Police Use of Force: Does Measurement Matter?

• In Event: 4155 - Section on Crime, Law, and Deviance Refereed Roundtables (1 hour)
  In Refereed Roundtable 60min: 11. Police Use of Force

Abstract

Contact with the police has been widely understood as a key determinant of socialization and wellbeing at the individual level, and a potential driver or mitigant of social inequality at a population level. Recent high-profile incidents of police violence, particularly against unarmed young men of color, have further underscored the importance of understanding the role of the police, and police use of force (UOF) in American racial inequality. This paper uses data collected by a consortium of researchers and law enforcement professionals to measure the prevalence and severity of police UOF in 11 participating police departments. We examine variation in the way UOF is collected across departments, and the extent to which this variation may affect the assessment of racial disparities in police activity. Preliminary results suggest that classifications of UOF vary widely across departments, underscoring the importance of standardization in comparative research. However, departments’ positions as egalitarian or disparate relative to their peers appear to be largely robust to force measurement decisions. One domain in which force rankings are more variable is that of lethal force, which is much rarer, but much more consistently collected than nonlethal force. This finding underscores the importance of collecting data on nonlethal as well as lethal force, to provide a more comprehensive understanding of police practices and their social consequences.

Authors

• Amanda Geller, New York University

• Phillip Atiba Goff, Center for Policing Equity

• Amelia Haviland, Carnegie Mellon University

• Tracey Lloyd, Urban Institute

• Dean Obermark, Urban Institute

• Jack Glaser, UC Berkeley