Policing and the Social: Questions of Symbolic Power Author(s): Ian Loader Source: The British Journal of Sociology,

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lan Loader

Policing and the social:quesiions of symbolic powerv

ABSTRACT Taking as its point of departure the tension that currentlyexists in Britain policing, betweenofficialcrimecontroldiscourseand popularsentimenttowards this paper has two aims. Drawingupon Bourdieu's(1991) concept of symbolic powerI argue,first,that sociologicalenquiryneeds to devote more attentionto within the understanding social meaningsof policing, and outline a framework which the role and significanceof policing as a culturalcategorymight be inves powerof the police bymeansof a discussion the tigated.I then illustrate symbolic culturalsalience of policing in the 1950s.Myargumentis of the contemporary and appealof policing in this period saysmuch that the continuingmobilization about the relationship between the police and dominant forms of English nationalidentity. symbolicpower;culturalmeanings;national policing;symbolism; KEYWORDS: identity

The political system performs a function of symbolic protection far beyond its specific role as an apparatusof the selective regulation of socialrisks.[. . .] It is mostof all on the symboliclevel thatthe institutions and even codes of with all their show,ritual,prescriptions, of authority, manners and etiquette, satisfya latent need for social protection and sensationof order and security.(Zolo 1990:43) spreada gratifying
FORCES OF A INTRODUCTION: TALE TWOPOLICE

ln recent years,a burgeoningbody of criminologicalresearchhas emphasized the rather limited role the police can play in reducing crime and maintainingsocial order. The weight of evidence now suggests that increasingthe numbersof officersdeployed makeslittle differenceto crime rates,that more foot patrolsreassurepeople but fail to make communities safer,and that fasterresponsetimes have little effect on the likelihoodof a successfulcaptureor investigation(Clarkeand Hough 1980, 1984;Bayley 1994:ch. 1).
Volume Bri. ofSociollW no. 48 Issue no. 1 Jnl. March 1997 ISSN 0007-1315 <) London School of Economics 1997

Ian Loader

These evident limitationson what policing can accomplishare increasingly being recognized by police managers.The police now in the main realize that they are faced with an 'impossiblemandate' (Manning1977); that the causes of crime lie largelybeyond their control and that more money is not the answer.The search for alternative- and more manageable - indicatorsof police effectivenesshave followed. So too have crime preventioninitiativesthat accord a more central place to other statutoxy and voluntaxyagencies, and attempts to enlist citizens as the additional 'eyes and ears' of the police. Much of this makesgood sociologicalsense. But it rests uneasilyalongside the prominent place the police currentlyappear to occupy within extantEnglish'structures feeling' (Williams of 1964).One might note here the continued prominence that police voices have in public constructions of the crimequestionand relatedsocialproblems.Wemight recallalso the enduring prominence of the police and the police officer within popular culture (Sparks1992).Whetherin respect of True Crzmes magazine,detective thrillers,Crzmewatch Crzmestoppers, host of fictional television and or a representationsfrom TheSweeney Miami Viceand TheBitl, the police to remain one of the principalmeans by which English society tells stories about itself.We need, finally,to take stock of the stubbornly high levels of supportevincedacrossthe socialspectrumfor more 'bobbieson the beat'. Despite mounting evidence of the limited effectivenessof beat patrolling, the public demandfor visiblepolice protectionpersistsunabated. Weare faced then witha markedcontrastbetweenthe currentdirection and tone of much public policy on the one hand, and the contours of popular sentiment towardspolicing on the other. I want in this paper to take this tension as a startingpoint for some interpretive reflectionson the social meaningsof policing.1 wantto suggestthat the prominentplace the police occupyin the Englishpopularimaginationcan fruiffullybe illuminated using Bourdieu's (1991) notion of symbolicpower.Havingset out some of the issuessuch powerthrowsup for both police sociologyand social policy,1 outline a framework withinwhich to understandthe role and significance of policing as a culturalcategoxy.1 then illustratethe symbolic powerof the police by means of a discussionof the contemporaxy cultural salience of policing in the 1950sand, in particular, embodimentin the its fictional figure of PC George Dixon. My argument is that the ongoing mobilizationand enduringpopularity Dixon of Dock Greenand the hisof toricalperiod he representssaysmuch about the relationshipbetweenthe police and dominantforms of Englishnationalidentity.
UNDERSTANDING POLICING, DECENTRMG POLICE: QUESTION THE A OF SYMBOLIC POWER

When collectiveideas and sentimentare obscureor unconscious,when they are scatteredpiecemeal throughoutsociety,they resistany change. (Durkheim1957:87)

