Policing Pandemics

This book explores the role of police in public health emergencies such as pandemics. Modern policing has become increasingly complex with police officers required to respond to a wide variety of emergencies and other potentially dangerous situations, where well-designed and executed police responses can mitigate fatalities and economic damage. It provides an overview for non-specialists of the nature and characteristics of different pandemics like COVID-19 as well as diseases with pandemic potential, biological weapons and agroterrorism. It discusses the police responses to them and the challenges presented by them. It covers topics including: different police responses to naturally occurring and deliberate events, the police role in the governance of biological research, the role of leaders and leadership in responding to pandemics, impacts on first responder wellness and workforce capability, and police capacity and capability from a global perspective. It offers advice on effective engagement between law enforcement and other professionals and agencies, with case studies designed to highlight best practices in pandemic preparedness and the various challenges identified. It speaks to a wide market of academics, health organisations, governments and NGOs.

The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the inadequacies of the state’s response to public health and public order issues through deeply flawed legislation. Written in the context of the #Blacklivesmatter protests, this book explores why law enforcement responses to a public health emergency are prioritised over welfare provision and what this tells us about the state’s criminal justice institutions. Informing scholarly, civic and activist thinking on the political nature of policing, it reveals how increasing police powers disproportionately affects Black people and suggests alternative ways of designing public safety beyond a law enforcement context.

Written in the context of the #BlackLivesMatter protests, this book explores why law enforcement responses to a public health emergency are prioritised over welfare provision and what this tells us about the state’s criminal justice institutions.

This book critically explores how police power manifested beyond criminal law into the field of public health during the pandemic. Whilst people were engaged with anti-police violence protests, particularly in the US, they were being policed openly and notoriously by the government and medical science in the public health arena. The book explores how public health policing might be an abuse of constitutional power and encourages the abolition question to be applied consistently to the state’s discourse in the area of public health, as black people the world over continue to bear a disproportionate cost burden for public health policies. The chapters explore contemporary policing in terms of the historical context of slavery, the growth of the police and prison abolition movement and how this should be applied more widely, and how police power operates throughout society beyond the criminal justice system, in finance, technology, housing, education, and in medicine and health science. It seeks to re-examine our relationship to health sovereignty and the police power more fundamentally. It provides insights into the convergence of policing and social control of humans and argues that the most normative response is abolition.

Policing the Pandemic explores how police agencies in United Kingdom and the United States have adjusted to their changing environments, both during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic and later, when the restrictions have been relaxed and the societies have begun to develop their new normal. Combining interviews and surveys of police officers and police administrators from the United Kingdom and the United States, this book provides a systematic and empirically based account of these changes and elaborates on the lessons for the future. The book offers insight into organizational and operational changes brought on by the pandemic, including the changes in their workload, enforcement activities, and administrative changes. It examines police perceptions of, and compliance with, pandemic-related changes, any potential COVID-19-related training, and the frequency with which they used various responses when observing violations of COVID-19 regulations and laws. It also focuses on police officers’ own fear of contracting COVID-19, whether they had been diagnosed with COVID-19, and how the pandemic affected their own health, stress, and general well-being. This book is an essential reading for scholars, policymakers, and police administrators tackling issues such as procedural justice, organizational change, and police officer well-being, as well as those more widely engaged with societal and legal consequences of the pandemic, be it the COVID-19 pandemic or any future pandemics.

Providing a global perspective on police adaptations to the COVID-19 pandemic, this book explores the extent of police organizational and operational changes in a number of countries as diverse as Brazil, China, South Africa, South Korea, the Philippines, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Bringing together a range of international experts, this book reflects on the changes in the broader social environment during the pandemic, examining the contours of police operational and organizational changes across several countries, analyzes the police enforcement of the government COVID-19 rules and regulations, explores the factors related to the COVID-19 effects on police officer wellness and safety, and studies police administrator, police officer, and citizen views about the potential consequences of organizational and operational changes on the interpersonal relations within police agencies and police–community partnerships. Policing During the COVID-19 Pandemic is essential reading for scholars and practitioners interested in exploring the police organizational adaptations, particularly in the times of emergencies, and the societal, cultural, and legal impacts of such adaptations. Sanja Kutnjak Ivković is Professor at the School of Criminal Justice, Michigan State University, USA. She is the Co-Editor of Policing: An International Journal. She is past Chair of the Division of International Criminology, American Society of Criminology, and past Chair of the International Division, Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences. Her co-authored and co-edited books on policing include: Exploring Contemporary Police Challenges, Police Code of Silence in the Times of Change, Police Integrity in South Africa, Exploring Police Integrity, Police Integrity across the World, Enhancing Police Integrity, Fallen Blue Knights, and The Contours of Police Integrity. Marijana Kotlaja is Assistant Professor in the Department of Criminal Justice and Criminology at the University of Missouri-Kansas City, USA. She is involved in evaluation research projects with many organizations, specifically focused on crime and place, and juvenile delinquency. She has led multiple international data collection efforts and has extensive knowledge of advanced quantitative methodology, including structural equation modeling, Bayesian analysis, and hierarchical linear models. She is the Secretary/Treasurer of the Division of International Criminology (American Society of Criminology), as well as the Editor of Around the Globe for the Criminologist. Jon Maskály is Assistant Professor in the Department of Criminal Justice at the University of North Dakota, USA. He won (with co-authors) the 2016 William L. Simon Outstanding Paper award from the Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences. His primary research interests revolve around issues in policing, notably police–community relations, police integrity, and police accountability. He has worked as a subject matter expert in several police reform projects around the nation. He has secured multiple contracts with police organizations to enhance their ability to make data-driven decisions. Peter Neyroud is Associate Professor in Evidence-Based Policing in the Jerry Lee Centre for Experimental Criminology, University of Cambridge, UK. He is the General Editor of the Oxford Journal Policing: A Journal of Policy and Practice. He set up and ran the UK National Policing Improvement Agency. He was commissioned by the UK Home Secretary to carry out a fundamental “Review of Police Leadership and Training,” which led to the establishment of the National “College of Policing.” He is the Co-Chair of the Campbell Collaboration Crime and Justice Coordinating Group.