Police, politics, and culture in a deeply divided society

Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology

Volumn 98, Issue 3, 2008, Pages 1119-1145

  Hasisi, Badi ^a  

^a HEBREW UNIVERSITY OF JERUSALEM   (Israel)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 62149134909     PISSN: 00914169     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: None     Document Type: Review

References (70)

1. See JOHN D. BREWER, BLACK AND BLUE: POLICING IN SOUTH AFRICA (1994) [hereinafter BREWER, BLACK AND BLUE]; RONALD WEITZER, POLICING UNDER FIRE: ETHNIC CONFLICT AND POLICE-COMMUNITY RELATIONS IN NORTHERN IRELAND (1995) [hereinafter WEITZER, POLICING UNDER FIRE]; RONALD WEITZER, TRANSFORMING SETTLER STATES: COMMUNAL CONFLICT AND INTERNAL SECURITY IN NORTHERN IRELAND AND ZIMBABWE (1990) [hereinafter WEITZER, TRANSFORMING SETTLER STATES]; John D. Brewer, Policing in Divided Societies: Theorizing a Type of Policing, 1 POLICING & SocΎ 179 (1991).
2. See, e.g., DAVID H. BAYLEY & HAROLD MENDELSOHN, MINORITIES AND THE POLICE: CONFRONTATION IN AMERICA (1969); ROBERT BLAUNER, RACIAL OPPRESSION IN AMERICA (1972); RANDALL KENNEDY, RACE, CRIME, AND THE LAW (1997); AUSTIN T. TURK, CRIMINALITY AND LEGAL ORDER (1969); SAMUEL WALKER, THE POLICE IN AMERICA: AN INTRODUCTION (3d ed. 1999); Scott H. Decker, Citizen Attitudes Toward the Police: A Review of Past Findings and Suggestions for Future Policy, 9 J. POLICE SCI. & ADMIN. 80 (1981); Joe R. Feagin, The Continuing Significance of Race: Antiblack Discrimination in Public Places, 56 AM. SOC. REV. 101 (1991); Simon Holdaway, Police Race Relations in England and Wales: Theory, Policy, and Practice, 7 POLICE & SocΎ 49 (2003); David Jacobs & Ronald Helms, Collective Outbursts, Politics, and Punitive Resources: Toward a Political Sociology of Spending on Social Control, 11 Soc. FORCES 1497 (1999); Michael D. Reisig & Roger B. Parks, Experience, Quality of Life, and Neighborhood Context: A Hierarchical Analysis of Satisfaction with Police, 17 JUST. Q. 607 (2000); Tom R. Tyler, Policing in Black and White: Ethnic Group Differences in Trust and Confidence in the Police, 8 POLICE Q. 322 (2005); Ronald Weitzer & Steven A. Tuch, Race and Perceptions of Police Misconduct, 51 Soc. PROBS. 305 (2004).
3. E.g., HUBERT M. BLALOCK, JR., TOWARD A THEORY OF MINORITY-GROUP RELATIONS (1967); PAMELA IRVING JACKSON, MINORITY GROUP THREAT, CRIME, AND POLICING: SOCIAL CONTEXT AND SOCIAL CONTROL (1989); Lawrence Bobo & Vincent L. Hutchings, Perceptions of Racial Group Competition: Extending Blumer's Theory of Group Position to a Multiracial Social Context, 61 AM. SOC. REV. 951 (1996); Feagin, supra note 2; Malcolm D. Holmes, Minority Threat and Police Brutality: Determinants of Civil Rights Criminal Complaints in U.S. Municipalities, 38 CRIMINOLOGY 343 (2000); Karen F. Parker et al., Racial Threat, Concentrated Disadvantage and Social Control: Considering the Macro-Level Sources of Variation in Arrests, 43 CRIMINOLOGY 1111 (2005); Lincoln Quillian & Devah Pager, Black Neighbors, Higher Crime? The Role of Racial Stereotypes in Evaluations of Neighborhood Crime, 107 AM. J. SOC. 717 (2001).
4. See, e.g., CLIFFORD R. SHAW & HENRY D. MCKAY, JUVENILE DELINQUENCY AND URBAN AREAS: A STUDY OF RATES OF DELINQUENTS IN RELATION TO DIFFERENTIAL CHARACTERISTICS OF LOCAL COMMUNITIES IN AMERICAN CITIES (1942).
