John Buttle

Gangnam Style versus Eye of the Tiger: people, police and procedural justice in Indonesia

Indonesias police force is the fifth largest in the world, and it is one of the most brutal, corrupt and ineffective. Since the forced resignation of authoritarian President Suharto in 1998, millions of dollars have been funnelled into police reform, with much of this funding coming from overseas donors such as the USA and Australia. Despite good intentions and some limited but notable success, police reform has failed to deliver tangible improvements in policing across the archipelago. There are many reasons for the failure of reform efforts, but a contributing factor is the lack of robust academic research on what kind of reform will work best for Indonesia. Without research-led reform, reform models have relied on the adaptation, or even wholesale adoption, of overseas models. As such, reforms have focused on delivering instrumental change primarily through improving the capacity of police to deter, investigate and solve crime. That reforms have been instrumentally focused presupposes that police legitimacy, fundamental to a well-functioning police service, rests on a public desire for outcome-based policing in preference to procedurally just policing. Until now there has been no research to contribute an empirical base to this assumption in Indonesia. To begin filling this void, long-term ethnographic fieldwork was conducted by the first author to examine public perceptions of police. In evaluating citizen narratives, our research shows that the procedural justice model of policing dominates assessments of police over and above instrumental concerns. Part of the reason for the importance of procedural justice vis-à-vis instrumentality relates to kinships of shame that configure respect as a foundation of social legitimacy. A large-scale quantitative study is needed to extend our findings beyond its ethnographic base, and if our findings are supported, reform efforts will do well to acknowledge that procedural justice policing will improve police legitimacy in Indonesia more substantively than instrumental policing.

A Constructive Critique of the Officer Safety Programme Used in England and Wales

Traditionally, officer safety has not been taken seriously enough for police officers to receive regular training in the use of force. However, this changed in the early 1990s, when the officer safety programme was initiated as a result of a perceived increase in assaults against police officers. Currently, police officers undergo officer safety training at a level and regularity unknown to their predecessors. Using interviews with police officers, observations of officer safety training and official documentation, this article examines the rationale behind officer safety training, while exploring its limitations. It is argued that the officer safety training is structured in a way that encourages pre-emptive uses of force, which is exacerbated by the ambiguous nature of guidelines and rules of engagement that fail to adequately regulate the use of force. Furthermore, suggestions are made for changes that will ensure officer safety, while providing greater safety and accountability to the public.

The impact of rural policing on the private lives of New Zealand police officers

This article is concerned with perceived differences between rural and urban policing in New Zealand. More specifically with how officers view the effect that rural and urban policing has on their private lives and those of their family members. Using grounded theory as a research method because of its reflexivity in regard to generating questions from emergent data, 16 participants were interviewed. Seven of these participants were stationed in an urban location while nine were recruited from rural stations. The results suggest that rural policing has a greater and often more stressful impact on the private lives of police officers and their families. This suggests a need for the New Zealand Police as an organisation to engage in policy-making that gives greater recognition to the rural aspects of policing, with a particular focus being the provision of support for the families of rural officers.

Unravelling the ‘Velcro Effect’: Is Deterring Assaults against the Police Indicative of a More Aggressive Style of Policing?

The ‘Velcro Effect’ was proposed to explain how the mere threat of using incapacitant sprays deterred assaults against the police (Kaminski, Edwards, & Johnson, 1998). The deterrent capabilities of CS spray were used to legitimise its deployment against a background of critical media coverage. However, what Kaminski et al. failed to consider is that batons — and the police uniform — also deter assaults against the police. This suggests an alternative explanation for the ability to deter assaults against the police that centres on the actions of police officers rather than the characteristics ascribed to any single weapon. Based on a study of officers in one of the 43 police forces in England and Wales, this article argues that it is the officers ability to appear competent and ready to fight that deters would-be assailants. Furthermore, it is argued that in order to deter would-be assailants, police officers have to adopt an aggressive demeanour that is far removed from that of the traditional image associated with routine policing in England and Wales.

A cultural constraints theory of police corruption: Understanding the persistence of police corruption in contemporary Indonesia

Despite a decade of reform, Indonesia’s police continue to be plagued by systemic corruption. This article examines the reasons for the persistence of police corruption by firstly establishing that corruption is rife and then discuses Indonesian police reform post-Suharto. The international understandings are explored with a view to developing a definition of police corruption that accounts for sociocultural and historical factors in Indonesia. There is an examination of the relevance of international theories of police corruption for Indonesia. It is argued that these theories are only partially applicable to Indonesia and the authors posit the ‘cultural constraints theory of police corruption’, which accounts for invitational, slippery slope, noble cause, and predatory theories, but recognizes the distinct nature of Indonesia.

The Police Complaints Process

As an organisation, the police and its officers hold a considerable amount of power over the average citizen. Therefore, it is important that police are held accountable for their actions by having a process by which citizens can seek recompense against police misconduct. For the sake of impartiality, such an organisation would need to be independent of police influence. This chapter provides a historical analysis of the struggle towards an independent police complaints organisation for New Zealand. It concludes that while the complaints process is more independent now than it was in the past, there is still large room for improvement.

A Disinterested Press: Reporting police in a provincial Indonesian newspaper

Abstract This article constitutes the first analysis of newspaper coverage of police in Indonesia. Analysing 63 articles that appeared in the print version of the Lombok Post between September and October 2011, we were curious to see whether recent media liberalisation meant that the press were now critical of police corruption, brutality and ineffectiveness, or whether there existed a close relationship between police and media such that the press worked as a public relations mouth piece for the police. We also wondered whether the Lombok Post reported about police in a sensationalist way in order to sell more newspapers. What we found were articles that generally failed to criticise police or promote police interests in any enduring way. We also found that articles reported on police in a benign way by simply describing characteristics of the incident, victim, and suspect, and discussing the status of an investigation or trial. What our article suggests is that the Lombok Post is largely disinterested in police and policing, and in a circular way both reflects and sculpts public opinion of police. Media significantly shapes public perceptions of police, and as the most widely read newspaper in Lombok, the Lombok Post has the potential to spark critical debate about policing in the region. Until media across Indonesia recognise the importance for democracy of reporting favourably and critically on police, citizens will remain largely disengaged from police, allowing poor policing practices to persist.