Exploring Neighbourhood Dynamics and Policing: A Study from Delhi, India

• In Event: Neighbourhood policing in transition: perspectives from the police and the public

Abstract

Neighbourhood dynamics are essential in fostering social cohesion, trust, and a shared sense of community identity. Police and experiences of policing are linked to perceptions of neighbourhood and community (Jackson & Bradford, 2009; Kwak & McNeeley, 2017). This means that police serve not only as enforcers of law and order but also as vital mediators of neighbourhood cohesion, belonging, and a sense of community as representatives of society. However, police, through daily, mundane interactions with civilians, communicate whether they belong or not and create social differences and hierarchies (Bradford, 2014, 2016; Loader, 1997, 2006). Against this background, dawning on semi-structured interviews, this paper examines resident’s idea of police-neighbourhood relations in one marginalised urban area of Delhi, India. This will account for residents’ experience with the police and what they expected from the police. It will also explore how these experiences and expectations are shaped by markers of social inequality (caste, class, religion, and gender) in multicultural societies like India.

Author

• Deep Chand, University of Tübingen