Where State Meets Citizen: Tracing the Origins of ‘Sousveillance’ in American Community Policing

• In Event: POL Panel 13. Rural and Community Policing

Abstract

The current discourse surrounding policing in the United States is one that aligns quite squarely with the rhetoric espoused on either side of the two-party political system. On one side of the spectrum, an anti-police sentiment that distrusts the institution of policing as a whole, seeks to majorly restructure or defund the police, and demands accountability and sanctions for instances of wrongdoing. One the other side, a pro-police sentiment that decries so-called ‘soft-on-crime’ reforms and calls for the ousting of progressive politicians and legal practitioners. However, across all agendas and ideologies, the institution and practices of policing are undoubtedly under scrutiny. One mechanism through which the American police set out to meaningfully engage with the communities they serve and keep their finger on the pulse of citizens' needs is through community council meetings. The meetings, which developed in the 1940s as a wartime means of helping inform and prepare citizens against invasion and conflict, provide an open, 'non-partisan' forum for citizens to report local public safety and quality of life issues. This article argues that while the historical and sociopolitical landscape within which the meetings originated may have changed, the purpose of these meetings is, and always has been, inextricably linked to the notion of sousveillance (Mann, 2004). Sousveillance, which comes from the French for ‘to watch from below’ and can be contrasted with the better-known surveillance, meaning ‘to watch from above,’ builds upon existing notions within surveillance discourse to indicate a transition from more formal and hierarchical types of guardianship and responsibility (Orwellian Big Brother or Bentham’s and, later, Foucault’s Panopticism) to more decentralized, informal types. While the council meetings provide a unique partnership between State and citizen, this article questions the continuing, and potentially problematic, impact of positioning citizens as the eyes and ears of the police.

Author

• Julia Mireille Rootenberg, Van Vollenhoven Institute, Leiden Law School