Policing through Subsidized Firepower: An Assessment of Conventional and Minority Threat Explanations of Police Militarization via the 1033 Program

• In Event: 3222 - Section on Crime, Law, and Deviance Refereed Roundtable Session
  In Refereed Roundtable 60min: Table 01. Courts and Policing

Abstract

There is a popular belief that the use of military equipment can improve police efforts at social control. However, recent protests and riots across the country have piqued public concern about racial disparities in law enforcement and the acquisition and use of military equipment by police in the U.S. Using data from the Department of Defense’s 1033 Program, we conduct an agency-level analysis of police militarization to assess the validity of both conventional arguments for police militarization and minority threat explanations of police militarization. Our results suggest that conventional explanations, including higher violent crime rates and recent officer fatalities or terror attacks, increase law enforcement participation in the 1033 Program. However, police militarization is also a function of racial and economic threat, as the relative size of the non-Hispanic Black population and the local poverty rate predict involvement in the 1033 Program. Finally, the associated between racial composition and involvement in the 1033 Program is more pronounced in places with lower levels of poverty, suggesting that racial threat may be more salient when economic threat factors are less present.

Authors

• Trent Steidley, University of Denver

• David Michael Ramey, Pennslyvania State University