Report - Guardian

122 The LSE Identity Project Report: June 2005first police commissioner explicitly articulated in connection with the issue of authority.The principles of policing in Britain are based upon flexibility – or discretion – in theexecution of the law, giving primacy to common rather than statutory law. Greatreliance is placed on professional competence within police forces.Mobile technologies may give officers exceptional coordinating and documentingpower whilst promoting an internal accountability through the surveillance of policeaction. But they also displace the rules of engagement with society and promote amechanistic, administration-oriented form of law enforcement, dwarfing the essential –and subtle – peacekeeping function that communities seek. 325Social control is a property of states of social relations and not a thing imposed from theoutside. Thus:“the police ultimately depend on the voluntary compliance of mostcitizens with their authority…the combination of strength and restraintbecame the foundation of the London Bobby’s public image.” 326Although it might be argued that mobile technologies have not entirely removeddiscretion, it is precisely because of the symbolic value of these technologies thatdiscretion might be at risk. As argued by many researchers 327 , police officers tend to actin a different way when they feel they are being observed – be it by fellow officers,other citizens or the media. Usually their behaviour, when under surveillance, tendstowards a standardised imposition of order. This may lead to mechanistically stoppingand demanding fingerprints or iris scans merely because the technology is available andthe law appears to encourage such conduct.By comparison, the American system, from which most technological innovations inpolicing are borrowed, has always been action oriented and predicated upon perceptionsof the public as a dangerous adversary. 328 It is not a leap of imagination to assume thatwe are slowly transforming our own police toward the American system, particularly aswe adopt American techniques and technologies. We are driven by the spectre of fearthrough the narrative of dangerous stories. 329 It is common to think of police work interms of the most extreme incidents they attend; however, these represent a small part ofthe work of a police officer, and such scenarios should not form the basis upon whichtechnologies are designed and built.This is not to suggest that police should do away with mobile – or other – technologiesthat may facilitate the act of peacekeeping. However, it is within the use, or envisageduse, that the problems of particular technologies lay. There may be some essential partsof the police function where the use of technology should not be encouraged.While a technological attitude on an abstract level may makes perfect sense in a policebureaucracy, the perception that all use of technology is good tends to obscure the325 Goldstein, H. (1964). ‘Police Discretion: The Ideal vs. the Real.’ Public Administration Review(23): 140-148.Goldstein, H. (1990). Problem-oriented policing. Philadelphia, Temple University Press.326 Newburn T (2004) Policing: Key readings. London, Willan Publishing page 32 .327 Manning, P. K. (2003). Policing contingencies. Chicago, University of Chicago Press328 Manning, P. K. (1997). Police work : the social organization of policing. Prospect Heights, Ill., Waveland Press.329 e.g. Glassner B (2000) The Culture of Fear. Basic Books.