myAIPMThe importance of evidence based policing for the thinking professional police officer
Herrington, Victoria. (2016)
Introduction
There has been much discussion in recent years about evidence based policing (EBP). Policy documents across the world refer to evidence based policing; it has made its way into the lexicon of police officers at all levels of the organisation; and—alongside evidence based practice in other disciplines—governments are increasingly requiring hard evidence that public monies are being spent in the most efficient and effective way possible. But is EBP just another fad? Is it the preoccupation of a couple of academically minded senior officers keen to change business for change, or promotion’s, sake? Or is it a more fundamental challenge to the way policing practice is done.
The title of this paper somewhat telegraphs the author’s opinion and the paper’s conclusion. The aim is to convince you—the police practitioner—that evidence based policing is vitally important to the future of your work on the street and in our communities. In doing this, this paper will explore the challenge for EBP in gaining traction in our police organisations, and the need for individual efforts throughout the hierarchy to be complemented by a broader transition to innovative, agile, learning organisations.
To add weight—dare we even say ‘evidence’—to what might otherwise seem a series of self-serving opinions, this paper will draw on two bodies of work.
The first is a series of three roundtable discussions that were held at the Australian Institute of Police Management (AIPM) in late 2015 and early 2016. These workshops bought together academics, police officers, and others from government and nongovernment organisations interested in advancing the conversation about the value of research and academic insights to issues of public safety. An organisational attendance list for the three workshops can be found at the end of this paper so as to be transparent about the breadth of perspectives represented.
The second body of work this paper draws on is the National Police Research Inventory, which was a piece of scoping research undertaken by the AIPM to ascertain the amount and type of academic research on policing currently underway (or recently completed) in Australian universities. Full details about this research are available on the AIPM website, and a summary of the information gleaned will be presented as appropriate here.
Read the full article here
Herrington, Victoria. (2016) The importance of evidence based policing for the thinking professional police officer. Police Science: Australian and New Zealand Journal of Evidence Based Policing, Vol 1(1), p 13-18.