Chameleonizing: A microsociological study of covert physical surveillance
| Author | Johanne Yttri Dahl |
| DOI | 10.1177/1477370819896204 |
| Published date | 01 March 2022 |
| Date | 01 March 2022 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
https://doi.org/10.1177/1477370819896204
European Journal of Criminology
© The Author(s) 2020
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DOI: 10.1177/1477370819896204
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Chameleonizing: A
microsociological study of
covert physical surveillance
Johanne Yttri Dahl
Norwegian Police University College, Norway
Abstract
This study empirically explores covert physical surveillance conducted by the police and proposes
the concept of chameleonizing in covert physical surveillance. Like the chameleon, police officers
conducting covert physical surveillance must blend into and mirror their surroundings by adapting
their appearance, in terms of both looks and behaviour, to resemble the people in the vicinity
to prevent detection. Thus, police officers conducting covert physical surveillance must be able
to read their surroundings and have great knowledge about social interactions. Accordingly,
this exploration of an extraordinary phenomenon, covert physical surveillance, sheds light on
something very ordinary: that is, social interactions in everyday life. Furthermore, the concept
of the chameleon gaze is proposed and discussed, because physical surveillance depends on a
multifaceted gaze enabling observation from different angles.
Keywords
Chameleonizing, chameleon gaze, covert physical surveillance, covert policing, policing,
surveillance
The essence of covert physical surveillance is to gather information about people without
their knowledge, which may require watching, following and listening to people without
them being aware of the fact that they are under police surveillance. This implies that a
police officer conducting covert physical surveillance must avoid being seen, noticed or
remembered – in that order. The first is often unavoidable, but the last two may be
avoided more often. Furthermore, it is possible to be seen without being noticed only a
limited amount of times. Therefore, officers involved in covert policing or officers who
conduct covert physical surveillance need to conceal their presence (Mac Giollabhuí
et al., 2016) or at least not be noticed. Like Loftus and Goold (2012: 275), I study how
officers ‘attempt to blend into their surroundings and render their work invisible’, which
requires that police officers transform their looks, movements and behaviour to blend in.
Corresponding author:
Johanne Yttri Dahl, Research Department, Norwegian Police University College, Postboks 2109 Vika, Oslo,
0125, Norway.
Email: johanne.yttri.dahl@phs.no
896204EUC0010.1177/1477370819896204European Journal of CriminologyDahl
research-article2020
Article
2022, Vol. 19(2) 220–236
These officers must aim to reflect – rather than disturb – the background expectations of
both the public and the targets of surveillance (Loftus and Goold, 2012). Covert policing
is a relatively unexplored field in the social sciences (Mac Giollabhuí et al., 2016). In this
article, I attempt to add to the scarce body of literature on covert policing, especially
physical surveillance, by empirically exploring and proposing the concept of chamele-
onizing. A chameleon can change colour or pattern to blend in by developing similarities
with its surroundings to appear less visible.1 Like the chameleon, police officers must
blend into their settings and mirror them in order not to be noticed. Accordingly, to be
able to chameleonize, officers must have great knowledge of what is expected of people
in settings when it comes to both looks and behaviour. Consequently, this article explores
how covert police ‘manipulate’ everyday norms of looks and behaviour in order to mirror
and blend into their surroundings so that they can watch without being seen.
This article is not like Marx’s (2016) new book Windows into the Soul: Surveillance
and Society in an Age of High Technology on what surveillance does to us, but more on
how surveillance is conducted. Physical surveillance by the police may be conducted in
several ways. The focus in this article is on how the police conduct covert physical sur-
veillance, primarily in public spaces. Accordingly, covert physical surveillance and cha-
meleonizing may be studied as a microsociological phenomenon. This article explores
something extraordinary, police covert physical surveillance, but also sheds light on a
very ordinary occurrence: that is, social interactions in everyday life, such as our behav-
iour in public places (Goffman, 1963) and the presentation of ourselves in everyday life
(Goffman, 1971). Studying social interaction by focusing on the extraordinary may also
provide new insights about ourselves in other surrounding. It is valuable to study every-
day life because it makes us attend to the routine and temporal aspects of social life.
Additionally, it makes us attentive to the seemingly unimportant aspects (Back, 2015).
More crimes are met by ‘high policing’ (Brodeur, 2011), and there has been an
increase in intelligence-led and proactive approaches to crime control (Maguire, 2000;
Ratcliffe, 2016). These approaches systematically target particular people, locations and
behaviours, and draw upon a number of advanced sources of intelligence and surveil-
lance techniques. There has been an expansion in the use of ‘exceptional methods’ in
ordinary crime cases (Fyfe et al., 2018; Larsson, 2018; Loftus, 2019), which may be seen
as function creep (Dahl and Sætnan, 2009) or normalization of the exceptional (Flyghed,
2002; Larsson, 2018; Loftus, 2019). Whereas covert physical surveillance was previ-
ously primarily a police method reserved for serious crimes, especially in relation to
drugs, it is now used for less serious criminal offences (Larsson, 2018; Loftus, 2019;
Mac Giollabhuí et al., 2016; O’Neill and Loftus, 2013; Sharpe, 2002) such as volume
crime. Consequently, there is a need for increased knowledge about the phenomenon
(Loftus et al., 2016). Another trend in policing is an increased focus on volume crime
such as theft and burglary. Both these elements of policing appear in my study of police
investigations of crime committed by mobile organized crime groups.
In this article, the following research question is explored: how do covert police offic-
ers chameleonize to conduct covert physical surveillance without being detected?
Empirical data are drawn from interviews with and observations of a Norwegian police
force specializing in crime conducted by mobile organized crime groups, who primarily
commit volume crime, such as theft from residences. The article is organized as follows:
221
Dahl
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