The effect of local political culture on policing behaviors in the 1990s: A retest of Wilson’s theory in more contemporary times

Political Culture Versus Socioeconomic Approaches to Predicting Police Strength in U.S. Police Agencies

“…Viewed from this perspective, the variation in community characteristics determines, to a large degree, police strength and policing style in a local community. The socioeconomic approach has played a rather prominent role in policing research since 1970s, but the local political culture approach has been revisited in recent research (Stucky, 2003(Stucky, , 2005Zhao & Hassell, 2005;Zhao, He, & Lovrich, 2006).…”

Crime clearance rates in Canadian municipalities: A test of Donald Black's theory of law

“…In contrast with Black's hypothesis, empirical studies have reported mostly negative effects of population size (Braithwaite and Biles, 1980;Davies, 2007;Donohue and Levitt, 2001;Gottfredson and Hindelang, 1979;Litwin and Xu, 2007;Paré and Ouimet, 2004;Paré et al, 2007) and population density (Greenberg and Kessler, 1982) on crime clearance rates. There are also findings of nonsignificant effects (Borg and Parker, 2001;Furlong and Mehay, 1981;Litwin, 2004;Zhao et al, 2006).…”

“…Zhao et al (2006) reported that the relationship between political culture and arrest rates was nonsignificant. The quantitative analysis by Davies (2007) of the relationship between the clearance rate and mayoral election failed to show a connection between the variables.…”

An Analysis of Factors Affecting the Implementation of Small Municipal Police Agencies: An Open-Systems Approach

“…In attempting to replicate Wilson's earlier studies on the political influence of police organizations, Zhao et al (2006) concluded that politics no longer are a strong predictor of organizational behavior among large police agencies in America. The authors base their findings on three factors.…”

“…Finally, those police organizations that followed a service orientation emphasized community resident satisfaction, and therefore took all requests from the community for both law enforcement and order-maintenance as a high priority; major crimes would take precedence over minor infractions, and arrests would be viewed as a last resort over other sanctions. Wilson's study compared the arrest rates for minor offenses in 146 cities, concluding that politics played a role in the type of policing conducted by municipal officers (see also : Langworthy 1985;Zhao et al 2006). Levitt (1997) found that increases in the size of police forces in large cities were disproportionately concentrated in election years for mayor and governor.…”