Institutional racism and police reform: an empirical critique

Abstract

Institutional racism became a potent mobilising concept in police reform in the UK following the publication of the Stephen Lawrence Inquiry in 1999. Yet while it continues to be used to highlight problematic police/community relationships, little attention has been paid to whether it actually works as a conceptual instrument for change. The explanatory value of the concept has long been contested due to its inherent ambiguities: how, then, is it interpreted and applied by those charged with responding? Drawing on ethnographic research in the aftermath of the Inquiry, this paper puts in question the continuing use of the term as a lever for reform. The conceptual restrictions inherent in the term simultaneously confronted police services with a series of profound difficulties in responding, and encouraged an urgent focus on the internal social relations of the organisation. Consequently, despite the Inquiry's intention that the term would divert attention away from a preoccupation with racist language and behaviour among police staff, this is precisely where reform activity was directed. Further, the patterns of responses in this arena clearly demonstrate the limitations of the concept as a lever for reform. The term not only failed to direct attention to the dynamics of institutional discrimination but, through the activity it elicited, in fact sustained them. However, despite these limitations, the mobilising power of the concept may have instigated a more subtle and pervasive series of shifts in organisational norms. A new approach grounded in practice and giving primacy to conceptual accuracy is now needed.

‘Looking back, i wouldn’t join up again’: the lived experiences of police officers as victims of bias and prejudice perpetrated by fellow staff within an english police force

“…Gendered police roles and attitudes are bound up with embodied power, patriarchy, and machismo (Westmarland, 2017). In her police ethnographic work, Souhami (2014) found that women staff were subject to overtly exclusionary language that was not censured by their managers. Research also shows that a masculine ethos dominates police identity (Heidensohn, 1992).…”

“…In this regard, police officers might experience bias and prejudice within the police because of core aspects of their identity such as religion, gender, age, disability and sexual orientation, and the intersectionality amongst these aspects of identity. Yet in the aftermath of the Macpherson Inquiry and the urgency of police responses, these experiences have not been a focus of attention; instead, there has been an intense focus on race thereby ignoringand thus sustainingother forms of exclusion within the police (Souhami, 2014).…”

Institutional Racism, Numbers Management, and Zero‐Tolerance Policing in New York City

“…In one instance, executives focused on emotions and personal feelings; in another instance, they focused on “external social structures related to personal attitudes and behavior, amplified by organizational cultures” (Holdaway and O'Neill :354). In most cases, it seems that the understanding of institutional racism became associated with the concept of sexist and racist “canteen culture,” the informal conversation away from public view (Souhami ). Institutional racism became misunderstood as a “quasi‐psychological” problem (Singh ; Souhami ; Wight ).…”

“…In most cases, it seems that the understanding of institutional racism became associated with the concept of sexist and racist “canteen culture,” the informal conversation away from public view (Souhami ). Institutional racism became misunderstood as a “quasi‐psychological” problem (Singh ; Souhami ; Wight ). “As a result it masks rather than illuminates the interplay between social structures, state power and individual action in creating and sustaining disadvantage, even though these are the very dynamics which the concept was originally formulated to describe” (Souhami :5).…”

The stop and search of minors: A ‘vital police tool’?

“…The qualitative analysis presented below does not purport to say anything about the operation of police practices, since the data only concern perceptions of targeting, although perceptions are important in themselves (see, for example, Souhami, 2014). For the parents' survey, almost 40 per cent of respondents (17/44) said that their child had been stopped and searched (3/44 did not know), and 17/44 had themselves been stopped and searched.…”