Variations in Patrol Officers’ Concerns About Racial Profiling Across Communal Contexts

Authors

Paul Reck, Ramapo College

Abstract

"Numerous studies have explored the issue of racial profiling, but only a few studies have examined how officers view racial profiling and whether such views affect officers’ patrolling of racial minorities. These latter studies generally have found that officers rationalize and dismiss the issue of profiling. However, studies pertaining to citizens’ perceptions of the police and studies identifying policing imperatives that officers associate with particular spaces suggest that there are characteristics of communities that may play an important role in shaping officers’ perceptions of profiling and patrolling of racial minorities. The current study, which is based on ethnographic ride-along interviews with and observations of 52 officers in three demographically different suburban communities in a northeastern state, examines how particular community contexts affect officers’ views of racial profiling, and whether the salience of racial profiling as an issue constrains officers’ patrolling of various racial minority groups. The author finds that officers’ perceptions of racial profiling and patrolling of racial minorities vary by race and space across and within towns. Community-based constituency pressures, residential and school-related spatial arrangements, and perceptions of what racial minorities are doing in particular spaces appear to play a significant role in shaping the saliency of profiling concerns, and in turn, officers’ patrolling of racial minorities."

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 International License.

Recommended Citation

Reck, Paul (2015) "Variations in Patrol Officers’ Concerns About Racial Profiling Across Communal Contexts," Qualitative Criminology (QC): Vol. 3: No. 2, Article 3.
Available at: https://dc.swosu.edu/qc/vol3/iss2/3