Showing papers in "Annals of The American Academy of Political and Social Science in 1980"

Police Use of Force: Individuals, Situations, and Organizations:

Abstract: Police use of force is theoretically important because it involves the execution of perhaps the essential func tion of the state and is practically important because it af fects the public's attitudes and behaviors toward the police and government more generally. Because of its importance, much attention has been devoted to understanding how and why it varies. Three different types of explanation have been advanced: those explaining the use of force in terms of individual characteristics of policemen; those explaining it in terms of the characteristics of the situation in which police meet citizens; and those explaining it in terms of the organiza tion in which police work. But studies up to now have not determined which factors have a genuine influence and how important the various factors are. An analysis of Albert J. Reiss's 1966 observational data, using crosstabulations and multiple regression analysis, finds individual and aggregate relationships so weak that theoretical and methodological re- formu...

The Dirty Harry Problem

Abstract: Policing constantly places its practitioners in situations in which good ends can be achieved by dirty means. When the ends to be achieved are urgent and unquestionably good and only a dirty means will work to achieve them, the policeman faces a genuine moral dilemma. A genuine moral dilemma is a situation from which one cannot emerge inno cent no matter what one does—employ a dirty means, em ploy an insufficiently dirty means, or walk away. In such situations in policing, Dirty Harry problems, the danger lies not in becoming guilty of wrong—that is inevitable—but in thinking that one has found a way to escape a dilemma which is inescapable. Dire consequences result from this misunder standing. Policemen lose their sense of moral proportion, fail to care, turn cynical, or allow their passionate caring to lead them to employ dirty means too crudely or too readily. The only means of assuring that dirty means will not be used too readily or too crudely is to punish those who use them and the agency which end...

The Violent Police-Citizen Encounter

Abstract: While the emphasis in this article is on physical force by police officers, the perspective adopted is one of a transaction affected by police characteristics, citizen charac teristics, and their interactions in a given setting. The violent police-citizen encounter, moreover, is considered a develop mental process in which successive decisions and behaviors by either police officer or citizen, or both, make the violent outcome more or less likely. The emphasis upon mutual con tributions in the encounter carries policy implications that have not always been carefully considered in the past.

Police Shootings at Minorities: The Case of Los Angeles

Abstract: Basic data on the involvement of minorities in Los Angeles Police Department shooting incidents from 1974 to 1979 are presented. Shootings involving black suspects differed in number, in circumstances, and under some circum stances, in outcomes of the shooting review process from shootings involving Hispanics and whites. Few differences appeared between shooting incidents involving Hispanics and shootings involving white suspects.

Controlling Police Use of Deadly Force

Abstract: A central problem for democratic government is how to limit their own use of force, particularly their use of deadly force. Government control of force can be accom plished in a number of ways, but principally by controlling opportunities for its exercise and decisions to use it. To con trol opportunities for the use of deadly force, institutions and their organization must be altered, whereas to control decisions to use it, organizations must manage them. Some major ways to control the use of deadly force by structuring opportunities and decisions are explored. Restricting op portunities for the legitimate use of force appears effective in reducing its use and the harmful consequences of injury and death. Current decision models for managing the use of deadly force rely too much upon a micromodel detailing the sequential "choice" points in decisions to use deadly force. Such models have distinct limits. Among the more serious ones are that they ignore the ways that the use of deadly force in police encou...

Urbanization and Counterurbanization in the United States

Abstract: Urbanization, the process of population concentration, has been succeeded in the United States by counterurbanization, a process of population deconcentration characterized by smaller sizes, decreasing densities, and increasing local homogeneity, set within widening radii of national interdependence. This article reviews this shift, the means by which a national society is producing a national settlement system.

Killing the Police: Myths and Motives

Abstract: This article analyzes the situational motives of assailants who kill New York City police in the line of duty. Contrary to popular opinion, police are not often killed during domestic disturbances nor are they the seemingly senseless victims of madmen or lunatics. Rather, New York police are more likely to be killed by rational robbers fleeing the scene of a crime, who routinely use potentially lethal weapons as "tools of the trade."

