Just Regulation? Examining Police Attitudes on Gun Rights and Gun Control

• In Event: Police Views on Policing

Abstract

 In the Great American Gun Debate, public law enforcement have been sought-after allies for gun rights and gun control advocates alike. However, recent high-profile statements and opinion polls suggest that police increasingly hold favorable views toward gun rights: a 2017 Pew Report found that police favor gun rights over gun control by a 3-1 margin. While police support for gun rights may seem to contradict the state's interest in maintaining a monopoly on legitimate force, this paper show how a pro-gun stance can be embedded in a broader project of police legitimacy. Analyzing interviews with Arizona, California and Michigan police, I show how police draw on Second Amendment politics to assert particular boundaries around the communities they serve; to make sense of the relationships between police and civilians; and even to understand – and at times, justify – their own use of force. As such, this paper reveals the appeal of guns within US society is embedded not just in American culture or legal frameworks (as analyses of US gun politics often do) but also in the character of American statecraft and its organization of legitimate force.  

Author

• Jennifer Carlson, University of Arizona