NCJ Number
191033
Journal
Theoretical Criminology Volume: 5 Issue: 3 Dated: August 2001 Pages: 315-344
Editor(s)
Lynn Chancer,
Tony Jefferson
Date Published
August 2001
Length
30 pages
Annotation
This article used articles from elite publications to shape a dramaturgically informed case study exploring the decline in the official crime rate in New York City in 1996, the roles of Commissioner Bratton, the media, and the selected experts commenting on the causes of the decline.
Abstract
This article used materials drawn largely from the elite media and academic sources to create a dramaturgically informed case study (emphasizing the use of symbols to convey impressions to an audience) to examine the contradictions generated by the myth of command and control in policing. The case study focused on the crime decline in New York City which the media attributed to William Bratton, Commissioner of the New York City Police Department (NYPD) from late 1994 until September 1997. This analysis required an overview of dramaturgy, the drama of policing, and the centrality of imagery and rhetoric in sustaining police legitimacy and compliance internally. Dramaturgy’s value as a perspective is that it reads off public performances as they bear on the politics of mass society, shaped by the media through which modern imagery of politics are shaped. Dramaturgy illuminates the dilemmas of modern command and control. Dependent on the media, police cautiously adopted visual means of monitoring and defending their own conduct. The drama of crime control in New York City was socially created and amplified by the media, in cooperation with police. The present analysis suggested the importance of crime as uncertainty. The rise and fall of crime as an issue informs those about the drama of policing because it connotes uncertainty. It was argued in conclusion that such analysis might assist in theorizing policing, seeing the dramatic virtues of crime, and the role of media in policing and politics.