The New Publicness of Interrogation: How Police Questioning is Changing Through Mediatization

• In Event: Visions of Policing: Accomplishing the Public Availability of Policing and the Uses and Interpretations of Video materials

Abstract

The police interrogation is a communicative form that usually takes place within the premises of the police, sometimes on the spot, but mostly as a practice that takes place ‘backstage.’ However, as it is a very relevant and key situation, embedded in the processes and trajectories of investigation, it does not only aim at generating knowledge or revealing the truth. For this reason, even in the investigative process, the public is addressed, either through the protocols, which have a public character because they are subject to deliberation in court, or because there are specific roles, such as prosecutors and lawyers, who represent the public in the situation of police interrogation (guaranteed by legal rights).

However, interrogation has recently undergone systematic changes. Not only do new strategies and guidelines move away from the idea of uncovering the truth in favour of communication and the production of reliable information in cooperation - thus avoiding the coercion that was the subject of scandals - they are also changing through mediatisation. With video recording, a practice that has been established in some countries for more than 20 years but is still relatively new in Germany, for example, the interrogation situation itself becomes a situation that is likely to be subject to public scrutiny and attention. Our presentation therefore asks how this new 'publicness' is dealt with by those involved. We look at this dimension in the 'publicness' embodied in the actions of police officers and ask how it is achieved in the interrogation situation.

Authors

• Mina Godarzani Bakhtiari, TU Berlin

• Rene Tuma, TU Berlin