Poticingand thesociat

WithinprevailingEnglish'structures feeling' the police figureas central of to the productionand reproductionof order and security. This, of course, is not entirelymisplaced;the activity policingdoes indeed playan imporof tant, albeit secondary,role in preventingand controlling crime. Yet the degree and sheer intensityof much publicinterestin the policingphenomenon suggeststhat something else is at stake here other than a reasoned calculationof what the police can accomplishby wayof social protection. Popularsentiment towardspolicing is markedby a high 'fantasycontent' regardingwhatthe police can and should do (cf. Elias1987).It is attracted to the idea of an omnipotent source of order and authoritythat is able to face up to the criminalOther.The belief that there exists a 'policingsolution' to the crime question may even be one of 'the myths we live by' (Samueland Thompson 1980). In this respect, popularattachmentto policing is principallyaffective in character, somethingwhich people evince a deep emotional commitment to and whichis closelyintegratedwiththeir sense of self. Policing,it seems, can providean interpretlve lens throughwhich people makesense of, and give order to, theirworld;the source of a set of plausiblestoriesabout that worldwhich help people sustain'ontological security'(Giddens1991).As such, the attachmentto policing is unlikelyto be shiftedmerelyby demonstratingthat it is in some sense or other irrationalor wrong-headed. It is againstthis backdropthat one might refer to the police as having, not only coercive power,but also symbotic power. Bourdieu (1991) talks of symbolicpoweras an invisiblepower,inculcatedthroughinstruction,habit and routine, as powermisrecognizedas such, even exercisedby those who are subjectto it. Symbolicpoweris he says A powerof constitutingthe given throughutterances,of makingpeople see and believe, of confirmingor transforming vision of the world the and, thereby,action on the world and thus the world itself, an almost magical power which enables one to obtain the equivalentof what is obtainedthroughforce (whetherphysicalor economic), byvirtueof the specific effect of mobilization.(Bourdieu1991:170) The symbolicpowerof the police has become the powerof legitimatepr nouncement:a power to diagnose, classify, authorize,and representboth individualsand the world, and to have this power of 'legitimatenaming' notjust takenseriously, taken-for-granted. does not mean thatwhat but This the police sayabout contemporary problemsremainsuncontested (that is rarelythe case); nor is it to deny that, under 'mediatized'political conditions, the police often feel compelled to engage in whatSchlesingerand Tumber (1994:ch. 4) call 'promotionalism'. is merelyto point out that lt the police's entitlement and capacityto speak about the world is seldom challenged.They startfrom a winning position. To speak in this wayof the symbolicpowerof the police is to refer first and foremost to a set of durable dispositions (a 'habitus'in Bourdieu's (1990) terms) that incline a wide range of people to act and react to

Ian Loader

policing in certain ways.These dispositionsoperate at the level of what Bourdieuoften refersto as 'the doxic', or at that of whatGouldner(1976) terms the 'palersymbolic' (see also, Sparks1992:ch. 2). The firstof these terms refers to those taken-for-granted, often pre-consciousdispositions which generate and shape people's attitudes,perceptions and practices. The second ('palebsymbolism')refersalso to the 'restrictedcommunicability' (Gouldner1976: 224) of such beliefs and sentiment,but speaksas well (in a fashion that eludes Bourdieu) of the emotionallycompelling characterof that which seems to be at stake. Takentogether,these ideas enable us to speakof a set of predispositions which operate in such a way that when people think of crime and order they reach as it were instinctively the police. Such dispositionsamount for - as Bourdieuwould say- to an unthoughtcategoryof thought that habituallyleads people to couple crime and policing together as one. An idealized force for good is imaginedas strugglingwith, and seeking to contain, an unknown,unpredictableand demonized evil. The link between policing and social order seems an obviousone. It would, I think, be a mistaketo view the symbolicpowerof the police as principallya product of the activeconstructionof public consent. The police do of course take steps to generatesuch legitimacy; especiallywhen - as has often been the case in Britainduring the last 20 years- public consent appearsfragile. The activitiesand imagerymobilized under the banner of communitypolicing attest to this (Alderson1979). So too does the recent proliferationof force 'missionstatements',the attendantprivileging of the police's servicerole, and the enlisting of professionalimage makers (Wolff Olins 1990). Initiativessuch as these, however, do not succeed or fail in a vacuum.In so far as they 'work',they do so by appealing to, and resonatingwith, pre-existing palewsymbolic understandings of policing. They depend on the fact that when the police speakthey already occupy a place in the order of things that authorizestheir right to prw nounce about the world. Much the same can be said about the mobilizationand displayof police symbols.Bourdieu (1991: 75) emphasizesthat there can be 'no symbolic powerwithoutthe symbolism power'.This does not mean, however, of that the ceremonies,ritualsand imageIyassociated withpolice workthemselves generatethe symbolicpowerof the police. Theydo not. Rather, iconogthe raphy of policing - the handcuffs, fingerprints,cop shows, uniforms, photofits,picturepostcards,memoirs,cars,sirens,helicopters,riot shields and so forth - connect with and re-articulate dispositionstowards, fanand tasiesof, policing that alreadypertainwithinthe widerculture (see Sparks 1992). As Bourdieu (1991: 126) again says,perhaps overstatingthe case: 'The belief of everyone, which pre-existsritual, is the condition for the effectivenessof ritual.One only preachesto the converted.' None of this means that the police's position is unassailable,their 'promotionalism' somehowguaranteedof success.Though theybegin from a winning position, such positions can be lost. The police still have to

