NCJ Number
185684
Journal
Law and Society Review Volume: 34 Issue: 1 Dated: 2000 Pages: 129-156
Date Published
2000
Length
28 pages
Annotation
Interviews conducted in three neighborhoods in Washington, D.C. in 1996-97 as part of a larger study of police-citizen relations examined residents’ perceptions of differential police treatment of individual black and white persons and disparate police practices in black and white neighborhoods.
Abstract
The research took place in a middle-class white community, a middle-class black community, and a lower-class black community. The 169 participants lived in households randomly selected from telephone directory lists of the selected census tracts. The research used bivariate and multivariate analytical techniques. Results revealed substantial agreement across the communities that police treat black and white people differently and that black people receive worse treatment than white people. Results also revealed racial variation in participants’ explanations for racial disparities. Residents of the black middle-class neighborhood differed from those of the other two neighborhoods regarding their assessments of police relations with their own community relative to other-race communities. The residents of this community tended to believe that the neighborhood receives similar treatment as white neighborhoods. The interviews and field observations suggested that the more benign style of policing in the middle-class black community than in the lower-class black community may account for the differing perceptions. Findings suggested that the class position of black communities makes at least some difference in structuring residents’ attitudes toward the police and challenge the claim that black persons and white persons are homogeneous groups who live in completely different worlds in relation to the police. Tables, footnotes, and 61 references