Introduction
After the development of policing in England, the United States of America also developed policing. At that time, there were two forms of policing: informal and communal. They were referred to as Watch or private for-profit policing. The overall system was known as The Big Stick.
The people who were part of this system were mostly volunteers from the community who kept watch on any possible danger. The system was first implemented in Boston under the name of night watch and after that, both New York and Philadelphia adopted this system. They did not strictly control crime initially, but this system was developed as punishment for people who had to perform night duty as watchmen. The functions of these watchmen were mostly to serve the land surveyors and provide verification of the accuracy of measures and weight. The categories of this system were night and day duty, which constables served. The structure of the policing system changed and evolved from time to time, and it even stayed in operation after the American Revolution. Now, the advancement of technology demands the development of modern policing, and future perceptions need attention (Cordner, 2014).
Discussion
Now, the modern policing system also shares the same characteristics which are, supported by the general public and have the form of bureaucracy. The second one is that they are fully employed instead of just the volunteers, and the third one is that the policing policy is now fully designed with designated roles and duties and criteria of selection. The last characteristic is that the ultimate authority of this system is the police department and they will answer to the central authority of government. The history of policing structure is that southern states developed this system to look after the affairs of slaves. Their duties were to enforce laws on the slaves and keep pressure on those slaves to chase those who run away and the last was to keep discipline among the slaves. This form of policing structure after the revolution turned into the law enforcer for free slaved because they were turned into laborers (Cordner, 2014).
During those times, the need for developing police was due to the growing population and cities. Rapid urbanization requires the government to have an additional amount of law enforcers to keep the order of law maintained. But soon this volunteer policing was turned into authorized law enforcers because of the increase in crime and violence and the volunteers didn’t have the authority to enforce the law but only to look for possible danger. There is evidence that shows that this system helps greatly in bringing the order because of increase in crimes. The other reason for the need for this system is economic and social differences. These differences among classes raised the crime rates because of injustice in the overall system. To control these violent crimes, the government enforced a policing system. It was a collective effort of businessmen and government to design and implement this system with defined system and duties.
The 20th century brought many changes and one of the most significant changes was technological change. Besides everything else, the system of policing also needs a change in the technological system it uses. The government should ensure that police are fully equipped to perform their jobs (Tyler, Goff & MacCoun, 2015). The need for advancement in the police system because of:
- To work in the streets ensuring the safety of people and their efforts directly links with policy makers.
- The concern of citizens is because of the increase in crimes.
- The media and leaders are interested in making this system more efficient.
- The private sector has developed technology, so their concern over it has changed.
To perform the job, police are emphasizing the technology they need in order to make the job more effective and efficient. The technology related to finger prints and laboratories for crime observation greatly influenced the job of the police and made it effective. Communication through radio and the use of advanced cars have made this job even more productive and beneficial to society. All these technologies first reached the army but the police reached quite late because of no priorities were ever given to them. After having all these facilities they are more efficient in performing the job. Technology is evolving with each year and emphasize should be put on the policymakers not to ignore once again the police department’s timely change will be more effective and timely change will help in controlling possible crimes. It was technology through which the Crime Commission created the system of 911 which is widely praised and still the most effective system that every citizen is using (Ratcliffe, 2016).
The concern that was earlier mentioned by the private sector is that private business owners are buying all the technological instruments. Cars, computers, radios,s, and firearms are examples of tools and instruments that are owned and manufactured by the private sector. This concern can be entertained if the policymakers give the private sector the resources and allow them to spend resources on advanced technologies that are not accessible to police departments. Their manufacturing will eventually help the police department to deal with lethal weapons used by the terrorists and to meet the challenges they face on a daily basis task to enforce laws and prevent violent crimes. The other concern which is directly related to policy makers is to emphasize the integration of the federal agencies that provide advanced technologies to other apartments but ignore the policy department. The integration between local and federal will not just help in sharing the advance technology but also the procedures and trainings could also be shared for dealing with crimes. There are also several other technological tools that police use that are old and do damage, which has a bad impact on the reputation of the police. For instance, the use of pepper spray by the police has been used for several years and this should be replaced with other tools which are more efficient but leave less damage. There is another issue with the detection doors for detecting weapons, it raised the concern that it’s an invasion of privacy. The advancement in technology should also cater to these issues and give such tools that can help police detect weapons without invading the privacy of other people (Carter & Phillips, 2015).
Police departments themselves can acquire advanced technologies if their funding increases. They now have their own research and development departments and they can work efficiently. They are capable of creative effective tools but the lack of funds is bounding them to ask for such tools from the federal. The future of police departments in America is full of power as the policymakers are inclined towards the empowerment of police departments. The advanced training given to them which is close to the army is because of the terrorism growing in the world and the threat to America. These technologies will allow them to tackle such incidents efficiently. They are also being integrated with federal intelligence agencies and will work closely with the same functions as intelligence functions. This raises concerns about privacy issues, which will make the police department efficient. The core object of the police department is to bring back the law and order by decreasing the crime rate. The rights of citizens like the weapons are a challenge to police departments, but such advanced technology and training will help them dealing every possible threat. The other most significant step the government takes is to liberate the policy departments from politics which also influences them to work efficiently (Friedman & Pnomarenko, 2015).
Conclusions
In the end, the strong emphasize is one the system which is purely on the citizen’s safety and keeping in view the history where mistakes were made to ignore this department. The modern policing system also shares the same characteristics which are, supported by the general public and have the form of bureaucracy. Their duties were to enforce laws on the slaves and keep pressure on those slaves chasing those who run away and the last was to keep discipline among the slaves. During those times, the need for developing police was due to the growing population and cities. Rapid urbanization requires the government to have more law enforcers to maintain the order of law. There is evidence that shows that this system helps greatly in bringing the order because of increase in crimes. All these technologies first reached the army but the police reached quite late because of no priorities were ever given to them. After having all these facilities they are more efficient in performing the job. Technology is evolving each year and emphasize should be put on the policymakers not to ignore once again the police department’s timely change will be more effective and timely change will help in controlling possible crimes. They are capable of creative effective tools but the lack of funds are bounding them to ask such tools from the federal. The future of police department in America is full of power as the policymakers are inclined towards the empowerment of police department. The future holds many new reforms closely associated with intelligence and advanced technological equipment that will enable them to work as efficiently as it was never done before.
References
Cordner, G. (2014). Community policing. The Oxford handbook of police and policing, 148-171.
Tyler, T. R., Goff, P. A., & MacCoun, R. J. (2015). The impact of psychological science on policing in the United States: Procedural justice, legitimacy, and effective law enforcement. Psychological science in the public interest, 16(3), 75-109.
Ratcliffe, J. H. (2016). Intelligence-led policing. Routledge.
Carter, J. G., & Phillips, S. W. (2015). Intelligence-led policing and forces of organizational change in the USA. Policing and society, 25(4), 333-357.
Friedman, B., & Pnomarenko, M. (2015). Democratic Policing. NYUL Rev., 90, 1827.
