Community policing is a way of life meant to support the strategies of a society by mainly holding up on partnership with the civilians and by providing systematic procedures or techniques of solving diverse problems (Irvin and Stansbury, p.12).
The policing programs address the immediate circumstances that cause disorder in the society such as crime and apprehension among people due to misdemeanours.
During the policing procedures, the police provide patrols as an extra eye and ear to hit upon possible crimes immediately. Police car-patrol theory is a conservatory measure, linked to the fact that most officers keep watch over the crime prone areas from the patrol car windows.
They drive around and perform the spotlight timing of the criminal activities by the sidewalks. Most of the street-related crime concerns issues regarding quality of life. Like the emergency calls, such patrols are many but elicit very low actions, due to scarcity of information (Irvin and Stansbury, p.12).
Through community policing, the police ought to know the three Rs policy and encourage routine and non-confrontational relations with the public. The first R is for random patrol where the non-fixed styles and patterns of patrolling generate an illusion of offices’ omnipresence.
The second R is for rapid response to crime, thus higher apprehension of criminals. It may not be a preventive mechanism, but the strategy causes deterrence from future possibilities of similar attacks. Lastly is the reactive investigation R, which assist to enhance quick solutions to crime cases, thus leading to deterrence from future cases (Irvin and Stansbury, p.12).
Community policing is negatively affecting the family lifestyle of the offices, while assisting to meet the societal needs. Emotional dissonance is an internal form of stress caused by existing real-life threats and possible dangers involved in the nature of police or correctional officers jobs.
Their professions demand unique strategies and skills in handling precarious situations such as confronting armed persons. Officers have to deal with cases of interpersonal hostility and physical confrontations from the emotionally charged persons (King and Stivers, p.3).
Stress associated with such tasks and what an officer has to deal with in the daily tasks has huge impact on mental status, and may ends up affecting social or personal lifestyles. In line with King and Stivers (p.3), critical situation that occur in our lives are rigid to eliminate from the mind, since the occurrences keep resonating within.
Moral authority requires implementation of goals or concepts that adhere to the conventionally acceptable standards of community policing, in the aim of reducing crime. This is an appropriate problem-solving mechanism, since the officers’ governance style preserves the social characteristics, as opposed to the physical coercion where they use excessive forces.
Moral influence by police officers allows good neighbourliness and interaction for efficiency of services. The patrol officers are closer to the community; therefore, meet the community policing endeavours. They ought to provide optimal positive form of contact with members of the society. The patrol cars are a single entity for enhancing policing (Brody et al, p.247).
Moral obligations therefore require implementation of mini-stations in the estates and planning of regular community conventions. This is in the aim of forming social form of coercion, to allow populace to air concerns, report suspicious cases and find solutions to criminal activities by collaborating with the police.
Unlike the past when the police had to use excessive physical force to ensure order. In the contemporary social setting, police often volunteer to patrol in the aim of finding mischief first-hand and make immediate arrests. They have mechanisms that assist to implement procedures of involving citizens, who inform them on what they need to know, to help them catch up with crime perpetrators within the society.
Modernization also helps in formation of partnership with residents to enhance patrolling and reporting of feasible mischief. Without social reforms, coercion is a cost effective and extra surveillance aspect, that common patrol unit would not be in a position to provide.
The structure of the police department has great influence over the formation and identity of their performance role and procedures. Owing to the fact that the power accorded to these offices creates high chances for potential physical abuse, the law considers various internal and external controls.
Federal states have well-structured constitutional laws, common policies and statutes to control behaviours of police offices. According to Lukensmeyer and Boyd (p.1), various legal settings can implicate police actions to criminal violations. The legal structure therefore has control over policing identity and implementation.
On the other hand, the structure gets support from the culture. Foreign experiences and policing backgrounds have a major significance in leadership and policymaking arenas. The fields of education and foreign exposure are part of crime management experiences.
Cultural traits are never inborn or mastered but achieved through experiences. Rarely do we find a successful administrator who has no experience in diverse fields. The most important thing to govern policing is involve personal traits and organizational culture (Brody et al, p.247).
Politically, the citizens’ actions ought to influence community policy and decision making procedures. The citizens are involved in the exercises of fighting crime related incidents, and they demand for a close observation over administrative operations through the public correlation procedures.
Contemporary organizational cultures and structures provide citizens with ability to seek proper administration and security through their own administrative participation (Brody et al, p.247).
Citizens can participate in policing issues actively through formation of consensus over monitoring particular administrative issues and requests passively through questioning and providing information to reduce criminal activities. The cost and benefits are determinants of participation in policing. Citizens’ participation activities become low and relatively limited, when there is lack of a culture to protect identity of those who assist in crime prevention.
Subject matters, procedures, opportunity as well as operational costs forms part of the policing structure while the cultural identity remains informal.
The police identity depends on both the structure and culture. They both benefit the society because they are measure of police identity as well as participation. Argumentatively, community participation benefits are higher, compared to costs (Seasons, p.434).
The general form of law enforcement code has a connection to equal protection of human rights regardless of race, age, gender, or social class differences. The policing procedure ensures that officers follow the law without violation. They must also uphold moral standards by ensuring that they do not use the accorded power for personal or social immorality.
However, various police subcultures drive the offices from practicing the professional moral code and legal policies, to personal form of rules.
According to Seasons, (p.434), the subcultures are for protection of loyalty towards fellow offices over the societal needs. It emerges because the offices are able to hide identity within their physical appearances. They also have a common lifestyle with similarity in the forms of dangers faced, the work-related setbacks or unsatisfactory rewards.
There is therefore a great difference between the civilian and police officers and they tend to fight the forces against their tasks. This forms a huge divide between them and bureaucratic leaders, politicians, or the public who uses the general law to forces police actions (Seasons, p.434).
Ecology encourages the close interaction between humans and the physical environments. Traditionally, the spirit of collectiveness was highly supported by the physical appearances unlike the current modernized states/cites where people settle in individuality. There is no community based or common purpose due to lack of interaction as opposed to the traditional ecology that was an elevated support of close human interaction. Good plans in the estates also promote spatial relationship.
Ecology analysis indicates that our environments such as the housing units have permeable fencing that normally does not translate to poor privacy and security. The solid fencing common in various estates and home today is a hindrance to community policing.
People are not able to interact, understand their societal needs and present their cases to the police offices. Today we lack good foster of the community-based programs due to poor planning. People do not consider the environmental-related designs.
Works Cited
Brody, Samuel, Godschalk, David, & Burby, Raymond. Mandating citizen participation in plan Making six strategic planning choices. Journal of the Journal of the International City/County Management Association. ICMA Code of Ethics with Guidelines. July 2004. Web.
Irvin, Renee, & Stansbury, John. Citizen participation in policing: is it worth the Effort? Public Administration Review, 64, 55-65. 2004.
King, Cheryl, & Stivers, Camilla. Government Is Us: Public Administration in an Anti-Government Era. California, CA: Sage Publications. 1998.
Lukensmeyer, Carolyn, and Boyd, Ashley. Putting the “public” back in management: seven Principles for planning meaningful citizen engagement. Public Management, 86, 10-15. 2004.
Seasons, Mark. Monitoring and evaluation in municipal planning: considering the Realities. Journal of the American Planning Association, 69. P 430-441, 24 November 2009. Web.