Policing and thesocial

cultivate those inchoate, supportivefeelings towardspolicing that exist withinEnglishsociety.They have to be able to takeadvantageof the afEinities that exist between police and nation, and know how to evoke and deploy those varioushallowed traditionsof 'Britishpolicing', such as the 'villagebobby', 'citizensin uniform'and 'policing by consent'. Sir Robert Mark,Metropolitan Police Commissioner backin the 1970s,appearedskillfullyadept at this. His famousquip about the police 'winningby appearing to lose' revealedan almostintuitivegraspof the symbolsof Britishpolicing and how to use them. Since then things have become more difficult.A decade of urbandisorderand police 'paramilitarism', followedbya marked managerialistemphasis on 'value for money', 'consumerism'and even privatization; these have all threatenedto create a disconnectionbetween the directionthatthe Britishpolice are takingas an organization, those and affectiveattachmentsto policing (as an idea) that exist among people at a doxic/paleo-symbolic level. To conceiveof police powerin thiswayis to throwup somethingof a challenge to both police sociologyand social policy.Police sociology,as is well known,hasmushroomedoverrecentdecadesand we nowknowa greatdeal about policing systems and how they work. Sociological research and reflection has illuminated much about matters such as police accountability,occupationalcultures,discretion,effectiveness,police-community relationsand the like. Police sociologyhas, in short, developed a range of significantinsightsinto policingas socialaction. There havetoo been several attempts to account for the importance of symbolism in police work (Manning1977;Young1993).This though has been largelyconcernedwith understandinghow variousrituals (such as police funerals) and symbols (most obviously,'the unifonn') are mobilized for instrumentalpurposes, or withhow threatsto the police officer'ssymbolicauthority animatepolice discretion,such as in the policing of juveniles (Piliavinand Briar1964). What there has been much less of within police sociologyare enquiries of a more fundamentaland ambitiouskind into the role and significance of policing as a culturalcategory.We consequentlyknow and understand relatively littleabouthowrepresentations the police and policingare proof duced and received;or of the competing social meanings ascribedto policing and their varioussources,supportsand effects.Police sociologyhas, in other words,devoted insufficienttheoreticaland substantive attention to comprehendingthe symbolicpowerof the police as a social institution.l Nor is the question of symbolicpowerwithoutits implicationsfor social policy.If the police are an institutionpossessedof such power,if they- and, more particularly, certainvisionsof policing- occupya centralplacewithin prevailingEnglish 'structures feeling', then any attemptto remakethe of police as a 'mundaneinstitutionof government'(Reiner1992a:270) faces a potentiallyuphill struggle.Twoexamples offer helpful instructionhere. Recallfirstthe waveof storiesabout 'vigilantism' surfacedin the media that backin August1993,storiesorganizedlargelyaroundthe idea thatthe criminaljustice systemwas 'letting people down'. Mightit be no accident that

Ian Loader

this manifestationof a more visceralconception of policing occurredat a time when the police were engaged in whatmustoften havelooked to outsiders like an insular an technocratic debate about the Sheehy Report (1993)? Consider,secondly,the groundswellof public support expressed for Somersetpolice officerPC SteveGuscottin May1994when he wasconvicted and fined for a common assaultagainsta 15-year{)ld (McKenzie boy 1995). Does such a groundswellnot denote something importantabout dominant popular sentiments towardspolicing? Not too many people spoke up demandingthat PC Guscottbe sacked. These examples illustratethe wayin which certain policies and actions can resonate unhappily with - and even in opposition to - prevailing doxic/paleo-symbolicsentiment;sentiment that can stand as a powerful impediment to the creation of a culture - and, more specifically, set of a crime preventionpolicies - from which the police have been decentred. Rendering the police symbolically importantto the maintenance of less socialordermayfor manyrequirea significant re-organization self, someof thing not easilyaccomplishedmerelyby presentingpeople with the latest criminologicalevidence. To raisethese considerations not to re-introducethe kind of structural is fatalism,that the left realistpositionwithincriminologyhas properlydone so much to counter over recent years (Youngand Matthews1992). It is merelyto point out that 'takingcrime seriously'requiressomethingmore than merelydevisingappropriatepolicies, howeverrational,well thoughtout or principledthey may be. Such policy fonnulation is of course vital. But being prudentabout policing surelyrequiresas well thatwe pose some significantsociologicalquestionsabout the relationshipbetween policing and the social. It requiresaskingwhy the idea of a 'policing solution' has secured such a powerfuland affectivehold over the public imagination. And it demandsconsiderationof whyand how the police have come to be embedded in the traditions,vocabularies sensibilitiesof people in disand tinct ways,and with what effects. Myprincipalpurpose in this paper is to begin this interpretivetask.

POLICINGAND SYMBOLICPOWER:TOWARDSAN INTERPRETATION

How then might we begin to think, in a somewhatdeeper way,about the socialsignificanceand emotionalappealof policing?Perhapsa usefulstarting point here is DavidGarland's Punzshment ModernSoctety. this text, and In Garlandaddressessome importantand cognate questionsabout the social institutionof punishmentand its culturalmeanings.He explores, first of all, the waysin which culturalmentalities (systemsof cognition or belief) and sensibilities (configurationsof affect) shape penal institutionsand practices,establishingboth the contours of 'acceptable'punishment,and determiningthe concrete forms that punishmentcan take. Second, Garlandconsidershow and whatpunishmentcontributesto the