Perspectives on Police and Violence

Abstract: Police and violence are central to our con ception of government, yet they form a troublesome paradox: in their efforts to stop violence, police must often be violent themselves. This paradox leads to the three related questions addressed in this volume. First, how can the police act more effectively and justly against violence in society? Second, how can we better understand and reduce the violence com mitted against police? Third, what accounts for the wide varia tions in police use of violence, and what can we learn from that variation to reduce police violence to the lowest possible level? The three questions are to some degree artificially distinguished, since most of what they encompass are police encounters with citizens from which violence emerges. But to understand the whole of police and violence, we need first understand its component parts.

Untenured and Tenuous: The Status of Women Faculty

Abstract: Issues of equity in higher education have assumed prominence with the development of laws seeking to abolish sex discrimination. The status of women on faculties thus has become a subject for widespread study and debate. A historical sketch of women's participation in the professoriate is followed by a more detailed overview of the positions they hold, how they are distributed among institutions, what they are paid, and what functions they perform. Numerous studies in this field agree that women faculty are overconcentrated in the least prestigious institutions and in the lower ranks, carry a disproportionate share of teaching loads especially at introductory levels, and are seriously underpaid at all levels when rank, field, Ph.D. cohort, type of institution, and work functions are held constant. Evidence is adduced which suggests that such faculty distributions and reward systems may adversely affect the quality of education and of scholarly research. Implications for higher education policy are discussed.

Beyond Account: The Personal Impact of Police Shootings:

Abstract: The aftermath of a police shooting is a messy matter. The consequences of a shooting are felt and acted upon at several levels within police organizations. Official, col legial, and individual versions of a particular shooting often contrast in both form—external/intemal/private—and con tent—representation/symbol/feeling. Based on one's commit ment to the police role and one's social position within a department, an officer will attempt to build an account for a shooting that will protect his sense of self as shaped by the relationships he has with his colleagues and organization. Be cause shootings are to a degree "routine matters" within many police agencies, especially large ones, individual accounts are worked out in line with mutually held background under standings of what constitutes proper police conduct before, during, and after a shooting. That such accounts are only partial indicators of "what really happened" is a point well understood by the police.

The Danger Zone: Academic Freedom and Civil Liberties

Abstract: This paper examines the way "corresponding rights and duties" surrounding academic freedom were negotiated between professional associations and organizations of university managers and trustees. The subject is approached through an analysis of the American Association of University Professors' (AAUP) major documents on academic freedom. In general terms it is argued that American academics, as intellectuals dependent on their employing institutions, have consistently sacrificed individuals and substantive principles in order to gain compliance for procedural safeguards from university officials for the profession as a whole. Restitution or reinstatement were not serious issues: the goal of the AAUP was a uniform personnel policy recognizing tenure. Even this goal was difficult to achieve. To win its acceptance, professors effectively traded civil liberties for job security.

Violence and the Police Role

Abstract: The police use of deadly force has been viewed as a commonsense aspect of the police role. It should be questioned, for only by asking why violence is used, can one address the issues of how much, by whom, and against whom it is used, or why violence is selected from among several techniques available for achieving police ends. The violent event is multivalent and the complexities are reflected in the control mechanisms, which are legal, administrative, and occupational in origin. Legal controls are weak, the sub stantive case law is inconsistent, and departmental regula tions and policies on the use of force are variable. The public, organizational, and personal meanings of events involving force are not given in the facts at hand, but are constructed and woven together over time: the occupational role and the self of the officer are in most instances made integral by the unifying act of applying force. This construction of the prob lem implies that legalistic attempts to control the use of force, and ev...

The Crisis of the Professoriate

Abstract: The academic profession has been affected by substantial changes in the post-World War II period. The dramatic growth of universities in many nations in terms of enrollments and also of their societal role has placed the professoriate in a central social position. Challenges of expansion, pressures for reform and accountability, the student activism of the sixties, and other factors have endangered the traditional professorial role. Standard norms such as tenure and academic freedom have been questioned. Academic unions have appeared in many nations. This article focuses on a comparison of the major challenges to the academic profession. It discusses some of the ways in which the profession has been altered and analyzes how the professoriate has dealt with some of these difficult problems.

