Differences and similarities in the explanation of ethnic minority groups’ trust in the police
| Author | Maarten Van Craen,Wesley G. Skogan |
| DOI | 10.1177/1477370814535375 |
| Published date | 01 May 2015 |
| Date | 01 May 2015 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
research-article2014
Article
European Journal of Criminology
2015, Vol. 12(3) 300 –323
Differences and similarities
© The Author(s) 2014
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in the explanation of ethnic
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DOI: 10.1177/1477370814535375
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minority groups’ trust in the
police
Maarten Van Craen
KU Leuven, Belgium
Wesley G. Skogan
Northwestern University, USA
Abstract
Little is yet known about which factors influence the trust in the police of different ethnic
minorities in European countries. This article is a step towards filling in that gap. To assess
differences and similarities in the explanation of minority groups’ trust, we replicated a recent
study on Turkish and Moroccan minority group members’ trust in the Belgian police (Van Craen,
2013). The study on which we report here shifted the focus from traditional minority groups in
Belgium to a new immigrant group: Polish immigrants. We anticipated that our findings would
depart in two ways. We hypothesized that social capital and perceptions of discrimination would
not play an important role in the explanation of Polish immigrants’ trust in the Belgian police.
Regression analyses on data gathered in the city of Antwerp (N = 418) suggest that there is
no correlation between Polish immigrants’ social capital and their trust in law enforcement.
However, perceptions of discrimination are a key explanatory factor for this minority group too.
Implications for theorization and research are discussed.
Keywords
Discrimination, police, procedural justice, social capital, trust
Maarten Van Craen is a FWO-supported postdoctoral researcher.
Corresponding author:
Maarten Van Craen, Leuven Institute of Criminology (LINC), KU Leuven, Herbert Hooverplein 10, B-3000
Leuven, Belgium.
Email: maarten.vancraen@law.kuleuven.be
Van Craen and Skogan
301
Introduction
In recent years, major riots in London (2011) and Paris (2005) have revealed that the
relationship between ethnic minority groups and the police in big European cities is
characterized by severe tension (Mucchielli, 2009; Singh et al., 2012). European research
analysing minority group members’ attitudes towards the police is, however, limited. It
is remarkable that whereas the number of European studies on citizens’ trust in the police
is rapidly growing – especially in the UK – research scrutinizing the causes and conse-
quences of minority (dis)trust remains scarce (recently a few interesting articles and
book chapters have been published though: Jackson et al., 2013; Röder and Mühlau,
2012; Van Craen, 2013). This feature of European criminological and sociological
research sharply contrasts with the US research tradition in these fields. In the US,
research on ethnic minorities’ attitudes towards the police has a rich history. The police
violence to which the African Americans McDuffie (Miami, 1979) and King (Los
Angeles, 1991) were subjected, and the consequent rioting, were among the factors that
focused the minds of media and researchers on the attitudes of police and minorities
towards one another. These social events, and particularly the research on perceptions of
and attitudes towards the police they have sparked, strongly influenced US research on
trust in the police (Brown and Benedict, 2002; Decker, 1981). In developing this subfield
of criminology, many US scholars have paid special attention to minority trust (see,
among others, Lai and Zhao, 2010; MacDonald and Stokes, 2006; Skogan, 2006; Sun
and Wu, 2011; Sunshine and Tyler, 2003; Tyler, 2001, 2005).
These US studies indicate that the largest (and most studied) minority groups in the
US – African Americans and Hispanics – differ considerably from each other with regard
to victimization experiences, the extent to which they are affected by disorder, percep-
tions of police behaviour and attitudes towards the police. The title of one of Skogan’s
(2006) comprehensive studies of citizen–police relationships in Chicago speaks volumes
in this respect: Police and Community in Chicago: A Tale of Three Cities. In the US there
is not just a white–non-white divide; the two largest non-white groups have built up a
different relationship with the police as well. The extensive research carried out on this
issue has almost all indicated that African Americans have a less positive image of the
police, and trust in them, than have white Americans. It also shows that Hispanics tend
to take positions between those of African Americans and white Americans (Brown and
Benedict, 2002; Decker, 1981; Lai and Zhao, 2010; Schafer et al., 2003; Schuck et al.,
2008; Skogan, 2006; Tyler, 2005).