5. E.g., Richard Block, Community, Environment, and Violent Crime, 17 CRIMINOLOGY 46 (1979); Robert J. Sampson & W. Byron Groves, Community Structure and Crime: Testing Social-Disorganization Theory, 94 AM. J. Soc. 774 (1989).
6. See Rodney Stark, Deviant Places: A Theory of the Ecology of Crime, 25 CRIMINOLOGY 893 (1987).
7. RONALD WEITZER & STEVEN A. TUCH, RACE AND POLICING IN AMERICA: CONFLICT AND REFORM (2006); BRIAN L. WITHROW, RACIAL PROFILING: FROM RHETORIC TO REASON (2006).
8. E.g., HUNG-EN SUNG, THE FRAGMENTATION OF POLICING IN AMERICAN CITIES: TOWARD AN ECOLOGICAL THEORY OF POLICE-CITIZEN RELATIONS (2002).
9. See BENJAMIN BOWLING, VIOLENT RACISM: VICTIMIZATION, POLICING AND SOCIAL CONTEXT (1998); Harry Blagg & Giulietta Valuri, Aboriginal Community Patrols in Australia: Self-Policing, Self-Determination and Security, 14 POLICING & SocΎ 313 (2004).
10. Edna Erez et al., Introduction: Policing a Multicultural Society, 7 POLICE & SocΎ (SPECIAL ISSUE) 5 (2003); Lorraine Mazerolle et al, Policing the Plight of Indigenous Australians: Past Conflicts and Present Challenges, 7 POLICE & SocΎ (SPECIAL ISSUE) 77 (2003).
11. See, e.g., MIKE BROGDEN & CLIFFORD SHEARING, POLICING FOR A NEW SOUTH AFRICA (1993); DONATELLA DELLA PORT A, SOCIAL MOVEMENTS, POLITICAL VIOLENCE, AND THE STATE: A COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF ITALY AND GERMANY (1995); JOHN MCGARRY & BRENDAN O'LEARY, POLICING NORTHERN IRELAND: PROPOSALS FOR A NEW START (1999); RICHARD MAPSTONE, POLICING IN A DIVIDED SOCIETY: A STUDY OF PART TIME POLICING IN NORTHERN IRELAND (1994); WEITZER, POLICING UNDER FIRE, supra note 1; JOHN WHYTE, INTERPRETING NORTHERN IRELAND (1990); Graham Ellison & Greg Martin, Policing, Collective Action and Social Movement Theory: The Case of Northern Ireland Civil Rights Campaign, 51 BRIT. J. SOC. 681 (2000).
12. For more research on deeply divided societies, see AREND LIJPHART, PATTERNS OF DEMOCRACY: GOVERNMENT FORMS AND PERFORMANCE IN THIRTY-SIX COUNTRIES (1999); Sammy Smooha & Theodor Hanf, The Diverse Modes of Conflict-Regulation in Deeply Divided Societies, 33 INT'L J. COMP. SOC. 26 (1992); Pierre L. Van Den Bereghe, Multicultural Democracy: Can It Work?, 8 NATIONS & NATIONALISM 433 (2002).
13. For further elaboration, see THE FATE OF ETHNIC DEMOCRACY IN POST-COMMUNIST EUROPE (Sammy Smooha & Priit Järve eds., 2005) (discussing "ethnic democracy").
14. WEITZER, POLICING UNDER FIRE, supra note 1.
15. GRAHAM ELLISON & JIM SMYTH, THE CROWNED HARP: POLICING NORTHERN IRELAND (2000); AOGAN MULCAHY, POLICING NORTHERN IRELAND: CONFLICT, LEGITIMACY AND REFORM (2006); WEITZER, POLICING UNDER FIRE, supra note 1; Andrew Goldsmith, Policing Weak States: Citizen Safety and State Responsibility, 13 POLICING & SocΎ 3 (2003).
16. DELLA PORTA, supra note 11; MERCEDES S. HINTON, THE STATE ON THE STREETS: POLICE AND POLITICS IN ARGENTINA AND BRAZIL (2006); P. A. J. WADDINGTON, LIBERTY AND ORDER: PUBLIC ORDER POLICING IN A CAPITAL CITY (1994); Vince Boudreau, Precarious Regimes and Matchup Problems in the Explanation of Repressive Policy, in REPRESSION AND MOBILIZATION 33 (Christian Davenport et al. eds., 2005); Ellison & Martin, supra note 11.
