This paper addresses the topic of human trafficking as a wicked problem and examines the options of applying upstream disruption as a new and victim-centred approach, as well as an effective way to fight exploitation. The root causes and societal factors are discussed, and it argues for the need to focus on upstream disruption strategies. Rather than merely addressing the immediate consequences of human trafficking, the paper examines the differences between types of exploitation and advocates for preventative measures that target the systemic structures, social norms, and inequalities that foster each type of exploitation. Through an analysis of existing frameworks and policies, this paper proposes and provides examples of multi-level interventions that engage community, legal, and educational systems to create sustainable solutions. The argument builds on the need to go beyond reactive interventions and emphasises long-term solutions that address the factors contributing to exploitation at both local and global levels.
A trauma-informed approach to policing may improve the safety and effectiveness of police–public interactions. This scoping review, guided by Arksey and O’Malley’s framework, examined how trauma-informed policing (TIP) is defined, operationalized, and supported in the literature. Interest in TIP has grown substantially, yet only 22% of studies provided an explicit definition, and few offered practical implementation guidance. Research primarily focused on youth, racialized communities, individuals with mental illness, and sexual assault survivors. Key gaps included organizational culture change, community partnerships, standardized training, implementation frameworks, and evaluation, highlighting the need for greater conceptual clarity and practical guidance.
Real-time crime centers (RTCCs) have rapidly proliferated among law enforcement agencies in the United States, becoming a central feature in modern policing. However, research on RTCCs remains limited, particularly regarding the recent surge in their development. Using data from a nationally representative survey of law enforcement agencies, this study examines the development of RTCCs and their operational characteristics. Results reveal that RTCCs continue to expand rapidly, with notable variation in their structure and operations associated with agency size and the time since RTCC initiation. Our findings provide valuable insights for researchers and practitioners seeking to understand the current RTCC landscape.
Police legitimacy and procedural justice play important roles in democratic policing for their ultimate influence on police-citizen interactions. Prior research pointed out a plausible model of procedural justice from “inside-out” in police departments, but not much is known in police academies designated to train and prepare cadets. Built upon this framework, a sample of 2050 Taiwan police cadets survey data was used to examine the mediating roles of cadets’ self-legitimacy and learning in the academy mediate the relationship between internal- and external-procedural justice, as well as explore the impacts of police career motivations (e.g., public service motivation) on the process. Structural Equation Modeling was employed to analyze the data, and the findings largely supported our hypothesized impacts of public service motivation and the intervening factors of self-legitimacy and learning in the academy. The present study contributed to theoretical development through testing the framework in a non-Western democracy and offered policy implications.
Criminometrics treats crime as an econometric object. This paper argues that such ambition cannot scale under current institutions. Crime categories are socially and legally contingent, and crime data are administrative artifacts shaped by reporting, recording, and enforcement. The result is unstable measurement and reflexive feedback that blurs predictive accuracy and fairness with policing practices. Using examples of hotspot prediction, local forecasting, and risk-scoring techniques, and reviewing statistical and causal approaches to bias and tangled cause-and-effect, the paper shows that accuracy gains are setting-specific and often optimize administration more than understanding. It concludes by urging methodological pluralism and ethical scrutiny.
The use of firearms by the police in Germany lacks systematic research, despite its significance for understanding police work and accountability. This paper examines police firearm use through exploratory research, official statistics, and civil society data sources, contextualising findings within international police research. Unlike the United States, German research shows significant gaps and relies mainly on limited official statistics. Civil society initiatives attempt to fill these gaps, but their coverage remains incomplete. The paper analyses discrepancies between data sources, identifies research gaps and concludes that systematic research programmes and improved data transparency are essential for evidence-based policy and accountability.
Police work involves daily conflicts with high potential for violence, often occurring in groups with differing values. Conflict management ranges from destructive methods, causing maximum harm and rejecting compromise, to constructive approaches that reduce escalation and promote positive relations. A field study conducted among 229 police officers sought to develop stable scales for measuring officers’ destructive and constructive tendencies, examining relationships between these scales, level of violence exhibited during Police Academy training, and relevant personality scales. The findings indicate that it is possible to construct stable scales to measure tendencies toward constructive and destructive struggle among police officers. Evidence supports the validity of the scales against levels of aggression measured by means of peer evaluation during training, as well as construct validity. This research provides a valuable tool for understanding and potentially improving conflict management approaches in policing.