Policingand thesocial

creationof culture.Punishment,he maintains,is not just an instrumentof control;it is also an expressive institution,a culturalperformance.Through its depictions of social authority,subjectivity and social relations,punishment helps give meaning to the socialworld.Garland(1990:252) puts it as follows In the course of its routine activities,punishment teaches, clarifies, dramatizes, authoritively and enactssome of the basicmoral-political categories which help form our symbolicuniverse. Now passion may not be 'the soul' of policing in quite the same way as Durkheiminsistsit is of punishment,but manyof the things Garlandasks of punishmentmay also usefullybe posed in respect of policing (see also Walker1996). Of course, policing in contemporary westernsocieties comprisesfor the most part a bureaucratic, professionalized and goaldirected set of practices.But this does not mean that it is not also shaped and legitimatedby variousstructures socialbelief and affect.Policinglike punishof ment is embroiled in, and animatedby, a set of culturalmentalitiesand sensibilities.Policing too communicatesmeaning and playsits part in the creationof culture.Andjust as with punishment,the waywe police, represent policing to ourselves,and position it withinan overallsense of order, makesa differenceto both the constructionof individual subjectivities, and the qualit and characterof social relations. TakingGarland's suggestivepointersas a cue, I wantto outline an interpretive frameworkwithin which one might take forward sociological enquiryinto the socialmeaningsof policingand the symbolicpowerof the police. At this stage, and in the space available,this must amount to little more than an exploratoryforayinto the territory. merelypropose to set I out a range of questionsthat might guide researchand indicate some of the paths along which substantive investigation might travel.The heuristic valueof the overallframework only bejudged in the courseof detailed can case studies. Of the questionssuch studies might pose, however,I believe the followingto be among the more significant.They deal in turnwithsuS stance, means and effects. Why it thatpeopte is invest heavily policing so in andw specipicaUNpolice mare the as a - if notthe- principal source social of order? UZhat combination anncietuffls, of fears, hopes fantaszes and undurlay attachment policing? ts the'crzmapolsng' this to Why couptet an emotionally such compelling one? The police, it seems, are able to attracta degree of largelyunconditional supportfrom at least some sections of the population.In makingsense of this, we might usefbllydrawupon anthropologistVictor Turner's(1974) notion of the 'condensaiionsymbol'.Suchsymbols,Turnersays,operateby bringingtogether under one roof an otherwisedisparateset of meanings; they 'condense many references,unifying them in a single cognidve and affectivefield' (ibid: 55). As a culturalcategorg,policing, it seems to me,

Ian Loader

operatesin preciselythis way.To speakof policing is to evoke- at a paleosymboliclevel- some deeplyfelt fearsand anxieties,and some equallycompelling hopes and fantasies. On the one hand, policing operates as a constantreminderof the existence of the undesirable,criminalOther.As such, it is apt to evoke, or at the very least reinforce,feelings of hostility, aggression,powerlessness, violationand vulnerability; sense thatthe social a world is a ratherfragile and troublingplace. Yet the idea of policing also brings to mind (and stomach) sensationsof order, authorityand protection;it makesit possiblefor people to believethata powerfulforce for good stands between them and an anarchicworld, that the state is willing to defend its citizens. Policing, in other words, manages simultaneouslyto denote both the dangerousOther and the meansto deter and, if necessary, capturethat Other. Popularattachmentto the idea of policing can perhapsbest be explored using the notion of 'guardianship'. The police, in their omnipotence and potential 'everywhereness' imagined as 'guardians'.This may take a are numberof forrns.It maybe embodied,for instance,in the dramatic appeal of 'banditwatching' a form of policing, where the police are enacted as as immediately and actively apprehendingthe Other.2 equally,the notion But of guardianship maystronglyunderpin the enduringpopulardemandfor more 'bobbies on the beat'. While such officers may indeed do little to preventcrime,theydo - as studyafterstudyconfirms- providepeople with the reassurancethat they are being 'looked after' (Shaplandand Vagg 1988). We have too in the idea of guardianship useful means of exploringthe a emergence and likely impact of privatesecuritypatrols.Such patrolsare mushroomingat present,organizedby both commercialconcernsand, to a lesserextent, by local authorities(Johnston1992).Yetwe currently understandlittle about the basisand limitsof their appeal.An accountof private securitycouched in termsof symbolicpowermight thereforetell us much aboutwhetherthe appeal of a 'guardian'is, in fact, an attachmentto policingas a set of activitiesor to the police as an institution.Willprivatepatrols everbe able to generatethe auraof reassurance apparently providedby the public police? Do people want a state-authorized 'bobby'patrollingtheir streets,or merelysomebodyto undertakethe mundanetaskof patrolling? Does the appealof that 'somebody'depend upon whetheror not he or she 1S wearlnga unltorrnH In addressingthese variouspossibilities, mustbe careful,however, we not to present the symbolic power of the police as a static phenomenon, unchangingover time and throughspace.There is always danger,in prea senting the relevantissues in this necessarilyabstract,theoreticalway,of positing too great a coherence and uniforrnity prevailirlg in 'structures of feeling' towards policing.Thiswouldbe a mistake.Everl when one is trying to grasp the meaningsof policing at a doxic/paleo-symbolic level (rather than seeking to elicit people's 'attitudes'),it is still necessaryto attend to competingmeanings and the relationship betweenthem.Wealso need to pay
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Policing and the social

