POWER-HOLDER LEGITIMACY:

THEORY AND EVIDENCE

Justice Tankebe (jt340@cam.ac.uk)

4th International Conference on Evidence Based Policing (Cambridge, 5 July 2011)

Outline

• Conceptual Groundwork

• Correlates of Power-holder Legitimacy

• Concluding Thoughts

The Return of a ‘Grand’ Concept

Trust

Confidence

Legitimacy

To condemn something as illegitimate is, I think, implicitly to threaten defiance. Calling a decision illegitimate adds the suggestion that the decision is mistaken, or lawless, or immoral, in a way or to a degree that raises a question about whether it should not be obeyed’

(Strauss 2005: 1854)

Police Legitimacy and Public Behaviour

• It encourages cooperation with the police (Sunshine & Tyler 2003).

• It facilitates acceptance of police decisions, and general compliance with the law (Tyler 1990).

• It generates a willingness to empower the police (Sunshine and Tyler 2003).

• Reduces reoffending, and support for vigilante violence (Paternoster et al 1997; Tankebe 2009).

Tyler’s Model of ‘Process-Based Regulation’

Procedural elements

•quality of decision making

•quality of treatment

Process-based judgments

•procedural justice

•motive-based trust

Immediate decision

acceptance

Long-term decision

acceptance

Supportive values

(legitimacy)

General cooperation

•compliance

•cooperation

•empowerment

Source: Tyler (2003: 283.

Herbert’s ‘Conflicting Pathways to Police Legitimacy’

• Subservience – Democratic

• Separation – Liberal order (human rights)– Professionalism

• Protection from citizen meddling • Need for unquestioned authority • Quest for prestige

• Generativity – Police understandings shaping situations – Deployment of moralistic frameworks (self-identity as

‘moral guardians’)

Power-holder Legitimacy

The self-belief power-holders (e.g. police officers) have in their moral right to govern (Bottoms & Tankebe 2008)

People with power ‘must persuade themselves that their fates are deserved and therefore [morally] rightful (Kronman 1983).

Rulers need to believe that the power they possess is morally justified, that they are servants of a larger collective goal or system of values surpassing mere determination to perpetuate themselves in power, that their exercise of power is not inescapably at odds with hallowed standards of morality.

(Dennis Wrong 1995: 103).

Police Legitimacy Defined

Legitimacy is the recognition of the moral rightness of the police’s claim to exercise power.

It consists in justifying simultaneously police power and citizens’ obligation towards obedience.

Adapted from Coicaud, J-M (2002)

WHAT FACTORS SHAPE CONFIDENCE IN POWER-

HOLDER LEGITIMACY?

• Procedural Fairness

• Relational Social Capital (RSC)

• Performance

• Corruption

• Corruption reforms

Data & Method

• Sample of 181 officers in Accra (response rate = 82%)

• Education: secondary school (80.1%); tertiary education (19.9%)

• Length of service = 15 years (mean)

• Gender = 29.3% female

Findings

Model 1 Model 2 Model 3

ß (s.e) ß (s.e) ß (s.e)

Individual Variables

Gender .04 .10 .06 .09 .07 .08

Education .01 .11 .04 .11 .04 .10

Length of service -.15* .02 -.22** .02 -.22** -.07

Performance

Effectiveness --- --- .27** .07 .12* .07

Corruption --- --- -.06 .10 -.05 .09

Corruption reforms --- --- -.08 .05 -.08 .04

Internal Cohesion

Relational Social Capital --- --- --- --- .13* .08

Procedural Fairness --- --- --- --- .40*** .07

Constant .10 .30 .36

Adjusted R2 .01 .07 .28

N = 181; *p<0.05, **p<0.01, ***p<0.001

CONCLUSION

Does Power-holder Legitimacy Matter?

• Responsible exercise of authority

• Stable and effective exercise of authority

• A precondition for ‘external legitimacy’

• Organisational commitment; use of force?

The problem of the narcissistic power-holder

THANK YOU!

QUESTIONS?

Justice Tankebe (jt340@cam.ac.uk)

4th International Conference on Evidence Base Policing (Cambridge, 5 July 2011)