comprehension of the science of implicit bias. The impact of police training is likely to be greater when it is supported by other organizational forces, of which immediate supervisors may be the most important. We surveyed sergeants post-training. We found that most sergeants view monitoring for bias as one of their responsibilities, and that they are willing to intervene as needed with individual officers. One-quarter reported that they had intervened with an officer whose performance warranted intervention. Slightly more than half of the sergeants reportedly address issues of implicit bias during roll calls, thereby reinforcing the training. Insofar as officers’ unconscious biases may influence their enforcement decisions, and to the extent that officers apply their training in FIP strategies to manage their unconscious biases, we hypothesized that the training would lead to reductions in racial/ethnic disparities in enforcement actions, including stops, frisks, searches, arrests, summonses, and uses of force. We examined enforcement disparities at multiple levels of analysis – at the aggregate level of commands and the level of individual enforcement events. To isolate the effect of the training from other factors, the NYPD adhered to a protocol for a randomized controlled trial that provided for grouping commands into clusters scheduled for training by random assignment. This experimental control was supplemented by statistical controls in the analytical models. Overall, we found insufficient evidence to conclude that racial and ethnic disparities in police enforcement actions were reduced as a result of the training. It is very difficult to isolate the effects of the training from other forces that produce disparate enforcement outcomes. Training impacts might be a signal that is easily lost in the noise of everyday police work. Estimating the effect of a single training curriculum on officers’ decisions to invoke the law or otherwise exercise police authority may well be akin to finding the proverbial needle in a haystack. Furthermore, it has been presumed but not demonstrated that enforcement disparities stem, at least in part, from officers’ implicit biases. Though research has shown that police officers, like the general public, hold unconscious biases, no scientific evidence directly links officers’ implicit bias with enforcement disparities. To the contrary, the evidence – which is thin, to be sure – suggests that officers practice controlled responses even without implicit bias training. If disparities stem from forces other than implicit bias, then even a welldesigned training that is flawlessly delivered cannot be expected to alter patterns of police enforcement behavior.

Albany, NY: John F. Finn Institute for Public Safety, Inc , 2020. 188p.

By Guillermo Vázquez del Mercado, Luis Félix and Gerardo Carballo

Extortion is one of the main crimes that negatively affect citizen security in the Northern Triangle of Central America (Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador) and, to a lesser extent, Costa Rica and Panama. Given the widespread presence of this crime in the region, the availability, relevance and reliability of data on extortion are essential to understand its magnitude, as well as to develop evidence-based public policies to contain it and build community resilience. However, unlike for other crimes such as homicides, public institutions in the countries of the region have not yet developed a specific methodology to collect, produce and disseminate up-to-date, reliable, relevant and high-quality data on extortion. This shortcoming hampers the analysis and research needed to measure the real magnitude of this crime and to generate evidence-based public policies. Furthermore, the dynamics of cooperation and territorial disputes between organized crime groups and the lack of knowledge about the variables involved in establishing an extortion rate are additional factors that merit further investigation, as they make it difficult for public institutions to measure extortion.1 This report analyzes the availability of public data on extortion and the transparency mechanisms for accessing it. To do so, the authors reviewed the availability and accessibility of data on extortion from official sources in the countries concerned, particularly the websites of national police forces and prosecutors' offices.

Geneva: Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime, 2021.

By Stanford Law School and Policy Lab and Brennan Center for Justice

Even before racist political rhetoric around the coronavirus triggered a wave of hate crimes against Asian Americans, white supremacist incidents around the country had fueled a vigorous public debate about the proper responses to hate violence.In March 2020, Stanford Law School and the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU Law School hosted a convening of experts in the fields of criminal law, civil rights, community advocacy, and restorative justice to assess the current hate crime enforcement model and explore alternative approaches that could more effectively redress the harm resulting from hate crimes.

Palo Alto, CA: Stanford Law School; New York: Brennan Center for Justice. 2021. 52p.

By David Taylor

Professor David Taylor has established a fine reputation for his books and articles on the history of policing in England. This new book on Huddersfield policing looks at the mid-nineteenth century and issues facing the local area in relation to policing a centre of West Riding textile production.

Huddersfield, UK: University of Huddersfield Press, 2016. 301p.