For most European countries there are barely any quantitative studies available on the
trust of minorities in the police. Consequently, we know very little about the trust levels
of different minority groups in European countries and the extent to which their trust is
determined by the same factors (however, for the UK, see Bradford and Jackson, 2010;
Jackson et al., 2013). To help fill in the latter gap, we replicated one of the scarce
European studies in this subfield. In that study, Van Craen (2013) assessed the relevance
of social capital theory, performance theory and procedural justice theory for explaining
the trust of Turkish and Moroccan minority group members in the Belgian police. He
concluded that social capital, perceptions of police performance and perceptions of dis-
crimination all play a part in accounting for minority group members’ trust in the police.
302
European Journal of Criminology 12(3)
However, the study focused on only one type of minority group members (visible ones
with an Islamic background), which raised the question of whether that conclusion also
holds for other types of minority group members in Belgium.
To answer this question, we replicated Van Craen’s study among a totally different
minority group: Polish immigrants. We anticipated that our findings would depart in two
ways. As the migration history of these minority group members is still very recent and
they migrated from a country where the quality of social capital is relatively poor, we
hypothesized that social capital would not play an important role in the explanation of
Polish immigrants’ trust in the Belgian police. Further, as they do not belong to a visible
minority group and their religious background is not Islamic (but Catholic, like that of
the majority group), we expected that, for this community, perceptions of discrimination
would not be an important explanatory factor either. Regression analyses on data gath-
ered in the city of Antwerp (N = 418) suggest that there is no correlation between Polish
immigrants’ social capital and their trust in law enforcement. However, perceptions of
discrimination are a key explanatory factor for this minority group too.
Theories about trust
Social capital theory, performance theory and procedural justice theory are theoretical
frameworks that provide elements to explain the levels of citizen trust in the police. They
were formulated in general terms, without making an explicit distinction between mem-
bers of a majority group and members of minority groups. In this section, we summarize
these theories briefly and indicate, on the basis of Van Craen’s (2013) results, their rele-
vance for explaining the trust of Turkish and Moroccan minority group members in the
Belgian police. In the next section, we discuss why their potential to help explain minor-
ity trust in law enforcement may differ from one type of minority group to another.
Social capital theory
A first theoretical basis from which to account for the level of citizens’ trust in the police
can be found in social capital theory. In Making Democracy Work, a study of the func-
tioning of governmental organizations in Italy, Putnam (1993) argued that networks of
civic engagement foster robust norms of reciprocity and – by facilitating communication
and reducing uncertainty – reinforce trust. In recent years, many other scholars have
conceptualized social capital, sometimes with other words or different emphases, but, as
Kääriäinen (2007: 412) has remarked, ‘the basic idea behind most definitions of social
capital [is] that well-functioning social networks and communities lay the foundation for
the emergence of norms of reciprocity and trust’.
Putnam (2000: 338–339) states that networks increase not only trust between citizens
but also the effectiveness of and trust in (democratic) authorities: ‘Voluntary associations
are places where social and civic skills are learned – “schools for democracy”. Members
learn how to run meetings, speak in public, write letters, organize projects, and debate
public issues with civility.’ Besides participation in associational life (formal social capi-
tal), he also points to the importance of informal social capital: ‘In a world of civic net-
works, both formal and informal, our views are formed through interchange with friends
Van Craen and Skogan
303
and neighbors’ (Putnam, 2000: 343). With regard to trust in the police, recent studies
have found empirical indications that neighbourhood social capital indeed shapes this
attitude (Sun and Wu, 2011; Sun et al., 2012).
Social capital, in Putnam’s view, increases trust in the authorities because it familiar-
izes citizens with the way in which institutions work and provides them with ways...
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