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The book demonstrates the unique contribution police ethnographies make to our understanding of policing cultures and practices globally. The book is a resource for scholars and researchers of policing, criminology, sociology, law, and research methods.
List 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
About the author
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).