By David G. Schwartz

The story of the Wire Act and how Robert Kennedy’s crusade against the Mob is creating a new generation of Internet gaming outlaws. Gambling has been part of American life since long before the existence of the nation, but Americans have always been ambivalent about it, what David Schwartz calls the "pell-mell history of legal gaming in the United States" is a testament to our paradoxical desire both to gamble and to control gambling. It is in this context that Schwartz examines the history of the Wire Act, passed in 1961 as part of Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy’s crusade against organized crime and given new life in recent efforts to control Internet gambling. Cutting the Wire presents the story of how this law first developed, how it helped fight a war against organized crime, and how it is being used today. The Wire Act achieved new significance with the development of the Internet in the early 1990s and the growing popularity of online wagering through offshore facilities. The United States government has invoked the Wire Act in a vain effort to control gambling within its borders, at a time when online sports betting is soaring in popularity. By placing the Wire Act into the larger context of Americans’ continuing ambivalence about gambling, Schwartz has produced a provocative, deeply informed analysis of a national habit and the vexing predicaments that derive from it. In America today, 48 of 50 states currently permit some kind of legal gambling. Schwartz’s historical unraveling of the Wire Act exposes the illogic of an outdated law intended to stifle organized crime being used to set national policy on Internet gaming. Cutting the Wire carefully dissects two centuries of American attempts to balance public interest with the technology of gambling.

Reno, NV: University of Nevada Press, 2005. 296p.

By James Banks

Offering the first empirically driven assessment of the development, marketisation, regulation and use of online gambling organisations and their products, this book explores the relationship between online gambling and crime. It draws upon quantitative and qualitative data, including textual and visual analyses of e-gambling advertising and the records of player-protection and standards organisations, together with a virtual ethnography of online gambling subcultures, to examine the ways in which gambling and crime have been approached in practice by gamers, regulatory agencies and online gambling organisations. Building upon contemporary criminological theory, it develops an understanding of online gambling as an arena in which risks and rewards are carefully constructed and through which players navigate, employing their own agency to engage with the very real possibility of victimisation. With attention to the manner in which online gambling can be a source of criminal activity, not only on the part of players, but also criminal entrepreneurs and legitimate gambling businesses, Online Gambling and Crime discusses developments in criminal law and regulatory frameworks, evaluating past and present policy on online gambling. A rich examination of the prevalence, incidence and experience of a range of criminal activities linked to gambling on the Internet, this book will appeal to scholars and policy makers in the fields of sociology and criminology, law, the study of culture and subculture, risk, health studies and social policy.

Farnham, UK: Ashgate Publishing, 2014. 182p

Edited by Wa Baile, Mohamed; Dankwa, Serena O.; Naguib, Tarek; Purtschert, Patricia; Schilliger, Sarah

Racist police checks are part of everyday life in Europe. They make it dramatically visible who is not considered a fellow citizen. While much of the dominance society finds this racist practice normal, more and more people are no longer prepared to accept it without resistance. The volume brings together scientific, artistic and activist contributions to the social backgrounds and modes of action of racial profiling and the possibilities of intersectional anti-racist resistance. The focus is on Switzerland, supplemented by perspectives from authors who are familiar with the German context.

Bielefeld: transcript Verlag, 2019. 337p.

By N.E. Haas.

Why can vigilantes count on public support? Why do citizens in certain cases oppose the formal prosecution and punishment of vigilantes? Are such reactions an indication of lacking confidence in the criminal justice system? Or do situational aspects perhaps also play a role? The goal of this dissertation is to explain public support for vigilantism. In two studies, respondents were presented with a fictional case about vigilantism and answered related questions. The findings of both studies show that support for vigilantism cannot be interpreted automatically as a sign that confidence in the criminal justice system is lacking: situational characteristics have an independent influence on support. The results also reveal that support for vigilantism is a complex concept. People are not simply for or against vigilantism; responses to vigilantism are more nuanced. People can for instance feel little empathy for the victim of vigilantism, but at the same time express a desire for punishment of the vigilante. Additionally, a higher level of confidence in the courts and criminal justice system led to less support for vigilantism, while confidence in police did not play a role. Lastly, general support for vigilantism was an important predictor of support for a specific case.

Leiden: Netherlands Institute for the Study of Crime and Law Enforcement (NSCR), 2010. 197p.

By Charlie de Rivaz, Cathy Haenlein, Alexandria Reid and Veerle Nouwens.

Illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing poses not only a systemic threat to the environment, but also a sustained threat to national and regional security. Valued at an estimated $10–23.5 billion per year, much IUU fishing takes place on a systematic and industrial scale for profit, with these large-scale operations increasingly recognised as a form of transnational organised crime. In recognition of the scale and sophistication of this threat, a growing number of policy recommendations have been made to help shape national and international responses. Yet progress in developing effective and practical measures has in many cases been limited. The result has been a collective failure, at a systemic level, to provide an adequate global response. This lack of progress has rarely been the subject of detailed cross-regional analysis. Indeed, while many affected jurisdictions have enacted key measures to address IUU fishing, little work has been done to assess the extent to which these measures have effectively mitigated the role that transnational organised crime plays in the IUU fishing industry. This report seeks to contribute to a more nuanced understanding of this area, considering obstacles to, and opportunities for, more effective action. It does so by examining experiences in five countries: Indonesia; Thailand; Vietnam; Tanzania; and South Africa. In each case, the report examines the approaches taken by those states and the successes and failures of their policies – aiming, in the process, to contribute to a more comprehensive understanding of the obstacles to – and opportunities for – more effective action. On the basis of a comprehensive literature review, 106 semi-structured interviews and four focus groups across the case study countries, this report outlines the key features of the multidimensional threat posed by organised, large-scale IUU fishing across the focus countries. It points, in particular, to high levels of convergence between this and other crimes, adding further complexity to the nature of the challenge posed by IUU fishing. In responding to this threat, the report considers the range of challenges encountered in bolstering legislative, regulatory and institutional frameworks, strengthening detection and interdiction capabilities, and enhancing investigation and prosecution. These range from an insufficient prioritisation of the upskilling of the human resources needed to operate new technologies sustainably, to uneven application of new legislation and regulations, to challenges ensuring that officers possess the breadth of skills required to identify the broader crimes with which IUU fishing intersects, among many others. In considering experiences in these areas, the report also identifies a number of opportunities to address these challenges, highlighting successes and best practice where these have emerged. To ensure progress in tackling the multidimensional threat posed, it is crucial that this real-world experience is regularly accounted for, with lessons learned translated into updated policy and practice. Based on the analysis, the following recommendations are offered to support this process. These do not seek to reiterate global recommendations made elsewhere, which affected countries worldwide have already sought to apply. Rather, they offer specific guidance on tailoring existing approaches, based on the lessons derived from the study of these five countries.

London: Royal United Services Institute (RUSI), 2019. 73p.

By Peter Squires.

The study of social policy, or social administration, is usually associated with the study of statutory, welfare-oriented, distributive mechanisms. Indeed, it is precisely these distributive and welfare-related characteristics that qualifies certain kinds of policy as 'social'. Yet, there is no real justification, save historical accident and tradition for continuing to accept this particular conception of social policy. A different kind of examination of the historical record - such as the analyses contained within this thesis - reveals a quite different legacy to the British social policy tradition. Thus, the work contained within this thesis consists of an attempt to take another look at the historical development and modern evolution of state social policy. The effort is made to show that there is an older and more entrenched social policy tradition in Britain; one as much concerned with discipline as with welfare,. more to do with division than with integration and more repressive than, liberating. It is important to acknowledge that the penal code is as old as the Poor Laws, that the mercantilist science of police preceded the science of political economy; and, later in the age of capitalism and industrialization, the Metropolitan Police Act predated the extension of the franchise and the reform of the Poor Laws. In short, a central preoccupation of the thesis is the attempt to elaborate Gareth Stedman-Jones' remark that, in the history of social administration, welfare and discipline, or care and control, were but two sides of the same coin. In order to develop this argument, theoretical perspectives deriving from the work of Marx and Foucault have been employed. The works of Marx have been used to help in the analysis of the state, class struggle and the changing modes of political domination, whilst Foucault's work - especially his emphasis upon the analysis of discipline - has been employed to help elaborate the ways in which objectives, techniques and practices are brought together in forms of socio-political 'intervention' - political strategies or social policies. Furthermore Foucault's work in the analysis of socio-political discourse was of major importance insofar as it offered a technique for isolating and examining the formation of knowledges, practices and policies in social interventions.

Bristol, UK: University of Bristol 1984. 2 vols.