17. See BLALOCK, supra note 3; BOWLING, supra note 9; JACKSON, supra note 3; Feagin, supra note 2; Holmes, supra note 3; Stephanie L. Kent & David Jacobs, Minority Threat and Police Strength from 1980 to 2000: A Fixed-Effects Analysis of Nonlinear and Interactive Effects in Large U.S. Cities, 43 CRIMINOLOGY 731 (2005); Gustavo S. Mesch & Ilan Talmud, The Influence of Community Characteristics on Police Performance in a Deeply Divided Society: The Case of Israel, 31 Soc. Focus 233 (1998).
18. See MCGARRY & O'LEARY, supra note 11; MULCAHY, supra note 15; WEITZER, POLICING UNDER FIRE, supra note 1; WEITZER, TRANSFORMING SETTLER STATES, supra note 1.
19. WEITZER, POLICING UNDER FIRE, supra note 1.
20. BREWER, BLACK AND BLUE, supra note 1; WEITZER, POLICING UNDER FIRE, supra note 1.
21. A patrilocal residence is one in which the family unit lives near the male relations. The concept of location may extend to a larger area such as a village, town, or clan area.
22. Majid al-Haj, Ethnic Relations in an Arab Town in Israel, in STUDIES IN ISRAELI ETHNICITY: AFTER THE INGATHERING (Alex Weingrod ed., 1985).
23. JOSEPH GINAT, BLOOD REVENGE: FAMILY HONOR, MEDIATION AND OUTCASTING (1997); BRYNJAR LIA, A POLICE FORCE WITHOUT A STATE: A HISTORY OF THE PALESTINIAN SECURITY FORCES IN THE WEST BANK AND GAZA (2006); Manar Hasan, The Politics of Honor: Patriarchy, the State and the Murder of Women in the Name of Family Honor, 21 J. ISRAELI HIST. 1 (2002).
24. See STANLEY COHEN, INT'L CENTRE FOR PEACE IN THE MIDDLE EAST, CRIME, LAW, AND SOCIAL CONTROL AMONG THE ARABS IN ISRAEL (1990); LIA, supra note 23; Ginat, supra note 23.
25. See Smooha & Hanf, supra note 12; Ghazi Falah, Living Together Apart: Residential Segregation in Mixed Arab-Jewish Cities in Israel, 33 URB. STUD. 23 (1996).
26. See DENNIS P. FORCESE, POLICING CANADIAN SOCIETY (1992); Jharna Chatterjee & Liz Elliott, Restorative Policing in Canada: The Royal Canadian Mounted Police, Community Justice Forums, and the Youth Criminal Justice Act, 4 POLICE PRAC. & RES. 347 (2003); Mazerolle et al., supra note 10.
27. Wing Hong Chui & Lai-Kwan Regin Ip, Policing in a Multicultural Society: A Queensland Case Study, 6 POLICE PRAC. & RES. 279 (2005); Eric D. Poole & Mark R. Pogrebin, Crime and Law Enforcement in the Korean American Community, 13 POLICE STUD. INT'L REV. POLICE DEV. 57 (1990).
28. IMMIGRATION AND CRIME: RACE, ETHNICITY, AND VIOLENCE (Ramiro Martinez, Jr., & Abel Valenzuela, Jr., eds., 2006); Stephen Egharevba, African Immigrants' Perception of Police in Finland: Is It Based on the Discourse of Race or Culture?, 34 INT'L J. SOC. L. 42 (2006); Lars Holmberg & Britta Kyvsgaard, Are Immigrants and Their Descendants Discriminated Against in the Danish Criminal Justice System?, 4 J. SCANDINAVIAN STUD. CRIMINOLOGY & CRIME PREVENTION 125 (2003); David J. Smith, Ethnic Origins, Crime, and Criminal Justice in England and Wales, in ETHNICITY, CRIME, AND IMMIGRATION: COMPARATIVE AND CROSS- NATIONAL PERSPECTIVES 101 (Michael H. Tonryed., 1997).
