6 ms·

Peelian Principles

83 points by cstross 13y ago

w_t_payne 13y ago
That is very interesting. I had no idea.
midas007 13y ago
In the US, Europe and elsewhere, the S.O.P. is "Might makes right" => "We're going to beat the shit out of you if we feel like it, and there's nothing you can do about it. Oh and we're going to rob (whatever personal property or money is on you) too.* " * This happens not in a "3rd-world country," but in the U.S. of A.
- vacri 13y ago
  Jello Biafra speaks of his possessions being seized in a police raid in the 80s, and the sheriff's office sold them off before he even went to trial - this was (is?) legal in his county.
- pjc50 13y ago
  Some areas of the US are more "3rd-world country" than the people care to acknowledge. Mostly due to the legacy of colonialism. Economy based on manual labour for resource extraction or farming? Yup. History of racial conflict from the time of slavery? Yup. Poor rule of law linked to family and business corruption? Yup. Excessively violent policing as a result of those factors? Yup.
  - brg 13y ago
    I dispute this claim. In the last two decades, the most high profile cases of police malfeasance are coming from LA and Seattle. These have nothing to do with colonialism, but with complete lack of oversight and responsibility.
    - midas007 13y ago
      Exactly. The pattern is: 1. cops do whatever they want 2. they become more and more emboldened 3. something awful happens to an "innocent" person 4. temporary measures are put in place 5. delay 10 6. goto 1
visarga 13y ago
Even if they state they intend to protect individual freedoms, there is no guarantee. Reality shows that all systems can be perverted and all rules reinterpreted to mean something else.
- midas007 13y ago
  It's a book ideal that doesn't recognize reality: the fallibility and self-interests of individuals.
  - cstross 13y ago
    So kindly explain what's wrong, in principle, with defining book ideals and then using these as criteria to evaluate the success of organizations? The Peelian principles have been largely obscured or ignored in recent decades, and arguably they were always a bit hollow -- but the history of British policing since the 1830s has had significantly less emphasis on raw offensive firepower than other police systems: even today the vast majority of British cops do not ever carry guns, and per a 2006 poll of members of the Police Federation, 82% of officers don't want to routinely carry guns: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-19641398 http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-19641398 This demonstrates, if nothing else, that even after 170-180 years a high-minded book ideal can have a long term effect on an institution (even though we as a species seem to be extremely bad at keeping institutions on track on any time frame longer than a human working lifespan). And, if I may editorialize a little, being aware that it is possible to constitute a police force along radically unfamiliar lines should free us from the tyranny of low expectations that leads us to assume that current abuses of police powers are inevitable and unexceptional. We can do better, and we deserve better.
    - threeseed 13y ago
      UK police officers don't want to carry guns because they really don't need to. The most likely threat they are going to face is from a youth carrying a knife (gangs are an issue in outer London boroughs). And since police officers are wearing protective vests a knife attack isn't going to be hitting major organs.
threeseed 13y ago
One thing people need to remember is that in France, UK, Australia, Canada etc guns are illegal. That makes a big difference since police know that provided they don't invade someone's personal space they aren't at risk of dying. And as such they are able to resolve issues without needing to act with a defensive posture. It may seem arbitrary but you will never think of a policeman as an ordinary citizen if they aren't willing to engage with you in a normal manner.
- joe_computer 13y ago
  Some might argue that more abuses would occur because the police can operate without the fear of being shot back.
- tim333 13y ago
  Well, they are restricted but not totally illegal. Even in the UK people can use shotguns. I'm not sure having guns really effects the Peelian stuff.
  - cstross 13y ago
    Shotguns and bolt-action rifles are licensed in the UK. So are black-powder weapons (mostly muzzle-loaders for re-enactment). Air guns are also allowed, in some categories without a license. More here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_politics_in_the_United_Kingdom#Pistols http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_politics_in_the_United_King... Note that firearms licenses were pretty much non-existent in Sir Robert Peel's day, and as late as the mid 1980s it was possible to possess an AK-47 or similar (as long as the selector didn't permit burst firing). In spite of which, most police went (and preferred to go) unarmed.
- dobbsbob 13y ago
  Guns are not illegal in Canada. Criminals have no problems getting guns either. They are starting to force all cops here to wear video cams to weed out idiots, it helps prevent US insanity like where a physics prof called 911 for an ambulance and a cop showed up to smash his face and arrest him instead http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/17/nyregion/professors-detail-brutal-tangle-with-police.html?_r=0 http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/17/nyregion/professors-detail...
Pitarou 13y ago
I'd draw people's attention, in particular, to this principle: > Whether the police are effective is not measured on the number of arrests, but on the lack of crime. This is in contrast to the US, where a cop's career prospects largely depend on his arrest record. To see where this has led, read Arrest-Proof Yourself by Dale C. Carson. (By the way, I don't actually live in the US, so if you want to tell me I'm an idiot and I don't know what I'm talking about I'll have no comeback.)
- anvandare 13y ago
  See also Campbell's law, and Goodhart's law. It's only human. If your employment evaluation depends on a specific statistic (the number of arrests you made, lines of code written, number of pupils passing the test, etc.) then you'll try to keep that statistic on a favourable level; even if doing so fails the original intent behind it all.
  - notdrunkatall 13y ago
    Incentives incentivize things; who knew?
- watmough 13y ago
  Thank-you, I've spent a pleasant morning researching and actually reading Carson's entire book in PDF. Pretty much confirms what is pretty obvious. You don't want to be stopped, and if you get stopped, don't piss off guys that have lots more power than you do.
