Law Enforcement: A Human Relations Approach

• NCJ Number: 225030
• Author(s): Alan R. Coffey
• Date Published: 1990
• Length: 399 pages
• Sale Source: Prentice Hall
• Publication Format: Book (Hardbound)
• Publication Type: Overview Text
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America

Annotation

Based on the view that getting and keeping community support is the key to positive, enforcement-oriented policing, this book provides a comprehensive integration of the diverse factors that influence police-community relations.

Abstract

Part one, “Alignment of Police and the Rationale for Enforcement,” introduces the need for police to have community support for their law enforcement mission. It contains four chapters on the reasons for, the position of, and the restrictions on law enforcement. In emphasizing the human relations approach, law enforcement is discussed in terms of the limitations placed on police compared to the demands placed on police. Part two, “Unrest from Social Change: Present, Past, and Future Impact,” is composed of three chapters on the phases and levels of community unrest, with distinctions between tension that is either controlled or dangerous. Violent community unrest in the present, past, and future is examined from the human relations perspective. The five chapters of Part three, “Law Enforcement and the Community,” examine a few theoretical causes of crime, followed by descriptions of some of the police programs that help and some of the problems that hinder police and community efforts to counter crime. Part four, “Community Support Required for Police Success,” has 3 chapters that build on the previous 12 chapters in integrating the forces and influences necessary to gain and keep community support. While maintaining a human relations approach to police-community relations, these chapters examine police image problems, police-community cooperation, and police communication. Appendixes contain a police checklist for community tension and unrest; a discussion of prosecution, defense, and police; sections of the U.S. Constitution related to law enforcement; U.S. Supreme Court decisions related to law enforcement; some responses to the police-community problem of gangs; and drug abuse. Chapter summaries and discussion topics and a subject index