History of Policing in America

Just like anything else, policing has a long history with different eras.  These include the Political Era, the Professional Era and today's Community Problem Solving Era.

The Political Era
It is called the Political Era because this is when politicians had the power to appoint who they wanted to be police officers.  This lead to corruption within the ranks of the police.  Many people who were chosen to be police officers by elected officials were people who helped get them elected.  The elected officials owed them a favor so they made them police officers.  This also meant that police officers would turn a blind eye to anything these politicians may have been doing.

The Professional Era
It is called the Professional Era because this is when policing finally started becoming a profession instead of gifts from politicians.  These people actually went through training and policing was their career.  During this era there was a lot of focus on fighting crime.  They wanted to arrest as many criminals as they could.  The police during this era cared only about arrest rates and not the community as a whole.

Community Problem Solving Era
This brings us to the Community Problem Solving Era.  This is the era we are currently in.  During the Community Problem Solving Era police have begun to focus on the community as a whole.  Instead of focusing solely on arresting individuals and crime fighting they look at the bigger problem and try to fix that instead, because if they get rid of the problem crime will stop.  During this era police try and work with their communities.  They share information on how to deter crime and they communicate with members of the community to see if they have noticed anything suspicious.

Policing has come a long ways in its time.  I think that today's approach is by far the most effective way for policing to serve its community.  Law enforcement cannot be every where at once so they rely on the communities to be their eyes and ears.  With the help of their communities police can be much more effective.                

The Problem Analysis Triangle

One of the most effective ways to analyze a problem is by using the problem solving analysis triangle.

According to Peak and Glensor "the problem analysis triangle helps officers visualize the problem and understand the relationship between 3 elements" (89).  The three elements are require for a problem or crime to occur.


The first element needed is the offender.  This is the person or persons that commit the crime.  The second element needed would be the victim or victims that the offender victimizes.  The last element needed for the problem analysis triangle is a place or location.  This is a location that crime can occur.

The problem analysis triangle works on the basis that if police can just change on the elements on the triangle then no crime will occur.  Lets say that law enforcement uses the crime prevention through environmental design to change a dark alley into a well lighted area that you can easily see from the street.  Law enforcement has taken the location away from the offender so no crime can occur there now and the problem is solved.  This also work with the other two elements.  If police arrest the offenders crimes will stop occurring or if they convince potential victims to no go to certain locations then there will be no one that can get victimized.

There is one more triangle that can be placed outside the original and main one.  The second triangle contains handlers, guardians and managers.  Handlers are usually parents, teachers or neighbors.  These are people that want to help try and convince the offenders to stop what they are doing and to help them.  Guardians are people that have control over one of the elements in the triangle.  These people include law enforcement, parents and probation or parole officers.  Managers are the people that focus on the locations.  This includes property owners and managers of stores in the area.

As you can see there are many different people that can have an effect on one element of the problem and prevent crimes from occurring.  By changing one element of the triangle a person can easily prevent crimes from occurring there.