Police use of force (UOF) remains a major issue in the U.S., prompting national efforts to regulate policies in law enforcement agencies (LEAs). Qualitative studies on the content, quality, and enforcement of UOF policies and training are limited. Interviews with command staff from 25 U.S. LEAs explored changes in UOF policies and training and related challenges. Agencies reported policy adjustments but faced difficulties meeting requirements due to limited resources. Changes included greater use of scenario-based and de-escalation training. The study highlights the need for evaluation of policy and training effectiveness and discusses implications for improving UOF training and policy.
This study examines the effects of organizational support on officers' attitudes toward the use of force and the protection of suspects' rights both directly and indirectly through psychological factors of self-legitimacy and moral disengagement. Based on data from a survey of 498 officers conducted in the autumn of 2022, this study reveals that organizational support has a positive total relationship with both support for force and respect suspects' rights. While its effect on respect suspects' rights is mostly direct, its influence on support for force is chiefly indirect, through increasing both self-legitimacy and moral disengagement.
Despite recognition that multi-agency collaboration is vital in missing child investigations, coordination challenges persist. This study explores mechanisms that facilitate or hinder such collaboration from police perspectives, addressing theoretical and empirical gaps in existing research. Through thematic analysis of 23 interviews, eight mechanisms were identified: understanding useful intelligence, terminology, technology, policies, role boundaries, risk aversion, dedicated resources, and research needs. By applying inter-team theories such as Transactive Memory and Knowledge Boundaries, the study advances understanding of knowledge sharing in high-risk contexts, offering actionable, theoryinformed insights to strengthen coordination, policy, and practice in safeguarding vulnerable children.
Public policies to prevent and reduce crime often emphasize the need for increased police presence in strategic locations to lower crime through their deterrent effects and ability to incapacitate offenders. This study examines the association between police module allocation and the concentration of low-impact crime. To achieve this, a two-part empirical strategy is employed to assess the effects of the territorial distribution of police modules in Mexico City. The findings show a negative association between the territorial distribution of police modules and the concentration of low-impact crime, consistent with deterrence theory and informing policy design that strategically locates police infrastructure.
Artificial intelligence (AI) is increasingly influencing how police and criminal justice systems detect, predict, and respond to crime. This systematic review synthesizes over a decade of research on AI applications, with a particular focus on policing-related applications, including crime pattern detection, predictive policing, and criminal network analysis, alongside broader judicial and correctional tools. While AI holds considerable potential for enhancing efficiency and resource allocation, it also introduces substantial ethical and legal challenges, particularly regarding algorithmic bias, opacity, and due process. Drawing on peer-reviewed studies, government reports, and critical analyses, this review maps key trends, technical innovations, and gaps in oversight. The review concludes with targeted policy recommendations and directions for future research aimed at ensuring that AI tools in policing and criminal justice promote, rather than undermine, equity, accountability, and human rights.
The mental health and wellness (MHW) of police officers is a global concern. Although many individual-level programs have been implemented in recent years to help officers cope with traumatic events, these initiatives overlook the structural-level conditions that frame how MHW is perceived in police organizations. Drawing on police culture and social identity theory, this paper argues that progress requires attention to three areas: restructuring expectations surrounding MHW in policing, redefining perceptions of officers with MHW concerns, and realigning leadership practices to prioritize organizational MHW.
Domestic violence against women is a persistent challenge for the criminal justice system and is characterized by multiple forms of physical, psychological, sexual, patrimonial and moral aggression. In Goiás State, the Midwest Region of Brazil, in 2022, 25,800 Integrated Care Records (RAIs) were recorded, indicating the magnitude of the phenomenon. This study aimed to analyse the domestic crimes committed in the family context in Goiânia/GO, the state capital, during 2022, describing the sociodemographic profile of the aggressors and examining associations between the criminal type and variables such as age group, time of day, location of crime and color/race. Data from 5,280 records were used, concentrating the analysis on 4,766 cases committed by men. Descriptive statistics, Chi-square (χ 2 ) tests with Cramér’s V effect measure and multinomial logistic regression were applied to evaluate the associations and conditional effects of the independent variables on the criminal type. The results indicate that most crimes occur on residential properties (79.4%) and at night (35.5%), with a predominance of aggressors in the 25–39 age group. The most common criminal type was threat (65.3%), followed by injury (18.4%) and bodily injury (13.0%). Analysis by color/race revealed a greater percentage of brown individuals (56.4%), which is consistent with the local demographic composition. All association tests were statistically significant but with weak magnitudes (V < 0.10), indicating the limited influence of each variable alone on the criminal type. Multinomial logistic regression revealed relevant conditional effects: crimes of bodily injury were more likely in public places, with a higher incidence among aggressors aged 18 to 29 years, whereas other criminal types predominated in older age groups. Compared with the night period, the morning period was associated with a lower relative probability of the occurrence of bodily injury. This study contributes to the detailed characterization of the profile of aggressors and the circumstances of crimes, providing empirical support for intersectoral public policies, prevention of domestic violence and action strategies of security forces in Goiás and integrating demographic, temporal and spatial dimensions of the phenomenon.