29. Robert C. Davis et al., Immigrants and the Criminal Justice System: An Exploratory Study, 13 VIOLENCE & VICTIMS 21 (1998); Robert C. Davis & Nicole J. Henderson, Willingness to Report Crimes: The Role of Ethnic Group Membership and Community Efficacy, 49 CRIME & DELINQ. 564 (2003); Cecilia Menjivar & Cynthia L. Bejarano, Latino Immigrants' Perceptions of Crime and Police Authorities in the United States: A Case Study from the Phoenix Metropolitan Area, 27 ETHNIC & RACIAL STUD. 120 (2004).
30. The so-called Green Line is the 1949 Armistice line established following the war of 1948; later it became known as the pre-1967 border in order to demarcate the Arab territories occupied following the 1967 War (the West Bank, Gaza strip, East Jerusalem, and the Golan Heights). My use of the term the "Arabs in Israel" excludes the Palestinians in East Jerusalem and the Druze in the Golan Heights. If we chose to include these groups, then the Arabs in Israel would constitute about 19.9% (1.43 million) of the State of Israel's population. CENT. BUREAU OF STATISTICS, ANNUAL POPULATION REPORT, 2003 (2006).
31. SAMMY SMOOHA, INDEX OF ARAB-JEWISH RELATIONS IN ISRAEL (2004).
32. Falah, supra note 25.
33. Sammy Smooha, The Arab Minority in Israel: Radicalization or Politicization?, in ISRAEL: STATE AND SOCIETY, 1948-1988: STUDIES IN CONTEMPORARY JEWRY (Peter Y. Medding ed., 1989); see also Smooha & Hanf, supra note 12.
34. According to the Israeli Central Bureau of Statistics, the ethnic distribution of the Arab population is as follows: a majority (65%) are non-Bedouin Muslims, 9% are Christians, 9% are Druze, and 17% are Bedouins. The majority of the Bedouins reside in the southern police district, while the majority of Druze and Christians reside in the Northern District. CENTRAL BUREAU OF STATISTICS, supra note 30.
35. The Druze are a religious community, considered to be an offshoot of the Ismaili Islam, found primarily in Lebanon, Israel, and Syria. In Israel, the Druze are the only Arabs who are allowed to fight for the Israel Defense Forces, and many of them serve in the Israeli police.
36. Sammy Smooha, Part of the Problem and Part of the Solution: National Security and the Arab Minority, in NATIONAL SECURITY AND DEMOCRACY IN ISRAEL 81 (Y. Avner ed., 1993).
37. Hillel Frisch, The Druze Minority in the Israeli Military: Traditionalizing an Ethnic Policing Role, 20 ARMED FORCES & Soc. 53 (1993).
38. Amalia Sa'ar, Carefully on the Margins: Christian Palestinians in Haifa Between Nation and State, 25 AM. ETHNOLOGIST 215, 215-16 (1998).
39. V. Kraus & Y. Yonay, The Power and Limits of Ethnonationalism: Palestinians and Eastern Jews in Israel, 1974-1991, 51 BRIT. J. SocΎ 550 (2000). The Christian schools in Israel have a reputation as elite schools and of offering a better quality of education than public Arab schools. Sa'ar, supra note 38, at 217-18.
40. Sa'ar, supra note 38, at 231.
41. The Border Police was established in 1953 with the main function of preventing terrorist sabotage activities and the infiltration of Palestinians from neighboring Arab countries. COHEN, supra note 24. Over the years, this unit has become semi-militaristic and has come to deal mostly with public order policing. Arab protest in Israel has a traumatic and violent history of encounters with the Border Police. Furthermore, the Border Police is very active in the Palestinian territories, especially in policing terrorism, patrolling, and public order policing. These activities have given it a very negative reputation among Arabs in Israel. See Badi Hasisi & Ronald Weitzer, Police Relations with Arabs and Jews in Israel, 47 BRγγ. J. CRIMINOLOGY 728 (2007).
42. OR COMM'N, REPORT OF THE STATE COMMISSION OF INQUIRY TO INVESTIGATE THE CLASHES BETWEEN THE SECURITY FORCES AND ISRAELI CITIZENS IN OCTOBER 2000 (2003).
43. Hasisi & Weitzer, supra note 41, at 740-42 (2007); Arye Rattner, The Margins of Justice: Attitudes Towards the Law and the Legal System Among Jews and Arabs in Israel, 4 INT'L J. PUB. OPINION RES. 358 (1994); David Weisburd et al., Community Policing in Israel: Resistance and Change, 25 POLICING 80 (2002).
