Partnership Policing: From Strategy to Practice

About the project

During the last thirty years, police work has changed in several fundamental ways. Today, police work is often performed in collaboration between the police and municipalities, actors in civil society, public authorities, individuals and companies. The development is well-documented in the scholarly literature. However, there is little research on what happens when many actors work together against crime. What effects does collaboration have on the exercise of social control, organizational boundaries and the administration of justice? Whose interests dominate? How do common strategies translate into action "on the ground"? How are trade-offs made in practice between effective policing and citizens' freedoms and rights?

In this project, these issues are studied via an investigation of the Collaboration Agreement between the City of Stockholm and the Stockholm Police Region. These actors have created a comprehensive and ambitious collaborative body aimed to reduce crime and increase security. Based on theories that view the new police landscape from a network perspective, the project studies how formal (legislation, rules, resources and organizational goals) and informal (norm systems, interpretations, emotions, professional identities) dimensions affect decisions, resource allocation, knowledge production, accountability and implementation. Data is collected using qualitative interviews with participants and observations of their work.

The project contributes with new knowledge on how collaboration is organized and what effects it has for the participants, the boundaries of law enforcement, and for the traditional idea of citizenship. The results will be presented in a popular science publication suited for practitioners with responsibility for collaborating against crime and insecurity, and in articles in peer-reviewed scientific journals.