heed to whether and if so how emotional commitmentsto policing are themselvesstructuredby such axes of social divisionas class, gender, ethnicity,age and sexuality. Among some populations(such as young people, or the excluded communities of Britain's inner cities and peripheral estates), the symbolsof policing may have precious little appeal, and the police maybe as if not more likelyto conjurefeelings of anxietyand trepidationthan theyare 'gratifying sensationsof orderand security'(Zolo1990: 43). To speak of a paleo-symbolic attachmentto policing may be to refer largely,if not exclusively, 'middle England'. to Socio-historical researchinto policing as a culturalcategorymust,finally in this context, takeseriouslythe differentkindsof relationships whichcan pertain between policing and the social. The characterof economic and social relations, the thicknessof social bonds, the extent of division and inequality,the pace and direction of social change; all these mattersmay impactin importantwayson the degree to which people identifywith the police and policing,and the intensityof such identification.It mayeven be the case that the more fragile social order and governmentalauthority becomes, the more it is that policing is both coercivelyand symbolically mobilizedto keep 'enemies' at bay (Hall, et al. 1978). Whatforms these do investments andattachments policing in, to, take? Howand by whatmeansis policing positioned within prevailing vocabularies, sensibilities and 'structures offeeling'2 What thecultural does pmminence thepolice policing of and communicate thequality character socialrelations about and of 2 In order adequatelyto understandthe meansbywhich the affectiveappeal of policing is culturally produced and reproduced,it is necessaryto avoid making a hard and fast distinctionbetween the symbolsand practicesof police work (cf. Garland1990: 199). The routine activitiesand symbolic formsthatcomprisethe socialphenomenon of policing cannot so easilybe divided.The craftskillsand coercivepowersthat police officersdeploy on a daily basis are not just goal-oriented.They serve too to communicate meaning, not only about the police and their role, but also about power and authority society.Similarly, symbolsand signswithinwhichpolice in the workis encoded are not merelydecorative,an epiphenomenalgloss on the material practices of policing. They too have a practicaleffect and are mobilized for instrumentalpurposes. In seeking to understandhow the socialmeaningsof policingare produced,circulatedand received,one can learn as much from examiningpubliccallsfor police assistance, one can as from looking at how police workis dramatized and represented. Let us considerfirstthe everyday ritualsof police practice;thatmyriadof activitiesencompassingdawn raids and moving on teenagers on the one hand, and numerous 'socialservice'and communityinvolvementtaskson the other. How do such practicescontributeto the symbolicpower of the police?Here the workof Egon Bittner (1990) is especiallyinstructive. The police, Bittner reminds us, are the agency authorizedto act in situations

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Ian Loader

which involve 'something-that-ought-not-to-be-happening-and-aboutwhich-someone-had-better-do-something-now' 246). The capacityto ( ibid.: intervene,with force if necessary, and to stickarounduntil the immediate problem is 'resolved'is what underpins the range of tasksthe police are requested to perform. Everycall the police attend providesa small but importantreminder of this. It reinforcesthe belief that when things are awry, is the police who are there to deal with them. And it contributesin it no smallwayto the sheer 'obviousness' the connection between crime, of disorderand policing. One should not- as Bourdieu (1990) emphasizesunderestimatethe role such habitualreinforcementplaysin the production of durabledispositions. We might consider, secondly, the importanceand effects of what one might call the 'police voice'. It has long been recognized that the police occupy a privilegedplace in constructingrepresentations crime events of (Hall, etal 1978).Theyare frequently used byjournalists primary as sources of crime 'news', and individual forces have over recent years become increasingly adeptat newsmanagement(Schlesinger Tumber1994:ch. and 4). The police also playan importantand more diffuserole as whatEricson (1994) calls 'knowledgeworkers'- producing and disseminatinginformationon prevailing sourcesof riskand insecurity. a body possessingan As auraof authority knowledgeability, police arewell-placed 'name' and the to contemporaryproblems and diagnose their causes. The analysisof the police's symbolicpowerthus needs to pay carefulattentionto the production and circulationof the police voice, and its receptionamong different audiences. To focus on these mattersis not, however,to downplaythe significance of prevailingculturalrepresentations policing, for such representations of contributemuch to how the police are positioned and understoodwithin everydaylife. Here the analysis of symbolic power might fruitfullyreexamine that relatively well-documentedfield of enquiryconcerned with dramaticportrayals the police (Reiner1992a:ch. 5). In seeking to elicit of the place and meanings of policing within contemporary'structuresof feeling', such analysis needs to comes to termswith the valuesand imagery that are attributedto the police withindifferentversionsof the 'cop show' genre (Clarke 1983,1986).It mustalso,as RichardSparks(1992) hasshown, take seriouslythe emotive appeal of these fictions, and their connection with people's routine anxietiesand unfulfilleddesiresvzs-a-vzs crime,order anc Justlce. Finally, might usefullyexplore the comparatively we uncharteredfield of police iconography. One might consider,first,the icons that surroundthe activitiesof policing and detection; looking, in particular, the popular at attachment to, and meanings communicated by, the various forms of science and technologythat are mobilizedin police work,whethertheybe truncheons, riot shields, CS gas, fingerprinting,photo- and videofits, or helicopters. What is it that underpins the popular appeal of such technology?Whyis it that people are so powerfully drawnto the - ever elusive
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Policing and thesocial