PaulKeeble 13y ago
I wouldn't say all these principles are in force in the UK today. The very fact that our police is routinely used to break up peaceful demonstrations, to stop demonstrations from occurring in areas were our politicians might see them is kind of a perversion of one of the key points. The officers do still wear the numbers but they are routinely covered up to hide their identities, especially when they are dealing with a demonstration. The police have arrest targets just like everywhere else now, the headline figures are still types of crime per 100k of population but they have other targets within the organisation that are just like everywhere else. "The police are the public and the public are the police." - What trust there was in the police force has been declining since the break up of the miner protests in the 80's. The unnecessary aggression and brutality of the police force keeps happening and with each violent act they are seen more and more as a gang rather than as other citizens doing what any other citizen can do. My general feeling is that the police is more and more being used in the UK as a political vehicle to maintain power against an ever annoyed public, its not by consent when they break up a peaceful protest because the government passed laws that said all protests must be registered and agreed to. It might one day have been like that but its not based on these principles today.
- tehwalrus 13y ago
  Some of the positives of this system of justice do still remain - Personally, I would still approach a UK police officer in the street to ask for help without fear[1], whereas I don't think I'd ever go and ask for help from a US cop except in the direst of circumstances (mainly because of their reputation, and that they are all armed). That said, your criticisms of the current force are definitely valid ones, and I would like to see them addressed by a political movement to restore these principles in full to British policing. [1] with a few exceptions - not armed officers at airports, or police officers at protests whether or not in riot gear.
  - coolsunglasses 13y ago
    > I don't think I'd ever go and ask for help from a US cop except in the direst of circumstances Pretty silly. Most, if not all, cops I've encountered have been decent and helpful human beings. The primary source of ongoing friction with cops usually has to do with racial tensions in inner cities, especially in LA. Their being armed doesn't change anything, plenty of everyday non-police citizens walking around armed too. No reason for fear.
aragot 13y ago
Let's link that to HackerNews: How could we revisit those rules at the age of Internet?
- PavlovsCat 13y ago
  No more anonymous downvotes and flagging, for one? > Every police officer should be issued an identification number, to assure accountability for his actions.
Thiz 13y ago
Abuse of authority only comes from the public sector (aka as government). In the private sector you get a complaint and you're fired. Private defense and private security is the future.
judk 13y ago
> and without regard to the justice or injustice of the substance of individual laws, by Hmm.
judk 13y ago
In social contract theory, the entire government apparatus is supposedly dependent on the consent of the governed.
makmanalp 13y ago
Wow, this is exactly what we need in Turkey, where there is deep political conflict going on. Recently, there have been ongoing protests (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2013_protests_in_Turkey http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2013_protests_in_Turkey). There is a long history of police brutality in Turkey (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Police_brutality#Turkey http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Police_brutality#Turkey), but at least recently we had thought that the police was largely supportive of the current political party (AKP), as key positions were manned largely by AKP supporters, placed there by the government. Now, the government is having a conflict (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2013_corruption_scandal_in_Turkey http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2013_corruption_scandal_in_Turk...) with the Gulen Movement (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%C3%BClen_movement http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%C3%BClen_movement), which they used to be buddy-buddy with, and now no one seems to trust the police anymore, not even the government themselves. The government has been sacking police chiefs and reassigning commanders all over the country, in an attempt to break up any Gulen supporters, and to seize power over the police again. Looking at the Peelian principles, they've failed 1 many times before by taping over helmet identification numbers (http://www.ataturk.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/same-story-Turkish-police-hides-their-id-numbers.jpg http://www.ataturk.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/same-story...) and they've also failed 3 many times by engaging in cronyist tactics to avoid prosecution and accountability, even with evidence. Looking over the principles of policing, they've failed #2 since there has been widespread condemnation of police brutality, and the force is still there. They failed #4 when riot police attacked a camp of sleeping peaceful protesters at 4am with tear gas and batons. They failed #5, since the police chiefs are appointed by the current political party, and thus are not impartial. #6 is the same as #4. #8 goes along with #5, and also when police have been seen attacking people of specific political leanings, or refusing to carry out orders to arrest people of their own political leanings. My two main observations from all this are: First, like the judiciary, I believe the police force should also be completely isolated from the executive branch in terms of receiving orders and in terms of placement, hiring and firing of personnel. This prevents them becoming cronies of the current political power, and follows separation of powers. Second, I believe that the police should be paid at least average salary (way above poverty level) and be required to have at least average education (not merely primary school education). Otherwise, it becomes difficult to have the sorts of people who can meditate on concepts like cronyism, whistleblowing, consent of the governed, blindly following orders, etc. It becomes easier to have the sorts of people who are poor and likely to accept bribes, politically fired up and filled with hatred, power tripping.

