Arrest Rate as a Measure of Police Men and Women's Productivity and Competence
| Author | Jennifer Brown,Mike Neville |
| Published date | 01 October 1996 |
| Date | 01 October 1996 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/0032258X9606900404 |
| Subject Matter | Article |
JENNIFER BROWN, Ph.D
Principal Lecturer, Institute
of
Police and Criminology Studies,
University
of
Portsmouth
MIKE NEVILLE
Metropolitan Police Service
ARREST RATE AS A MEASURE OF
POLICE MEN AND WOMEN'S
PRODUCTIVITY AND
COMPETENCE
Introduction
This article seeks to examine the tension between the newly emerging
performance culture within the police, largely developed as a response
to external demands, and attempts to transform the traditional
occupational culture driven more from internal demands and particularly
manifest by quality of service policies. That tension is especially visible
in the measurement of performance, most notably those indicators
related to crime clear ups. The role of women officers and the part
they play, or rather allowed to play, in policing provides a point of
intersection between the demands for external service delivery and
internal quality of management. The former uses notions of competition
to push up standards of performance and emphasizes efficiency, whilst
the latter is trying to foster cooperation and emphasizes equity. By
promoting equality of opportunity within the police, it is argued that, by
extension, external service standards will become more effective. The
"cult of masculinity", documented to pervade the police by Smith and
Gray (1985), may facilitate the competitive drive for efficiency but is
contrary to a philosophy that seeks to change the traditional
occupational culture of the police through the creation of a more caring
and reflective organization. Comparing arrest rates and disposal of
suspects by men and women officers provides a focus to examine some
of these issues.
A New Performance Culture
The police force has been characterized as a "macho" organization in
which the domination of danger, authority and results make police work
an intrinsically unsuitable job for women (Heidensohn, 1994, p.18).
Fielding (1994, p.56) charts the ascribed "pecking" order of the value
of police work by the rank and file. Constables seek to accumulate a
good record of activity, usually arrests, with which to stake their claim
for organizational status: a good crime arrest (eg, of a residential
burglar) is held to be better than, say, arrest of a shoplifter. Fielding
goes on to argue that whilst women certainly perform uniformed patrol
duties, the time spent doing this may be impeded by demands on them
October 1996 The Police Journal 299
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