Police bodycams in Germany between new visibility and reproduction of the police gaze

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

Abstract

The use of bodycams and the footage they capture is currently changing police work around the world, as bodycams lead to new and far-reaching forms of mediatized visibility of police actions. In the public discourse in Germany, bodycams are still mainly addressed as a promising technology to de-escalate heated situations between citizens and the police rather than a transparency tool to increase police accountability. In this paper, we aim to provide a nuanced analysis of the implementation of bodycams by looking at a case study of bodycam use by German police forces, reconstructing the production process of 'de-escalation' and the underlying assumptions, discussing bodycams as instruments situated in an ambiguous tension between de-escalation and situational overpowering. By doing so, we focus on police officers in their role as filmmakers and examine the significance of police officers video use decisions for the ongoing process of mediatization and truth-formation in public debate and court. Our paper thus contributes to a more comprehensive view of the bodycams use by police forces and, by looking at the German case, brings aspects of international bodycam use to criminological attention that are currently underrepresented.

Authors

• Jasper Janssen, Bielefeld University

• Simon Egbert, Bielefeld University