ll

- possibility a 'technologicalsolution' to the problemof order,the latest of candidateforwhichundoubtedlybeing CCTV?3 mightalsoaddressthe One ways in which the police themselves are iconized within a culture. In England,a strikingexample of this concerns the wayin which the police have been constructedas a touristicon, representedand commodifiedas - among other things- picturepostcards,dolls, eggcups,paperweights and fridgemagnets(to list merelythe itemsI pickedup recentlyin a Greenwich gift shop).Whatdoes it sayaboutprevailing'structures feeling' in English of society that it elevates its police officers (rather than, say, its doctors or teachers) to the statusof a nationalsymbolin this way? We have then at least four waysin which the social meaningsof policing are generatedand transmitted routinepractice,the police voice, fictional dramatizations iconography. course, each of these modes differsin and Of terms of how it representspolicing and the kinds of culturalmeanings it signifies.Yetin each case a set of images and vocabularies providedwith is which people are able to classify, judge, condemn or celebratesome aspect of their society.And so in each case the same importantquestion can be posed: what does this particularrepresentationof policing communicate and teach about power,authority, morality, normality, personhood ('ours' and 'theirs') and social relations?
Whateffectsdo theseinvestments and attachments policing have?How is the in, to, emotionalappealof policing takenup, re-articulated, used in official,political and and mediadiscourse? Whatareits implicationsforcrimeprevention socialorderand

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The symbolicpowerof the police has numerousand for the most partdamaging effects. The overarchingconsequence of an affectiveattachmentto the 'policing solution' is to engender a quite limited set of waysof thinking, speakingand actingvis-a-viscrimeand socialorder.Of course,thisdoes not always and for all social actorsappearas a set of constraints. The presence - at a doxic/paleo-symboliclevel - of a diffuse but compelling commitment to policing resonates happily with some powerful - and in Gouldner's (1976) sense, articulated- ideologies regarding crime and crime control. Those who seek to mobilizemore or 'tougher'policing as a responseto crimefind themselves swimming withthe emotionaltide. If and when they are so minded, politiciansand commentators(usually,but not exclusively, those of the Right) can all too easilypropounda solutionwhose appeal seems self-evident. deeper appreciationof existent social meanA ings of policing would do much to assistan understandingand critiqueof these compelling,kneejerk 'solutions'. For the police themselves,the prevalentemotional appeal of policing is somethingof a mixed blessing.It is of course true that the affectiveattachment people feel towards policing creates an underlying reservoir of supportupon which the police can rely.It is also temptingfor the police to drawupon this diffusesupportat timesof crisis.Thiswe havewitnessedonly

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too often in recent decades (most recently perhaps during the Police Federation's campaignagainstthe Sheehyrecommendations), we may and well do so again as privatesecurityfirms continue to encroach upon traditionalpolice functions,such as patrolling. But the symbolicpowerof the police can also hoist the organization with expectations they are unable to meet, as well as creating difficultiesin 'gettingacross'a realisticimage of whatthe police can achieve.One thinks here of problems the police currentlyface persuadingpeople to accept variousforms of 'crime screening',or of the job officershave getting residents to accept the limits of what the police can do about 'youthscausing annoyance'.In this sense, a deep emotional commitment to the idea of policingcan all too easilyco-existwithsome stringentcriticismof the police institutionand its performance.When set alongside people's hopes and fantasiesof whatpolicingmightaccomplish(their 'policeforce of the imagination'), the real thing can all too easilyfrustrateand disappoint. We might consider, finally,the consequences of the police's symbolic power for crime preventionand social ordering. The affectiveappeal of policing undoubtedlyengendersconstraints those - increasingly for prevalent - forms of crime preventionwhich seek somehow to decentre the police. The taken-for-granted centralityof the professionalized, specialist police to the 'fight' againstcrime can generate among other professionals and public alike a resistanceto taking on board what is thought to be a police task.Giventhe dominantculturalconnection betweenpolicing and 'toughness',it can also makethose formsof socialcrimepreventionthatdo not depend heavily upon the police seem 'soft'. When set against the immediatenessand apparent certainties of policing, such solutions can appearless than emotionallycompelling. Asa cultural category, policingprovides people witha templatefor rendering 'intelligiblesocietyand socialrelationships, servingto organizepeople's knowledgeof the past and the present and their capacityto imagine the future' (Lukes1975:301).It allowspeople to 'fill out' - in affectively satisfying ways- a social realitythat all too often appearsrisky,uncertainand fragile,and aboutwhich informationis limited. In so doing, policing obviates the need for more fundamental thoughtas to whatit is that 'unitesand dividessociet' (Wrong1994),channellingreflectionabout the 'problemof order' down some narrowand ultimatelyillusorypaths.A societythat is in variouswaysobsessedby its police force is unlikelyto be able to generatea prudentassessmentof whatpolicing is and is not able to contributeto the realization socialorder.Englandmaywell be a case in point. of
THE POLICE, 'GOLDEN AGES' AND THE CONSTRUCTION OF ENGLISH NATIONAL IDENTITY: CASE OF SYMBOLIC A POWER

I believe they [the police] standfor all we Englishare, maybeat firstaw pearanceslow perhaps,but reliablestout and kindly,I have the greatest

