Cultural Competency Training/Sensitivity Training

Demographic Shifts Create Challenges to Police

Communities within the United States are experiencing dramatic demographic shifts as the birth rates of African Americans and Latinos outnumber those of Caucasians; waves of immigrants, refugees, and undocumented aliens seek new opportunities; and international terrorism concerns increase. The impact of these and other demographic shifts are daunting challenges to training police officers to effectively serve their diverse and multicultural communities.

The U.S. Commerce Department's Census Bureau estimates that the nation's foreign-born population in 2003 numbered 32.5 million, or 11.5% of the total U.S. population. It further reported that many individuals living in the United States are not proficient in speaking, reading, writing, or understanding English. More than 26 million individuals speak Spanish, and nearly 7 million individuals speak an Asian or Pacific Island language at home. Twenty-six percent of all Spanish speakers, 29.9% of all Chinese speakers, and 28.2% of all Vietnamese speakers reported to the Census Bureau that they either could not speak English well or could not speak it at all.

In addition to verbal language, functional literacy on the part of Americans is also a great concern to police. A 1993 national adult literacy survey found that 22% of adult Americans perform at the lowest reading and writing skill levels.

The implications of these demographic changes for policing are extensive. Officers may misread cultural cues if they are unfamiliar with the practices or beliefs of a certain immigrant community. For instance, an officer may assess a person's lack of eye contact during an interaction as an indication of bashfulness or deceit. In the United States, direct eye contact is viewed as a sign of confidence and honesty, but in fact, eye contact is culturally specific, and in certain Asian and Latino cultures, eyes are kept down to show respect to an authority figure. Similarly, an officer reviewing a statement with a crime victim may judge that individual to be noncompliant because he or she refuses to sign a statement, when in fact, illiteracy may be the issue.

Concerns over establishing effective police–community relations with new immigrant groups and communities of color are no longer limited to urban areas within the United States. Different cultural and ethnic groups are settling in small cities and rural sections of the country as well, forcing their police agencies to share the challenge of larger departments of developing relations and serving populations with whom they are unfamiliar.

Compounding the difficulties of bridging linguistic, literacy, and cultural differences is the turbulent history of police relations with communities of color. Incidents scarred this country during the 1990s—such as the riots following the Rodney King verdict in Los Angeles and the waves of civil disorder in New York City following the attack by officers on Abner Louima and the police shooting of Amadou Diallo—and illustrate the tragic chasm in police–community relations. The price tag for these events has been high, with police departments and their municipalities facing scores of lawsuits over racial discrimination, personal injury, and property damage. However, the cost of poor community relations has been recognized to be even greater when examining the damage to public trust and confidence regarding law enforcement.

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