A social constructionist account of police culture and its influence on the representation and progression of female officers

Abstract

The police organisation receives much media attention regarding its record on Equal Opportunities. Research suggests that the organisational culture in police organisations plays a major role in impeding the progress of women. Using repertory grid technique, the culture of a police force, conceptualised at the level of performance value judgements or recipe knowledge was investigated. It is argued that rank, rather than gender has the greatest influence on the content of performance value judgements and that this is attributable to the way that hierarchy influences the way in which the grass-roots role is constructed. We argue that women's progression is impeded not because of dominant constructions of the role per se, but by the way such constructions intersect with broader socio-cultural constructions of women's domestic roles.

Perspectives on gender inclusion at work: case of a British police service.

“…Similar strong macho culture and gendered structures and processes have been identified in other research on the police service Davies and Thomas, 2008;Dick and Jankowicz, 2001;Doran and Chan, 2003;Leishman, Loveday and Savage, 2000;Martin 1999;Waddington, 1999).…”

“…Ridgeway and Correll (2004) argue that when women enter a particular field and that field is seen to become feminised, it subsequently becomes devalued. Therefore, those who choose to pursue 'appropriate feminine roles' might well be limiting their career prospects because feminine roles are associated with lower performance values or 'recipe knowledge' (Dick and Jankowicz, 2001). …”

“…Gerber (2001) Dick and Jankowicz (2001) found that membership of a supervisory rank had a significant impact on how female officers were judged in the organisation. The finding from this research show that female officers relied on their rank as a means of exerting influence in the police service, while males typically relied on their reputation as their main source of status and influence.…”

“…Arguably, the female occupation of these office-based, community support, domesticated, nurturing, and "pink and fluffy" roles reify the stereotypes of female officers and the reproduction of gender disadvantage in career progression (Rabe-Hemp, 2009). A glass ceiling effect could ensue if females continue to pigeon hole themselves by taking on so-called feminised, undervalued roles that lack 'recipe knowledge' of 'real' policing (Dick and Jankowicz, 2001;Davies and Thomas, 2008;Ridgeway and Correll, 2004). …”

Cultural change and lodestones in the British police

“…However, in a more recent British study, Loftus (2009) has suggested that there is more commonality than difference between these cultures. Of course, on closer examination there appear different police sub-cultures (Dick and Jankowicz, 2001;Herbert, 1998) -'firearms officers' will probably have a rather different understanding of what counts as 'real policing' to 'traffic cops' as they, in turn, will have to those involved in policing domestic violence. Moreover, Chan (1996) is surely right to suggest that cultures do not determine the actions of individuals.…”