Patrol

Definition

In its simplest sense, patrol is a deployment tactic in policing. More precisely, ‘Patrol is a policing tactic or technique that involves [Page 219]movement around an area for the purpose of observation, inspection or security. Since it is based on the allocation of officers between spatial areas, it is also a method of organizing policing resources and managing policing personnel’ (Wakefield, 2006: 12). It is performed by police officers as well as other agents of policing, operating alone or in pairs, in uniform or in plain clothes. It may be undertaken on foot, on a bicycle, on horseback or in a vehicle.

In defining the concept of patrol it is instructive to look at the range of activities carried out in the course of such activity. Van Maanen notes of the range of tasks entailed in the policing of city streets, ‘Some … are mundane; many of them are routine; and a few of them are dangerous’. He argues that ‘patrol work defies a general job description since it includes an almost infinite set of activities – dogcatching, first aid, assisting elderly citizens, breaking up family fights, finding lost children, pursuing a fleeing felon, directing traffic, and so forth (2005 [1978]: 283).

In police studies, the controversies associated with patrol work demonstrate that the topic itself is far from a mundane or routine matter. The strategic value of patrol to policing has been debated for decades. Demands for more officers on patrol are a continuous feature of public debates about policing. The proliferation of patrol initiatives delivered by bodies other than police represents society producing its own responses to needs unmet by the state. These themes provide continuous avenues for research and debate.

Distinctive Features

Foot patrol was a distinctive feature of Sir Robert Peel's ‘New Police’ model introduced in London in 1829, and exported to cities in the US. This preventative, high visibility approach was to become an entrenched feature of policing in the UK, and through the latter half of the twentieth century, the image of the friendly ‘bobby on the beat’ remained powerful even as officers were increasingly being diverted into new strategic areas. Yet in the UK and other jurisdictions, foot patrol came to be replaced as the main means of delivering policing, as new technologies such as the car and the telephone began to transform the social environment. Motorized patrols were considered to offer a much better use of police resources, and emergency call systems, centralized control arrangements and radio networks would allow the police to respond more efficiently to calls for service. This, it was thought, would improve police-public relations, as well the morale of police officers by allowing for a more professionalized, effective service. Yet by the late 1970s, the effectiveness of this new ‘professional’ police model was being called into question. Crime rates in Western jurisdictions were rising, and the public were becoming more critical of the police. The reactive, distant style of policing that had evolved was increasingly being seen to be achieving the exact opposite of what had been intended, eroding the relationship between the police and the community.

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