ABSTRACT
The previous chapter catalogued some of the potential causes of ethnic disproportionality in the distribution and experience of police stops. Explanations ranged from the idea that police activity will be concentrated in areas with high levels of crime – which might also have larger ethnic minority populations – to the possible existence of various forms of discrimination within the police service. Discussion of ethnic disproportionality also opened up some of the wider issues that are likely to surround this particular application of police power. We can now turn to the immediate issue of the distribution of police stops experiences across England and Wales as they are recorded in the CSEW. What, then, might we expect to find in this data? Drawing on the research described in Chapter 4, a number of hypotheses will guide the analysis. I expect that, first, people from some ethnic minority groups – particularly black ethnic groups – will be more likely to be stopped by police than those from a white ethnic group. Not only does the recorded data strongly suggest this will be the case but so do ideas about the nature of police discrimination and stereotyping, conflict theories, and group threat; as well, of course, as over 40 years of research into policing. Given this convergence of perspectives, it might be expected that the association between an individual’s ethnicity and their probability of experiencing a police stops will be robust to any number of statistical controls. Even controlling for people’s behaviours, it seems reasonable to hypothesize that people from ethnic minority groups will still be more likely to be stopped than their white counterparts. Second, I expect that people from disadvantaged social categories will, for similar reasons, be more likely to be stopped by police. This effect, too, should be independent of statistical controls. This hypothesis relates to the idea, developed in the preceding chapters, that policing is concerned with controlling and regulating forms of marginality other than simply those relating to race/ethnicity. Following the ‘usual suspects’ argument, I also expect people who have been experienced one mode of stop are also more likely to have experienced the other. Third, people’s ‘routine activities’ (e.g. time spent out of home, visiting pubs and night clubs) will be associated with the probability that they experience police stops. This general hypothesis relates to the availability thesis – certain behaviours make people more visible or available to police, and they are, on that
basis alone, more likely to be stopped. More specifically, I also expect that drug use will predict an individual’s probability of being stopped/searched. Fourth, it seems likely that police stop activity will be concentrated in areas with higher crime, hence, people living in those areas will be more likely to be stopped irrespective of their personal characteristics and behaviour. This hypothesis is really claiming little more than that all else equal police will use street stops, in particular, in areas where there is more crime as a response to that crime. Fifth, independent of crime levels, police stop activity will be concentrated in more disadvantaged, disorderly areas; which is in part to claim that stop and search has a social disciplinary function that extends beyond ‘fighting crime’. Sixth, police stop activity will be higher in areas with, in particular, larger black populations. The disproportionate targeting of police stop activity at ethnic minority groups should play out at the area as well as the individual level. Seventh, in light of the well-established (in the United States) ‘race out of place’ thesis, I expect that people from visible ethnic minority groups will be more likely to be stopped by police if they live in areas with larger majority group populations. Eighth, and finally, I expect that the same characteristics that predict a higher chance of being stopped will also predict a greater chance of being searched once stopped. In as much as police stops comprise ‘general surveillance and control’ (Lea 2003: 63) then a search following a stop indicates if nothing else a higher level of such attention. A search is a stronger intervention than a mere stop, and should therefore be directed more consistently toward those groups ‘in need’ of social control. Equally, implicit bias and stereotyping that affects the judgement of individual officers in terms of the decision on whom to stop should also affect their behaviour during the stop, particularly in regard to the need for a more intrusive search.
