NCJ Number
99252
Date Published
1985
Length
5 pages
Annotation
This paper suggests topics that should be examined in assessing the impact of public-sector collective bargaining on policing and offers hypotheses and issues for consideration under each topic.
Abstract
Academic scholars have not sufficiently analyzed the impact of police union-management collective bargaining on policing. Broad areas requiring study are the impact of collective bargaining on salaries and employment conditions, on agency administration and policies, and on police service delivery. An examination of improvements in police salaries and fringe benefits under unionism should also be accompanied by an assessment of increases in nonsalary resources, such as more patrol cars, better firearms, and improved forensic laboratories. In researching collective bargaining's impact on police administration and policies, the following hypothesis should be tested: a police union hierarchy undermines the paramilitary command chain on which police organizations are built. Other issues that should be addressed in this topic area are the impact of union demands on management's discretion to set policy and the identification of policy areas that have been a union focus. An assessment of the impact of collective bargaining on the quality of police services will be difficult. It involves setting criteria for police service quality and distinguishing unionism effects on police service from other effects on service. Seven notes are provided.