Policing and the socxal

13

admirationfor our police force and I am proud they are renowned abroad. (2Syear-oldshigherworkingclass'woman from Formby, Liverpool, quoted in Gorer1955:214) Let us now explore more substantively aspect of what policing means one within prevailingEnglish 'structures feeling'. I want to reflect upon the of culturalresonanceof thatmuch discussedbut stillbarelyresearchedperiod of English policing history the 1950s (and its fictional avatarPC George Dixon), and considerwhat the contemporary appeal of this period might tell us about the relauonshipbetween the police and the constructionof English national identity.The 1950s are often referred to - within both police sociologyand publicdiscourse- as a 'goldenage of police legitimacy' (Reiner1992b),a time of relative,perhapseven unparalleled,social peace and consensus. But can this image be sustained historically? Why is this period of postwar Englishsocietyso alluring? And whatmight its appealtell us about the symbolicpowerof the police? The short answerto the first of these questionsis that we simplydo not know;policing in the 1950s has been the subjectof little sustainedsocib historicalinvestigation(cf. Weinberger1995). There is some evidence, as Reiner (1992b) notes, to supportthe popularinterpretation this decade. of GeoffreyGorer's(1955) surveyof 'Englishcharacter' found a largemajority (75 per cent) expressingenthusiasticsupportfor the police, with any hostilitythat existed attachingto individualpolice officers ratherthan to the institutionitself. Researchundertakenfor the Royal Commissionon the Police (1962) largelyconfirmsthis view with 83 per cent of those surveyed professinggreatsupportfor the police, and no less than 80 per cent assenting to the propositionthat the Englishpolice were the best in world.This is suggestivestuff, and we certainlyshould not rule out a priorz the possibilitythat in some importantmaterialsense 'thingshave got worse'.Were this in fact to be the case, it would raise some importantquestionsabout the economic and social preconditionsfor order. Yet there exists a body of indicatorsthat at least requiresus to remain sceptical of received wisdoms about policing in the 1950s. The hidden police deviancerevealedin retiredofficers'memoirs (Mark1977), the rise in the crime rate during the period (from 438,085 recorded offences in 1995 to 743,713 in 1960, a 69.8 per cent increase), the 1958 Notting Hill 'race riots', and the litanyof scandalsand disputesinvolvingoften senior police officers that led up to the Royal Commission;these events and developmentshardlysuggest a nation entirely at ease with itself (Morris 1989).For the moment thejury must remainout. The claim that the 1950s was a 'golden age of police legitimacy'represents,at best, an informed guess. These evidentialproblemsdo little, however,to preventthe 1950sfrom makinga frequentappearancein currentpolitical,media and populardiscourseabout crime.The idea that the fiftiesmarkeda 'golden age' of policing has become an integral part of the British police tradition. In

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contemporary'lawand order' debates,this period has been able to secure a powerfuland veryparticular presence;its regularinvocationserving,not only as a wayof rememberingthe past, but also as a means by which contemporaryproblems of order, justice and morality are registered and assessed.And, as with all traditions,this one is cultivated,nurtured and propagatedby its very own 'guardians'; politiciansand commentatorsall too ready to offer formulaic interpretationsof the 'worldwe have lost' (Giddens1994). The effectivemobilizationof the 1950sis no doubt assistedby the dearth of reliable historical information about crime and social order in this period, as it is by the fact that the meaningsof the 1950sremain relatively uncontestedculturally (unlike,for example,those of the 1960s). the lack Yet of historical evidence and cultural disputation is hardly crucial here received wisdomsabout the 1950s are unlikely to be demolished by 'historicaltruth'alone. Those - usuallyconservative 'opinion formers'apt to invokethe 1950sfor particular politicalpurposesare not merelyin the business of 'inventing traditions' (cf. Hobsbawnand Ranger 1983). The traditionsof the fiftiesare mobilizedby politicians, journalistsand editorialists only in the knowledge that they connect with, and are emotionallycompelling for, sizeableand importantsections of the Englishpopulace.What though is the basisof this period'sappeal? PatrickWright (1985) providessome helpful initial clues here. In discussing the role and significance of the national past in contemporary Britain,Wrightspeaksof how imaginedversionsof that past are mobilized to help - as he puts it - re-enchanta disenchantedworld;a processthat is heightened during periods markedby rapid social change, and resultant economic and social insecurities.Wrightarguesthus In a worldwhere valuesare in apparentdisorderand where social hierarchy has lost its settled nature, it is not surprisingthat old forms of securitybecome alluring.(ibid.:22) It is not difficultin this light to graspthe contemporary appealof the fifties. Among a significantsection of those who experienced life in mid-199Os Englandas difficult,or who viewthe futureas uncertainand troubling,the 1950soffersa set of plausiblestoriesabout,and thus a wayof makingsense of, unwelcome social change. From the standpoint of the present, that decade can be collectively- and selectively (Halbwachs1992) - remembered as a period of relativeharmony,order and social restraint; era of an postwarreconstruction,where rationing had ended, 'community'meant something, and the mass of the people had - in the wordsof then Prime MinisterHaroldMacmillan 'neverhad it so good'. The invocationof the 1950scan serve too as a means of distinguishing'insiders'(not only those who were there, but also those who elect to share its values),from those undesirable'outsiders'(youngpeople, blacks)who eitherweren'tthere, or who don't embodywhatthe decade standsfor.The appealof the fiftiesmay