Death in Prime Time: Notes on the Symbolic Functions of Dying in the Mass Media

Abstract: The cultural (and media) significance of dying rests in the symbolic context in which representations of dying are embedded. An examination of that context of mostly violent representations suggests that portrayals of death and dying serve symbolic functions of social typing and control and tend, on the whole, to conceal the reality and inevitability of the event.

The Police and Weapons Offenses

Abstract: To control violence committed among strangers in public locations, police departments have increasingly turned to tactics of "directed patrol" focused on particular dangerous places or activities. Arguably, a suitable focus for directed patrol is illegal carrying or possession of weapons in public locations. Questions arise concerning the methods of weapons enforcement, the effectiveness of such a focus, and its administrative feasibility. Preliminary results of em pirical investigations into police practices with respect to weapons enforcement reveal that weapons arrests typically occur as a by-product of other enforcement activities and that the most important factor determining aggregate levels of weapons arrests is the general proactivity of the police department. Further, some empirical results suggest that police departments can shift to proactive strategies—and increase the level of weapons arrests—without dramatically changing the demographic characteristics of those arrested. Crucial unanswered q...

Always Prepared: Police Off-Duty Guns

Abstract: Even while off duty, American police are ex pected to be armed and to actively intervene in situations threatening to life, property, or order. This article considers the assumptions upon which that expectation is based and suggests that they may be ill-founded. Research to determine whether armed off-duty police actually increase community violence levels is recommended as a prerequisite to an in formed reconsideration of the appropriate role for off-duty police officers.

Talking about death: patterns of lay and professional change.

Abstract: For the past thirty years, researchers have surveyed attitudes of providers and patients to the disclosure of the diagnosis and prognosis to the dying cancer patient. Though the lay population has expressed the wish to know over time, a change in provider attitudes is apparent: physicians are now more likely to inform their dying patients of the truth than before. This trend is viewed against a number of precipitating factors: changes in perception of the impact of disclosure and changes in the basic ethical norms related to disclosure with new cohorts of younger physicians reflecting these changes. These correlate with changes in underlying social structure brought about in part by the shift to chronic disease as the paradigm for medical care. With increasingly bureaucratized health care delivery, the physician must collaborate with others who may hold different judgments about what ought to be disclosed. Some nurses not only find it right to disclose, but also in their professional interest. In such settings, honesty may be necessary to avoid conflicting messages to the patient. These shifts may signal underlying shifts in the sick role and in the medical professional role with the patient more active and more knowledgeable in medical decisions and the physician serving as a source of information and counsel.

Academic Tenure: Its Recipients and Its Effects

Abstract: A great deal has been written about the pros and cons of academic tenure but little systematic research has been done on the subject. Through an examination of the dossiers—vitae, letters of recommendation, and written assessments—of 115 individuals awarded tenure in 1967 and 1968, this paper attempts to shed some light on the characteristics of those awarded tenure and on its effects. There are large gaps in what writers know about candidates. Still, candidates are portrayed in the most favorable light. Because hard and fast criteria are not applied, the process for awarding tenure seems to be less stringent than evaluation for promotion to Full Professor. It would appear that since tenure does not primarily work either to reduce the intellectual activity of faculty or to protect the idiosyncratic or dissenting scholar, its central function is to insure minimal performance standards and compatibility.

Study Abroad and International Exchanges

Abstract: International educational exchange was a field of major concern to the President's Commission on Foreign Language and International Studies because of its contribu tion to research and scholarship on other countries, to foreign language learning, and to the international education of our citizens. Despite their importance, exchanges involving high school students and teachers remain distressingly limited and should be expanded. Although major federal funding of study abroad by American undergraduates is not likely, this field should be strongly encouraged; study abroad can have a lifelong impact on students' values and understanding of other cultures. The more than one-quarter million foreign students in American colleges and universities should be tapped much more as a resource for intercultural learning. Teaching and especially research abroad for faculty is essential to U.S. competence in international studies; federal funding for it through the Fulbright and other programs has seriously eroded and sho...

