1. Chapter Four Police Organizations
Police in America
Chapter Four
Police Organizations
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McGraw-Hill

2. Quasi-Military Style of Police Organizations
Officers wear uniforms
Military-style rank designations
Hierarchical command structure
Authoritarian organizational style
Legal authority to use deadly force and carry weapons
Criticisms
Cultivates an “us versus them” attitude
Encourages the idea of a “war on crime”
Authoritarian style contrary to democratic principles and produces low morale
Rigid structure leaves room for job dissatisfaction

3. Police Departments as Organizations
Dominant style is as a complex bureaucracy
Characterized by
Complex organizations
Tasks assigned to “bureaus”
Hierarchy and clear division of labor
Responsibility for specific tasks delegated to lower-ranking employees
Clear chain of command
Clear unity of command
Written rules and regulations
Flow of information according to chain of command
Clear career paths

4. Pros and Cons of Bureaucracy in Policing
The Problems
Rigid, inflexible, and unable to adapt to external changes
Communication within the organization often breaks down
Tend to be inward looking, self-serving, and isolated from the people they serve
Are accused of not using the talents of their employees and even stifling creativity
Criticisms:
Cultivates an “us versus them” attitude
Encourages the idea of a “war on crime”
Authoritarian style contrary to democratic principles and produces low morale
Rigid structure leaves room for job dissatisfaction
The Positives
Informal Aspects
Horizontal and vertical cliques

5. Bureaucracy and Police Professionalism
Professionalism challenged by the bureaucratic nature of policing
Professional departments adopted a “by the book” approach to policing
The bureaucracy imposes formal controls over the behavior of police officers

6. Changing Police Organizations
Community Policing
Decentralizes decision making (territorial and administrative)
Task Forces
Officers from different ranks based on talents

7. Community Policing
Community policing attempts to modify the police organization through de-bureaucratization.
decentralize
deformalize
despecialize
delayerize

8. COMPSTAT: Computer Comparison Statistics
Clarifies the department’s mission, goals, and values
Holds managers accountable
Organizational power and authority transferred to commanders who are responsible for geographic areas
Resources are transferred to commanders.
Data used to identify problems and to evaluate success and failure.
Middle managers expected to use innovative problem-solving tactics

9. Civil Service
Formal and legally binding procedures governing personnel decisions
Nearly universal
Purpose: to ensure personnel make decisions objectively
Reinforces the hierarchy of police depts.
n Rewards hierarchy n Status hierarchy
n Seniority hierarchy n Rank hierarchy

10. Police Unions Majority of police officers represented by unions
Three major police unions:
Fraternal Order of Police
International Union of Police Associations
Teamsters Law Enforcement League

11. Police Unions Continued
Collective Bargaining
“The method of determining conditions of employment through bilateral negotiations”
Grievance Procedures
Provides due process to employees
Unions and Shared Governance
Impasse Settlement and Strikes
Impact of Police Unions
Improvements in salaries and benefits

12. Police Organizations and Their Environment
Contingency Theory
Organizations are structured to achieve specific goals (crime control)
Institutional Theory
Organizations operate in relation to their external social and political environment
Resource Dependency Theory
Organizations must obtain resources to survive