Policing and thesocial

15

even be thatof a land pre-Commonwealth immigration where 'Englishness' wasapparently uncomplicatedand uncontested. The 1950scan also be givenparticular politicalinflections.The dominant discourse here is a conservativeone, in which the fifties denote order, respect for 'traditionalvalues', and settled social hierarchy.But it is also possibleto providethis narrative witha socialdemocraticre-interpretation, wherein the decade is cast as a pre-Thatcheriteage; a time of social cohesion duringwhichconsensusprevailedover such mattersas the mixed economy,full-employment, welfarestate,and the importanceof public the provision.As with all myths, the imagined fifties is capable of accommodating a numberof diffusestrandsand contradictory visions. How though does policing fit into these representations the past?The of startingpoint here has to be Dixon of Dock Gmen.Havingappearedinitially and fairlybrieflyin the featurefilm The BlueLampin 1950 (he wasshot dead after 40 minutes), PC George Dixon was reincarnatedin 1956 in a prb grammewhich ran for some 400 episodes until 1974 (Clarke1983;Sparks 1992:25-30). Since then Dixon has come to assumethe statusof national hero, firmly inscribed in both the popular imagination, and in public debatesabout real police workand real social change. Over the course of the last two decades, duringwhich time the world he stood for largelydisappeared,this fictionalparagonof virtue,integrity, and dedicationto duty has been seen to representall that was best about the upstanding'citizen in uniform'.George Dixon, the 'bobby'who knew- and was respectedby - everyoneon his beat, has become not only the perfect copper,but also the embodimentof consensus,communityand order. What is interestingabout all this is that these multiple referentsabout postwarBritainshould come to be attached to a police officer.To make sense of it, we need, I believe,to investigatethe intimate- but largelyunexplored - relationshipthatexistsbetweenthe police and dominantformsof English national identity.When, on St George's Day 1993, John Major evokedthe 1950sand spoke of Englandas the land of 'long shadowsfalling across the county ground, the warm beer, the invincible green suburbs' (quoted in Marquesee1994:10), he might easily- a few immediatepolitical difficultiesaside - have added the 'bobbyon the beat'. In perhapsno other country (Canada reserves its popular affection for the mounted nationalpoliceforce (Walden1982)) has the lowly'villagebobby'become so centralto the nationaliconography.4 nowhereelse has the ordinary And beat officercome to be constructedas an archetypal nationalfigurein quite the wayhe has in England.As Gorer (1955:310) put it back in 1955 (and the gendered utteranceis revealinghere) The policemanhas been for his peers not only an object of respect,but alsoa model of the ideal male character, selfsontrolled, possessingmore strengththan he ever has to use except in the gravestemergency. The police, in other words,have been constructedas one of the principal waysin which the Englishnation and its qualitiesare represented,both

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internallyand to others (hence the tourist knick-knacks) one of the As nation'sunique and traditionalinstitutions,they are also frequentlymobilized as a meansbywhichEnglandassertsits differencesfrom,and its superiority over, the rest of the world (Elmsley1992). The police - like the monarchy, powerfulcondensingsymbol- providean a enduringand affectivelyappealingmeansbywhich a certainstrataof Englishsocietyis able to imagine 'England'as a community(Anderson,1983).5 Herein, I believe, lies both the culturalsalience and emotionalpowerof that conjunctionof police, nation and socialorder that the 1950shas come to represent within English culture. The fifties enables people to bring together those alluringthemes of national greatness and respect for 'law and order', serving as a benchmarkfrom which they can register and bemoan the subsequentdecline of both. Just as England used to prevail over much of the globe, so too did young people stand in fear of the local 'bobby'.Andjust as the nation'sprosperity and influence in the worldhas waned, so has respect for 'Britishpolicing' and the values for which it stands.The repeated invocation of that imagined 'golden age' of social order representedby PC George Dixon is not only about the allure of a seeminglysafer and more harrnonious era; it is also a means of recalling justhow great this medium-sized,mula-cultural, economically-declining, European nation once was.
(Dateaccepted: December 1995) Ian Loader Department Criminologa of Universi1ryKeele of

NOTES

*I would like to thank Pat Carlen, Richard Sparks and Malcolm Young for their comments on an earlier version of this paper. I have also benefited greatly from many discussions I have had the about these matterswith Neil Utalker. 1. The nearest that enquiries into the police come to addressingthese kinds have of questions can be found in that body of work (fictional) representations of on policing see, in particular, the contributions Clarke (1983, 1986), Reiner of (1992: 5, 1994) and Sparks ( 1992, ch. 1994). 2. The appeal of this form of policing may indicate the distinctlygendered itself character the attachment to policing, of resonating does around the themes of as it physical prowess and strength. Given the deep cultural association of policing and

this form of 'action' (witnessed perhaps most often in cinematic and television drama), might even speak of an expecwe tation the part of many that police on officers should be men. If this were so, campaigns 'feminize' the police would to need address this 'masculine' appeal of to policing the paleo-symboliclevel. at 3. It is interesting to note here the number futuristic police feature films of (Terminator, Robocop etc.) in which the forces 'law and order' acquire an unasof sailable technical superiority over the enemy, enabling them to bring about thus a 'final' solution. 4. The frequent use of the term 'village bobby' official and popular discourse is in of particular significance, in that it manages connect the police with that to other powerful English icon - the country-

Policing and the social

side (Williams 1973). The emotional appeal of this couplet in what is a highly urbanizedsociety may lie in the idea of the police bringing the apparent order of the countryside to the chaos of the city. The mobilization of rural imagery in recent debates about community policing would repaycareful attention in this regard. 5. In this respect, students of English policing and its social meanings might derive much from recent accounts of the Britishmonarchy,its rituals,and its part in Britain's decline (Hayden 1987; Nairn 1988).

17
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