This study investigated the relationship between perceived organizational support (POS) and work engagement among Nigerian police officers, emphasizing the mediating role of organizational justice. Data were collected from 246 officers in Akoko, Ondo State, using standardized self-report measures. Hayes’ PROCESS macro with 5,000 bootstrap samples tested the mediation model. Results showed that POS and organizational justice positively predicted work engagement. Mediation analysis indicated a partial mediating effect of organizational justice in the POS–work engagement relationship. These findings highlight the importance of fairness perceptions in strengthening the positive influence of organizational support on police engagement, underscoring the need for supportive and just organizational environments to enhance officers’ motivation and well-being.
Police legitimacy is conceived as constantly being reconstituted through people’s interactions with police. Previous research on procedural justice and legitimacy has mostly focused on in-person police-community interaction. However, the increasing use of digital technologies by police has meant that more policing is done online and without face-to-face interaction with the public. Using facial recognition technology as an exemplar, this paper argues that adopting technologies using the pillars of procedural justice improves police legitimacy. Moreover, we make the case that the adoption of technologies is an act of dialogic legitimacy where police seek responses/consent from communities to guide further technology adoption.
Research on work-related trauma in criminal justice has focused on front-line officers, overlooking personnel such as analysts, secondary investigators, call takers, and forensic specialists, who are indirectly exposed to trauma. This systematic review synthesized 62 studies. Findings identified that supporting personnel face distress comparable to front-line staff, commonly experiencing Secondary Traumatic Stress, PTSD, and burnout. Risk factors included gender and low organizational support, while workplace social support and positive coping strategies, mitigated adverse outcomes. Negative coping strategies, including avoidance, exacerbated distress. Criminal justice settings need to recognize risk, foster effective coping mechanisms, and implement early interventions for supporting personnel.
This study examines the relationships between artificial intelligence capability (AIC), big data capability (BDC), and organizational impact on service innovation (SI) in policing, with a focus on how organizational impact mediates these relationships. Data from 266 police managers in Abu Dhabi and Dubai were analyzed using structural equation modeling. The findings reveal that AIC and BDC positively influence SI and organizational impact, with organizational impact also playing a mediating role. This research addresses a gap in empirical studies by demonstrating how AIC and BDC serve as essential digital capabilities driving SI within police forces.
This study investigated how psychopathic traits relate to job satisfaction and burnout in police officers. 101 Polish officers completed self-report measures for psychopathic traits, burnout, and job satisfaction. Findings indicate strong negative correlations between all psychopathy subscales and emotional exhaustion. Depersonalization also showed weak negative correlations with affective and cognitive responsiveness, and interpersonal manipulation. Conversely, personal accomplishment had moderate positive correlations with affective responsiveness and interpersonal manipulation. All psychopathy subscales strongly and positively correlated with overall job satisfaction. Results suggest that subclinical psychopathic traits may act as a protective factor against burnout and positively influence job satisfaction in police work.
Despite their centrality to police legitimacy and operational effectiveness, formal education and training remain under-researched and conceptually inchoate topics. This paper addresses this gap through a scoping review of academic literature published between 2004 and 2023. It systematically maps publication patterns, methodological approaches, disciplinary orientations, and topical and thematic foci to assess the range and character of existing research. The findings reveal key trends and blind spots, particularly regarding the design, delivery, and evaluation of instruction. By contextualizing these patterns within broader transformations in policing, the paper offers a foundation for future inquiry and more evidence-based approaches to officer development.
