NCJ Number
82785
Date Published
1982
Length
299 pages
Annotation
This discussion of police-community relations covers the broad topics of race and community tension, law enforcement in a democratic society, and police and social unrest.
Abstract
The section on race and community tension begins with a chapter that considers the nature of racial prejudice, its functions, and how it may be reduced, together with implications for police recruitment and use of minorities. In another chapter, socioeconomic conditions in black ghettos and Mexican-American barrios are portrayed, and the role of the police in securing equal justice for these groups is delineated. A third chapter in the section on race and community tension examines the effect on law enforcement of social tensions and social problems within a milieu of changing constitutional government, and some of the government functions claimed to be solutions to social problems. The concluding chapter of this section considers the challenge to law enforcement of the community tension occasioned by rapid social change in the area of race relations. Topics considered in the chapters of the section on law enforcement in a democratic society are the significance of attitudes in police work, historical and contemporary perspectives on police-community relations, and the problem of police image in a changing community. Chapters in the section on police and social unrest cover signs of social unrest, implications of group behavior for police, implications for law enforcement of intergroup relations, and community relations programming. Appended are brief descriptions and dates of major American disorders, equal opportunity guidelines, and a discussion dealing with community tensions and civil disturbances. Each chapter provides a list of discussion topics and annotated references.