Burying the ‘Power Few’: Language and Resistance to Evidence-Based Policing

Highest Harm Crime “Recruiters” in a London Borough: a Case of Moving Targets

“…In this year, 9220 offenders were identified for the same policing area, which suggests that these recruiters are responsible for 137 times as much harm as the average suspect. This is an extremely powerful demonstration of Sherman's (2007a, b;2019) "felonious few" hypothesis. It suggests that these suspects could be cost-effectively targeted by any policing agency, as the amount of harm they cause is so very much more than the average suspect.…”

“…These tactics may disrupt and deter offenders through myriad police actions, including bail/curfew checks, warrant execution, GPS tagging and targeted stop and search. Yet the value of these activities in reducing crime harm may depend entirely on the capacity of targeting strategies to distinguish the offenders causing highest harm from the majority whose sum total of crime causes less harm than a potentially predictable highest harm "felonious few" (Sherman 2019).…”

A critical examination of the introduction of drug detection dogs for policing of illicit drugs in New South Wales, Australia using Kingdon’s ‘multiple streams’ heuristic

“…The findings of this case study also demonstrate the importance of the 'available alternative'. As calls for 'evidence-based policing' continue to be voiced within the criminological literature (for instance, Sherman, 1998;Weisburd et al, 2005), it is important to note that Kingdon's notion of 'feasibility' does not equate with 'evidence of effectiveness', in the way we might imagine within the evidence-based policy paradigm. The idea must simply be 'available, worked through, and ready to go' (Kingdon, 1995, 143).…”

“…Such analysis would illuminate the conditions which foster such decisions and generate understandings about how an arguably ineffective policy can continue to garner support. The increased uptake of 'evidence-based policy' rhetoric in criminology and policing (for instance, Sherman, 1998;Weisburd et al, 2005) has been accompanied by the assumption that new policing policies should be introduced based on the best available evidence of 'what works', and if evidence as to their ineffectiveness is brought to light, then this should provide sufficient rationale to terminate the policy. We suggest that the taken-for-granted assumptions about 'evidence of effectiveness', 'rationality' and 'authoritative choice' embedded within the evidence-based policy paradigm belies a far more conflicted and contested process, and that a highly politicised domain such as drugs policing policy provides fertile ground for such investigation.…”

Experimental Criminology and the Free-Rider Dilemma

“…18), "high-risk, previously convicted, recently released Experimental Criminology and the Free-Rider Dilemma Koehler & Smith (2020) offenders," or "hot spot" high-crime neighborhoods (two of the four examples of the power few that Sherman provided, pp. 310), or "high-priority victims" or "felonious few" in Sherman's (2019) reconsideration of the nomenclature, these samples consistently draw from among the dispossessed. It is not enough that these groups may, in fact, benefit from the treatment because, as McCord makes clear, these groups nonetheless assume a risk of a possible null result or even iatrogenesis.…”