Sociology of Crime: Policing - Assignment Example

Sociology of Crime: Policing Word Count: 1438 Sociology of Crime: Policing Part The Original Contribution of Andrew Millie’s Article to the Theory of Policing The article by Andrew Millie “The Great Debate: How Wide or Narrow Should the Police’s Remit Be?” significantly contributes to the theory of policing as the universal treatment for crimes and the way this authority should work. (Millie, 2014, 1). The originality of the article is that is considers the police as primarily the institution which is designed for struggle against crimes and suggests separation or delegation of certain obligations which are currently done by it to the other parties including civil persons and non-governmental organizations. (Millie, 2014, 4). At the same time, another point of concern which considerably contributes to the mentioned theory is that, even though such tendency of separation has its right for existence, the author reasonably states that there are still functions and duties which are not directly aimed at criminals arrests or struggle against crimes, but such ones that cannot be passed over to the other parties and should be the points of contact when the police is asking for assistance in these spheres of activity. (Millie, 2014, 4-5). Another original finding of the author which is, obviously, is one more contribution is that the police can and may be used more effectively not only for the purpose of crime reduction and criminals tracking and arrest, but also crime prevention which is, as per the author’s reasonable suggestion, the root of the entire crime problem and shall be dealt with by means of intensive provision of significant assistance of any character, including material which becomes important in the realities of the present day. (Millie, 2014, 6). Part 2: Critique of the Andrew Millie’s Theory The significance and positive effect of the above mentioned contribution of the theory from the first part of the work, there are some issues that can be applied to it from the criticism perspective. The first point is that crime, being an object of criminology, has the same multifaceted structure, essence and realization as the criminology itself. (Ericson, 1996, 14). In this regard, the policing theory of Andrew Millie needs detailed consideration of particular crimes with the possible focusing on certain cases of law breaking from the multiple aspects point of view. The second thing to be mentioned in terms of critical approach to the above mentioned article is that crime shall be considered and treated from the perspective of real life. (Ericson, 1996, 14). This means that, when approaching to the problem of crime treatment and the role that policing plays in this regard it is necessary to take into consideration that certain life situations, including social factors, lead to such antisocial practice as crime committing, and that appropriate conclusions shall be made with the subsequent experience gaining when elaborating effective methods applied by the police for its main purpose. Another important comment that should be made on the work of Andrew Millie is that the problems highlighted in his article need a more detailed scientific grounding, particularly from the point of view of the already mentioned criminology. The necessity of this step is obvious: firstly, any practice is useless without its theoretical basis and framework; secondly, criminology as a science provides informational basis, techniques, methods and other important instruments which are useful in terms of making it clear what the crime is and what its causes are. (Ericson, 1996, 15). The point of concern is also the author’s suggestion of delegation or separation of certain duties currently performed by the police to the other parties which may be civil as well. There is no doubt that such measure can be productive in terms of time and efforts optimization which would definitely benefit the efficiency of the police work; however, the police is the only party so far which is capable of proper fulfillment of the duties it currently does regularly using theoretical and practical basis for this purpose. From this point of view, in case of this step realization, the police would also face the problem of performing the role of the tutor: the new parties, obviously, would need time to gain necessary skills and knowledge which is in practice a rather time consuming activity, and the police would need to combine the two activities: regular work and training, which, obviously, would influence the outcome of both activities in a certain way (the practice shows that trying to successfully cover two spheres of activity leads either to dissatisfactory results or to absence of the results at all). Knowledge division may also be a challenge for those sharing it, leading to conflicts within the educational activity which, certainly, does not contribute to the overall outcome of the measure take, on the contrary, a certain kind of influence conflicts may arise which would decline any effect. (Ericson, 1996, 17). Governmental initiatives, such as programs, reforms or any other political actions driven by the ambitions of the politicians or parties are objects of particular interest when considering the problem of crime and policing. In this regard, certain actions taken by the politics related parties may considerably affect the sphere of crime and policing, and the matter of fact is that their determination at certain positive results (labor market reanimation, struggle against poverty, population welfare increase) which are supposed to decrease the crime rate. (Ericson, 1996, 19). The author should consider the ways the political campaigns affect the state of affairs in crime and policing sphere by means of analysis of the governmental and oppositional programs and promises from the point of view of what has been said and what has been done and to which consequence the words and deeds have led. This will provide an opportunity to consider whether something shall be done on governmental or any other political level in this regard, and if so, what namely. The author also should consider the matter of criminal law. This is an important instrument in terms of determination of the role, the basis and the status of the policing authorities’ actions, particularly in terms of the mentioned possibility of duties delegation or separation. Law is the basis of any action, and this shall be considered when realizing the offered measure. From this perspective it is logical that the supreme role of legislation, criminal law in this particular case, is the guiding principle which is the source of possible decisions making and relations regulating between the participants of the process. This matter is also important from the point of view of strict division of the categories, issues and peculiarities of the process which is the solid way of problems solving. (Ericson, 1996, 20). Part 3: Theoretical Improvements to the Theory of Andrew Millie One of the possible recommendations that can be given for improvement of the above mentioned article is a practice-oriented approach to crime and policing. The author can use more examples of crimes and ways of their treatment from the real world situations, which is beneficial both from the point of view of experience accumulation and composing the reaction model on a regular basis in the real life environment. (Ericson, 1996, 1). The given recommendation, however, does not reduce the importance of theoretical framework of the problem discussed. Paying more attention to the scientific findings as well, it is possible to come to reasonable conclusions on the specific problems, moreover, the number of specialized institutions which deal with the problems of crime and policing regularly and from scientific and disciplinary perspectives is relatively high, which provides necessary amount of information for further studies. (Ericson, 1996, 1). The problem of measures taking and decisions making related to crime prevention is another thing which would theoretically improve the mentioned study. There are a big number of possible ways of reaching this purpose which is, undoubtedly, a considerable point of concern, and the solutions from the other spheres of activity may be quite useful. From this perspective, it is possible to consider and practically apply the experience of prevention of two interrelated and to a certain extent interdependent things: the crimes themselves and the consequences they lead to, usually material losses, and prevention the latter often positively contributes to the crime reduction. The problem may also be positively solved by paying more attention to it, and the author may consider the problem highlighting in the mass media. (Ericson, 1996, 21). References Ericson, R. (1996). Making Criminology. Current Issues in Criminal Justice, 8 (1), 14-25. Millie, A. (2014). The Great Debate: How Wide or Narrow Should the Police’s Remit Be? Research Focus, 2 (4), 1-10. Read More