Independent Police Complaint Bodies as voluntarily weak organisations: observations from four years of research over five different democratic countries

• In Event: Independent Police Complaints Bodies: Results of Cross-Country Comparative Research on Police Accountability

Abstract

Independent police complaint mechanisms emerged relatively late in the history of police-public relations in democracies, around the mid-1980s (Prenzler & Ronken, 2001). By then, the longstanding practice of police investigating their own misconduct no longer seemed sufficient to address citizens’ complaints about alleged misconduct and unethical behaviour. Independent Police Complaint Bodies (IPCBs) were introduced as a solution –
not only to ensure that grievances were properly addressed and officers held accountable, but also, more broadly, to drive cultural change within police institutions and improve public trust. However, findings from an international study conducted across five democratic countries over the past four years suggest that these expectations have largely not been met. Most of the IPCBs examined in our research suffer from (1) a lack of real sanctioning power, (2) limited influence on police professional culture, (3) difficulty maintaining full independence from police organisations, and (4) a significant gap between political promises and actual outcomes. At their core, these shortcomings stem from systematic underfunding and chronic resource constraints, which undermine their ability to function effectively. This presentation will explore key contradictions in how IPCBs operate and examine the political forces that may explain why these limitations persist – and who ultimately benefits from them.

Author

• Marc Alain, Université du Québec à Trois-Rivières