Police control systems in Britain, 1775-1975 : from parish constable to national computer / Chris A. Williams.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Williams, Chris A., author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Police--Great Britain--History.

Police.

Technological innovations.

Police administration.

History.

Great Britain.

Police administration--Great Britain--History.

Police--Technological innovations--Great Britain.

Physical Description:

x, 242 pages ; 23 cm

Place of Publication:

Manchester : Manchester University Press, 2014.

Summary:

During the last two centuries, the job of policing in Britain has been transformed several times. This book analyses the ways that police institutions have controlled the individual constable on the 'front line'. The eighteenth-century constable was an independent artisan: his successor in the Metropolitan Police and other 'new' forces was ferociously disciplined and closely monitored. Police have been controlled by a variety of different practices, ranging from direct day-to-day input from 'the community', through bureaucratic systems built around exacting codes of rules, to the real-time control of officers via radio, and latterly the use of centralised computer systems to deliver key information. Many innovative techniques of record-keeping, surveillance and control were early and strongly emplaced to control police organisations themselves, long before they were directed towards the population at large. This book examines the intentions behind these various developments. Police forces became pioneers in the adoption of many technologies - including telegraphs, telephones, office equipment, radio and computers - and this book explains why and how this happened, considering the role of 'national security' in the adoption of many of these innovations. It considers the extent to which police institutions fit into various grand models of social change proposed by Max Weber, Michel Foucault, and Christopher Dandeker, and brings in the conclusions of other theorists such as Bruno Latour and James C. Scott to explain and contextualise their transformation. It constitutes a longitudinal study which illustrates the development of bureaucratic and technical modernity within police institutions. Book jacket.

Contents:

1 The 'old' police, 1780-1840 22

2 The proletarianisation of police labour, 1800-1860 43

3 Drilled bodies and zealous minds, 1820-1890 62

4 Time, bureaucracy and the new policeman, 1830-1930 85

5 Real-time communication, 1848-1945 118

6 The arrival of the control room, 1919-1975 141

7 Computerising the back office, 1955-1980 174

8 Conclusion 202.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9780719084294

0719084296

OCLC:

864787995