Police Professionalization and Crime Prevention: Assessing the Longitudinal Impact of National Police Accreditation on Crime

• In Event: Police Organization: Police Practice and Public Safety

Abstract

The national certification program administered by the Commission on Accreditation for Law Enforcement Agencies (CALEA) has promoted professionalism in American policing through its evolving best-practiced standards over the past four decades. While previous studies have explored various criminal justice outcomes linked to CALEA accreditation, its impact on crime reduction remains under-explored. Instead of following previous literature's cross-sectional or place-specific design, this article adopts a staggered difference-in-difference framework to study the crime reduction effects of becoming CALEA accredited across 2462 localities and 41 years in the United States. Initial results indicate a notable reduction in overall crime since accredited agencies enrolled in the accreditation program, with no significant pre-existing trends. Split-sample analyses reveal that crime reduction primarily occurs among smaller police agencies, often characterized by lower formality before accreditation and flatter structures conducive to policy implementation. Other possible mechanisms are also tested, including clearance rates, hiring patterns, and city population changes. The findings highlight the importance of promoting police professional standards in crime prevention and cast doubt on the common practice of focusing only on larger agencies in previous policing studies.

Author

• Chin-Huai Shih, University of Pennsylvania