83 points by cstross 13y ago

That is very interesting. I had no idea.

In the US, Europe and elsewhere, the S.O.P. is "Might makes right" => "We're going to beat the shit out of you if we feel like it, and there's nothing you can do about it. Oh and we're going to rob (whatever personal property or money is on you) too.* " * This happens not in a "3rd-world country," but in the U.S. of A.

vacri 13y ago
Jello Biafra speaks of his possessions being seized in a police raid in the 80s, and the sheriff's office sold them off before he even went to trial - this was (is?) legal in his county.
pjc50 13y ago
Some areas of the US are more "3rd-world country" than the people care to acknowledge. Mostly due to the legacy of colonialism. Economy based on manual labour for resource extraction or farming? Yup. History of racial conflict from the time of slavery? Yup. Poor rule of law linked to family and business corruption? Yup. Excessively violent policing as a result of those factors? Yup.
- brg 13y ago
  I dispute this claim. In the last two decades, the most high profile cases of police malfeasance are coming from LA and Seattle. These have nothing to do with colonialism, but with complete lack of oversight and responsibility.
  - midas007 13y ago
    Exactly. The pattern is: 1. cops do whatever they want 2. they become more and more emboldened 3. something awful happens to an "innocent" person 4. temporary measures are put in place 5. delay 10 6. goto 1

visarga 13y ago

Even if they state they intend to protect individual freedoms, there is no guarantee. Reality shows that all systems can be perverted and all rules reinterpreted to mean something else.