44. IRA CAHANMAN & TAMAR TZEMACH, ISRAELI POLICE IN THE EYE OF THE PUBLIC: ATTITUDES ON SELECTED ISSUES (1991).
45. ARYE RATTNER & DANA YAGIL, THE CULTURE OF LAW: THE CRIMINAL JUSTICE SYSTEM IN THE EYE OF THE ISRAELI SOCIETY (2002).
46. Bedouin Arabs were excluded from the sample due to their small number in the Northern District.
47. See Table 1.
48. See Table 3.
49. B. Brown & W. Benedict, Perceptions of the Police: Past Findings, Methodological Issues, Conceptual Issues, and Policy Implications, 25 POLICING 543, 554 (2002).
50. Allen E. Liska et al., Fears of Crime as a Social Fact, 60 Soc. FORCES 760 (1982).
51. See Brown & Benedict, supra note 49; Mary Holland Baker et al., The Impact of a Crime Wave: Perceptions, Fear, and Confidence in the Police, 17 Law & SocΎ REV. 319 (1983).
52. This variable was measured for Arab respondents only.
53. This variable is labeled police-community clash.
54. See Table 1.
55. John Brewer, Policing, in THE ELUSIVE SEARCH FOR PEACE: SOUTH AFRICA, ISRAEL, AND NORTHERN IRELAND (H. Gilomee & J. Gagiano eds., 1990); see BREWER, BLACK AND BLUE, supra note 1; WEITZER, POLICING UNDER FIRE, supra note 1.
56. See Table 6.
57. Variance Inflation Factor (VIF) was conducted to verify if any independent variable in the model is a linear function of other independent variables. VIF values were less than two among all variables in the models.
58. See Hasisi & Weitzer, supra note 41.
59. See Brown & Benedict, supra note 49.
60. NOH LEWIN-EPSTEIN & MOSHE SEMYONOV, THE ARAB MINORITY IN ISRAEL'S ECONOMY: PATTERNS OF ETHNIC INEQUALITY (1993).
61. See Brown & Benedict, supra note 49.
62. See WOMEN AGAINST VIOLENCE, ATTITUDES TOWARDS THE STATUS AND RIGHTS OF PALESTINIAN WOMEN IN ISRAEL (2006); Hasan, supra note 23; Nadera Shalhoub-Kevorkian, Law, Politics, and Violence Against Women: a Case Study of Palestinians in Israel, 21 LAW & POLύ 190, 196(1999).
63. See Hasisi & Weitzer, supra note 41.
64. Robert J. Kaminski & Eric S. Jefferis, The Effect of a Violent Televised Arrest on Public Perceptions of the Police, 21 POLICING 683 (1998); Ronald Weitzer & Steven A. Tuch, Perceptions of Racial Profiling: Race, Class, and Personal Experience, 40 CRIMINOLOGY 435 (2002).
65. Blagg & Valuri, supra note 9.
66. MINISTRY OF PUB. SEC, STATE OF ISRAEL, PUBLIC ATTITUDES TOWARDS THE ISRAELI POLICE (2002); MINISTRY OF PUB. SEC, STATE OF ISRAEL, PUBLIC ATTITUDES TOWARDS THE ISRAELI POLICE (2001); RAFI SMITH, KEREN SHARVIT & SMITH CONSULTING & RESEARCH INC., PUBLIC ATTITUDES TOWARDS THE ISRAELI POLICE: EXECUTIVE SUMMARY (2000); MINISTRY OF PUB. SEC, STATE OF ISRAEL, PUBLIC ATTITUDES TOWARDS THE ISRAELI POLICE (1999).
67. David Weisburd, Magic and Science in Multivariate Sentencing Models: Reflecting on the Limits of Statistical Methods, 35 ISRAEL L. REV. 225 (2001).
68. Janet Chan, Changing Police Culture, 36 BRIT. J. CRIMINOLOGY 109 (1996).
69. Although non-Bedouin Muslims compose about 12% of the Israeli population, their representation in the police force is less than 2%. See Hasisi & Weitzer, supra note 41.
70. INDEP. COMM'N ON POLICING FOR NORTHERN IRELAND, A NEW BEGINNING: POLICING IN NORTHERN IRELAND 81-90 (1999).