ABSTRACT
This chapter reviews the definition of organised crime and examines the dimensions of the British organised crime threat and subject to scrutiny the institutions which are involved in its construction and its policing. It explores the social construction of organised crime, and its policing as a social problem. In 1992, the Conservative government elected to set up the National Criminal Intelligence Service (NCIS), and with the 1997 Police Act created the National Crime Squad (NCS), which took over from existing regional crime squads in 1998. Eight years later the New Labour government founded the Serious Organised Crime Agency (SOCA), an intelligence-led agency with law-enforcement powers and national and international reach. In 2013 the Conservative-Liberal Coalition government replaced SOCA with the National Crime Agency (NCA), an institution with unprecedented policing authority. Social construction indicates that no crime is fixed or simply given, but it relates to social norms and values.