midas007 13y ago
It's a book ideal that doesn't recognize reality: the fallibility and self-interests of individuals.
- cstross 13y ago
  So kindly explain what's wrong, in principle, with defining book ideals and then using these as criteria to evaluate the success of organizations? The Peelian principles have been largely obscured or ignored in recent decades, and arguably they were always a bit hollow -- but the history of British policing since the 1830s has had significantly less emphasis on raw offensive firepower than other police systems: even today the vast majority of British cops do not ever carry guns, and per a 2006 poll of members of the Police Federation, 82% of officers don't want to routinely carry guns: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-19641398 http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-19641398 This demonstrates, if nothing else, that even after 170-180 years a high-minded book ideal can have a long term effect on an institution (even though we as a species seem to be extremely bad at keeping institutions on track on any time frame longer than a human working lifespan). And, if I may editorialize a little, being aware that it is possible to constitute a police force along radically unfamiliar lines should free us from the tyranny of low expectations that leads us to assume that current abuses of police powers are inevitable and unexceptional. We can do better, and we deserve better.
  - threeseed 13y ago
    UK police officers don't want to carry guns because they really don't need to. The most likely threat they are going to face is from a youth carrying a knife (gangs are an issue in outer London boroughs). And since police officers are wearing protective vests a knife attack isn't going to be hitting major organs.

threeseed 13y ago

One thing people need to remember is that in France, UK, Australia, Canada etc guns are illegal. That makes a big difference since police know that provided they don't invade someone's personal space they aren't at risk of dying. And as such they are able to resolve issues without needing to act with a defensive posture. It may seem arbitrary but you will never think of a policeman as an ordinary citizen if they aren't willing to engage with you in a normal manner.

joe_computer 13y ago
Some might argue that more abuses would occur because the police can operate without the fear of being shot back.
tim333 13y ago
Well, they are restricted but not totally illegal. Even in the UK people can use shotguns. I'm not sure having guns really effects the Peelian stuff.
- cstross 13y ago
  Shotguns and bolt-action rifles are licensed in the UK. So are black-powder weapons (mostly muzzle-loaders for re-enactment). Air guns are also allowed, in some categories without a license. More here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_politics_in_the_United_Kingdom#Pistols http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_politics_in_the_United_King... Note that firearms licenses were pretty much non-existent in Sir Robert Peel's day, and as late as the mid 1980s it was possible to possess an AK-47 or similar (as long as the selector didn't permit burst firing). In spite of which, most police went (and preferred to go) unarmed.
dobbsbob 13y ago
Guns are not illegal in Canada. Criminals have no problems getting guns either. They are starting to force all cops here to wear video cams to weed out idiots, it helps prevent US insanity like where a physics prof called 911 for an ambulance and a cop showed up to smash his face and arrest him instead http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/17/nyregion/professors-detail-brutal-tangle-with-police.html?_r=0 http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/17/nyregion/professors-detail...

Pitarou 13y ago

I'd draw people's attention, in particular, to this principle: > Whether the police are effective is not measured on the number of arrests, but on the lack of crime. This is in contrast to the US, where a cop's career prospects largely depend on his arrest record. To see where this has led, read Arrest-Proof Yourself by Dale C. Carson. (By the way, I don't actually live in the US, so if you want to tell me I'm an idiot and I don't know what I'm talking about I'll have no comeback.)

anvandare 13y ago
See also Campbell's law, and Goodhart's law. It's only human. If your employment evaluation depends on a specific statistic (the number of arrests you made, lines of code written, number of pupils passing the test, etc.) then you'll try to keep that statistic on a favourable level; even if doing so fails the original intent behind it all.
- notdrunkatall 13y ago
  Incentives incentivize things; who knew?
watmough 13y ago
Thank-you, I've spent a pleasant morning researching and actually reading Carson's entire book in PDF. Pretty much confirms what is pretty obvious. You don't want to be stopped, and if you get stopped, don't piss off guys that have lots more power than you do.

PaulKeeble 13y ago

I wouldn't say all these principles are in force in the UK today. The very fact that our police is routinely used to break up peaceful demonstrations, to stop demonstrations from occurring in areas were our politicians might see them is kind of a perversion of one of the key points. The officers do still wear the numbers but they are routinely covered up to hide their identities, especially when they are dealing with a demonstration. The police have arrest targets just like everywhere else now, the headline figures are still types of crime per 100k of population but they have other targets within the organisation that are just like everywhere else. "The police are the public and the public are the police." - What trust there was in the police force has been declining since the break up of the miner protests in the 80's. The unnecessary aggression and brutality of the police force keeps happening and with each violent act they are seen more and more as a gang rather than as other citizens doing what any other citizen can do. My general feeling is that the police is more and more being used in the UK as a political vehicle to maintain power against an ever annoyed public, its not by consent when they break up a peaceful protest because the government passed laws that said all protests must be registered and agreed to. It might one day have been like that but its not based on these principles today.

