Kristian Williams - Our Enemies in Blue - Police and Power in America

whereas even the rookie patrolman soon learns the art of camouflaging bothinefficiency and policy infractions. In this sense, not only does the individualofficer, acting in an isolated instance, make a subjective judgment as to howhe should intervene in a particular situation, but when these discretionaryjudgments are made by officers on a wholesale basis, as they frequently are,it takes on the character of administrative and policy decisions being made byofficers at the lowest level of the hierarchy. 171'The careful tension between departmental policy and officer autonomy hasits benefits for both the commanders and the line officers. Though police regulationsdo notoriously little to actually regulate officer conduct, they do providea layer of plausible deniability between commanders and the routine activitiesof their troops. That is, the rules help to insulate commanders from responsibilityfor misconduct while at the same time police unions defend the rank and filefrom meaningful discipline. This arrangement allows for the formal appearanceof a rigorous command and control while maintaining maximum discretionat the lowest levels of the organization. The command staff can minimize thecriticism it faces through the manipulation of formal policies and bureaucraticshuffling, but concessions granted at this level need not affect much of whathappens on the street.Of course, discipline does exist and can be quite stringent when it comesto certain procedural or organizational matters-scheduling, the chain of command,uniforms, budgets, and so on. But both discipline and discretion existwithin carefully proscribed bounds according to the needs and aims of theinstitution. Discipline fails and discretion is preserved in those areas where it ismost convenient for the department that it be so-that is, when the police comeinto contact with the public. The public cares very little about whether cops areissued light blue or dark blue shirts, whether they stand at attention duringroll call, whether they work eight or ten-hour shifts, art w:'lJdlcl1eJ ill lJairsor alone, etc.-but these are just the sort of matters over which managementexercises the most control. Those elements with which the public is especiallyconcerned-when and how force is used, how the police deal with a noisy butpeaceful drunk, the basis on which people arc treated with suspicion-theseare left to the individual officer's discretion.Here is a convenient rule of thumb: police will be disciplined when their behaviorthreatens the smooth operation of the institution. But there is a corollary tothis: to the degree that officers collectively control the department, discipline willbe weaker, as elites will have to bargain for access to the institution's power. Thisis one effect of police unionization.Police labor action reminds local governments that they have created forthemselves a rival to their own power. Unlike private-sector strikes, whichthreaten the bosses' ability to make a profit, public worker strikes threaten thelocal government's ability to provide services or, in the case of the police, torule. They work by disrupting the city government's access to the institutionsby which it achieves its ends. While a sit-down strike may raise the specterof workers controlling industry-since there is a natural continuum betweenworkers shutting down a plant, occupying it, and running it themselves-analogousactions by the police would fall on a different continuum and foreshadow142