The Ghetto as a Form of Government

Abstract: Isaiah Trunk's classic study of the Jewish Councils in Eastern Europe under the Nazi regime points to four major conclusions. (1) The ghetto was a captive city-state, totally subordinate to German authority while remainng a Jewish entity with traditions and expectations rooted in Jewish experience. The Jewish councils that were placed in charge of the ghettos were facing a dilemma in that they could not follow German instructions without hurting Jews and could not help Jews without obeying the Germans. (2) As a socioeconomic unit, the ghetto was hovering between life and death. The Jewish population could not support itself in definitely by trading with the outside world; impoverish ment spelled out its doom. (3) For the incarcerated Jews, the ghetto was also a mirage. It instilled thoughts of normalcy and continuity in the Jewish community at a time when the Germans were preparing for deportations of the victims to death camps. (4) Finally, the ghetto councils and their police organs were a self-destruct...

The New Town Movement in Europe

Abstract: The new town movement, originated in Britain in the ideas of Howard, was active in successfully implementing two new towns on a cooperative basis, Letchworth and Welwyn. These ideas became important on the Continent when the new town movement continued on a wider scale, mostly with government initiative. A remarkable exception to this is Tapiola, Finland, built by a nonprofit organization.

Communications Technology and Land Use

Abstract: At the turn of the century, telecommunications had a centripetal effect on the topography of cities. It encouraged the separation of offices from factories and the consequent concentration of offices downtown. Thus telecommunications led to urban concentration. By the middle of the century, a more flexible and universally available telecommunications technology was used to escape urban concentration, with both homes and work places moving out of the city's center and even into exurbia. In that period, the effects of telecommunications were predominantly centrifugal. In the future, a still more malleable communications technology is likely to give people more choice in how they use it. Until now, each of the trends and effects noted for communications could be simultaneously noted in transportation. Now, however, in the prospect of an energy shortage, one of the very likely uses of telecommunications may be to overcome some consequences of high energy prices. Most particularly, improved telecommunications ...

African Academics: A Study of Scientists at the Universities of Ibadan and Nairobi

Abstract: This paper analyzes how western academic and intellectual traditions are being transformed at two African universities, the University of Ibadan (Nigeria) and the University of Nairobi (Kenya). It is argued that the academic and intellectual culture of these universities must be understood in terms of the accommodation of conflicting influences on African academic life: authority and autonomy; individualism and collectivism, and, finally, cosmopolitanism and specificity. While Ibadan and Nairobi are described as faithful to the traditions of Western universities in many ways, these traditions are influential selectively. Moreover, the academic and intellectual culture of these universities is shown to comprise traditions which are indigeneous and unreconciled with their colonial inheritance.

Nursing the Dying: Implications of Kübler-Ross' Staging Theory

Abstract: Society's failure to value the work of nurses, the professionals most frequently involved in the care of the dying, is attributed to a cultural definition of nursing as a second-class occupation and the public's need to deny the realities of the suffering and indignities often associated with the process of dying. Efforts within the field of nursing to improve the care of the dying, by shifting emphasis from a narrow physical focus to a more holistic patient and family focus, preceded the past decade's contributions of Elisabeth Kubler-Ross. Although her staging theory has been cited as having limitations in development and in interpretation, Kubler-Ross' influence towards increasing awareness of the needs of the dying and others experiencing major losses has been substantial as evidenced by many references to staging theory in nursing literature, by a marked increase in attention to holistic care of the dying in the basic and continuing education programs of nursing, and by specialty role development in nursing care of the dying. This decade has also witnessed the major growth of professionalism in nursing, including strides towards professional autonomy. Conflict with the traditional pattern of medical dominance and bureacratic constraints in institutions is inevitable, especially when the medical goal of cure is not attainable. Change to an interdisciplinary model of care is viewed as essential for optimal care of the dying and their families.