tehwalrus 13y ago
Some of the positives of this system of justice do still remain - Personally, I would still approach a UK police officer in the street to ask for help without fear[1], whereas I don't think I'd ever go and ask for help from a US cop except in the direst of circumstances (mainly because of their reputation, and that they are all armed). That said, your criticisms of the current force are definitely valid ones, and I would like to see them addressed by a political movement to restore these principles in full to British policing. [1] with a few exceptions - not armed officers at airports, or police officers at protests whether or not in riot gear.
- coolsunglasses 13y ago
  > I don't think I'd ever go and ask for help from a US cop except in the direst of circumstances Pretty silly. Most, if not all, cops I've encountered have been decent and helpful human beings. The primary source of ongoing friction with cops usually has to do with racial tensions in inner cities, especially in LA. Their being armed doesn't change anything, plenty of everyday non-police citizens walking around armed too. No reason for fear.

aragot 13y ago

Let's link that to HackerNews: How could we revisit those rules at the age of Internet?

PavlovsCat 13y ago
No more anonymous downvotes and flagging, for one? > Every police officer should be issued an identification number, to assure accountability for his actions.

Thiz 13y ago

Abuse of authority only comes from the public sector (aka as government). In the private sector you get a complaint and you're fired. Private defense and private security is the future.

judk 13y ago

> and without regard to the justice or injustice of the substance of individual laws, by Hmm.

judk 13y ago

In social contract theory, the entire government apparatus is supposedly dependent on the consent of the governed.

makmanalp 13y ago

Wow, this is exactly what we need in Turkey, where there is deep political conflict going on. Recently, there have been ongoing protests (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2013_protests_in_Turkey http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2013_protests_in_Turkey). There is a long history of police brutality in Turkey (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Police_brutality#Turkey http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Police_brutality#Turkey), but at least recently we had thought that the police was largely supportive of the current political party (AKP), as key positions were manned largely by AKP supporters, placed there by the government. Now, the government is having a conflict (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2013_corruption_scandal_in_Turkey http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2013_corruption_scandal_in_Turk...) with the Gulen Movement (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%C3%BClen_movement http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%C3%BClen_movement), which they used to be buddy-buddy with, and now no one seems to trust the police anymore, not even the government themselves. The government has been sacking police chiefs and reassigning commanders all over the country, in an attempt to break up any Gulen supporters, and to seize power over the police again. Looking at the Peelian principles, they've failed 1 many times before by taping over helmet identification numbers (http://www.ataturk.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/same-story-Turkish-police-hides-their-id-numbers.jpg http://www.ataturk.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/same-story...) and they've also failed 3 many times by engaging in cronyist tactics to avoid prosecution and accountability, even with evidence. Looking over the principles of policing, they've failed #2 since there has been widespread condemnation of police brutality, and the force is still there. They failed #4 when riot police attacked a camp of sleeping peaceful protesters at 4am with tear gas and batons. They failed #5, since the police chiefs are appointed by the current political party, and thus are not impartial. #6 is the same as #4. #8 goes along with #5, and also when police have been seen attacking people of specific political leanings, or refusing to carry out orders to arrest people of their own political leanings. My two main observations from all this are: First, like the judiciary, I believe the police force should also be completely isolated from the executive branch in terms of receiving orders and in terms of placement, hiring and firing of personnel. This prevents them becoming cronies of the current political power, and follows separation of powers. Second, I believe that the police should be paid at least average salary (way above poverty level) and be required to have at least average education (not merely primary school education). Otherwise, it becomes difficult to have the sorts of people who can meditate on concepts like cronyism, whistleblowing, consent of the governed, blindly following orders, etc. It becomes easier to have the sorts of people who are poor and likely to accept bribes, politically fired up and filled with hatred, power tripping.