NCJ Number
197200
Journal
Policing Volume: 24 Issue: 2 Dated: 2001 Pages: 200-215
Date Published
2002
Length
16 pages
Annotation
This paper argues for the use of the social capital concept in studying, evaluating, or implementing community-oriented policing (COP) strategies; this argument emerges from the findings of a study that assessed the extent to which social capital building was present and how this was related to the effectiveness of COP strategies in a small city.
Abstract
Social capital is created when the relations among persons change in ways that facilitate action, so social capital can be used to make the most use of the human capital among people who work together and trust each other. Various forms of social capital include obligations and expectations, information potential, norms and effective sanctions, authority relations, appropriate social organization, and intentional organization. COP is based on a philosophy that encourages partnership between the police and community residents for the purpose of solving problems of crime, fear of crime, and disorder. This effort involves democratic partnerships among the community, the police, and various public and private-sector organizations. To examine the importance of the social capital concept for COP, this study focused on a small city in eastern Iowa. The study used focus groups with members of four neighborhood groups and semistructured interviews with two community policing officers in order to gauge the effectiveness of COP and the strength and scope of social capital in the city. The study findings indicate that social capital was necessary among all actors for COP to be effective. Even if some of the citizenry have an established network of social ties and social capital building potential among themselves, a lack of social capital building between the citizenry and the police will not allow COP to reach its full potential. 1 table and 24 references