International Education in a Troubled World

Abstract: The external and internal environment of the U.S. has changed significantly since World War Two. Our military preeminence has vanished, in economic affairs the American model is not valid for other countries, and the U.S. is no longer the scientific leader of the world. Our foreign policy has become much more closely intertwined with domestic issues among which cultural pluralism is important. In an inter dependent world we cannot solve problems independently but must work in concert with other nations. Expertise on the rest of the world is hence needed as never before in government, business, and especially in the universities. But the system for maintaining and strengthening this expertise is jeopardized by the erosion of financial support. Increasingly needed are specialists who combine foreign language and international studies expertise with training in professional fields, and specialists not only on other countries and geographic regions but also on major international issues such as energy and eco...

Power Attracts Violence

Abstract: Policemen frequently are called to restore order to situations in which one of the parties is fighting "for his honor" in front of a crowd. In such circumstances policemen are not likely to be able to "stop the beef" nonviolently. While the crowd looks on, a citizen may only be able to save face by attacking the officers themselves. A citizen's honor—his reputation for implacability and vengeance—is vital to him particularly in rough neighborhoods because his safety may depend upon it after the policeman departs from the scene. A policeman who attempts to restore order at the expense of a citizen's honor leaves the citizen no recourse but to attack. The only nonviolent solution to this situation is for policemen to take pains to redefine the crowd's definition of honorable conduct, and that is an unusually difficult undertaking, de manding eloquence of a high order.

The Holocaust and the Enigma of Uniqueness: A Philosophical Effort at Practical Clarification

Abstract: This philosophical analysis seeks to foster understanding between representatives of diverse disciplines in the study of the Holocaust. The article inquires whether there are ways to avoid the mystification of the Holocaust without losing its singularity. Three concepts of uniqueness are utilized: ordinary uniqueness, unique uniqueness, and transcending uniqueness. Eight propositions are submitted that concern: the salience of facticity, the challenge of the Holocaust to conventional tools of study, the relation of historic antisemitism and the Holocaust, the relevance of eschatological images, the bearing of the Holocaust upon soteriological expression, ideology as a weapon against the Holocaust's concreteness, the theft of the Holocaust for antisemitic and anti-Israeli purposes, and the jointure of nomothetic and idiographic interpretation as a possible aid to understanding. In conclusion, the category of transcending uniqueness is applied to the moral dimension of the encounter with the Holocaust in a ...

The Holocaust and the Historians

Abstract: The impact of the Holocaust has been interpreted by historians largely according to the present needs of their audiences. Jewish historians, both in Israel and outside, see these events as the culminating tragedy of their people before the rebirth in statehood. German historians are more con cerned with the attempt to overcome their knowledge of guilt and therefore concentrate, not so much on Jewish sufferings, as on Nazi rule. Christian historians and theo logians have sought to eradicate the long tradition of Christian prejudice against Jews, which some of them see as cul minating in the Holocaust. Historians of nazism are divided into rival schools and have yet to reach any firm conclusions on such topics as the genesis of the Final Solution. Was the persecution of the Jews something unique or just the prelude to other genocidal measures against unwanted groups of society? The impact of ideology in governmental policies and the weakness of the traditional barriers to the corruptions of absolute power a...

Mobilizing Police Expertise

Abstract: Violence against police is a problem that calls for organizational solutions. Among dangers to be avoided are crisis-induced panic and the minimization of the problem, as well as strategic planning by police leadership without rank-and-file participation. Even the most serious violence problems afford opportunities for learning if such problems are addressed by cross sections of a police department's membership. Police unions can be involved as partners in organizational problem solving, as has occurred in industry in Quality of Work Life (QWL) experiments. Joint worker- manager problem solving is independent of labor manage ment negotiations, which can take adversary form. Recent experiences in the Oakland Police Department have shown that even problem officers—officers who contribute to citizen confrontations—can design interventions that reduce violence levels in a community. The Oakland model presupposes that organizational reform activity can simultaneously increase organizational effectiveness and e...