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This article presents the 2021 JSI special issue on legal socialization, which we planned to celebrate the legal socialization scholarship that was largely initiated by a special issue of JSI (1971, Vol. 27, Issue 2) published 50 years ago. In its broadest sense, legal socialization refers to the process by which people develop their relationship with the law. Undergirding this process is the acquisition, formation, and development of legal values, attitudes, and reasoning capacities. This intellectual tradition rests on four pillars—foundationality, reciprocity, ubiquity, and continuity—that provide order to a field of study where scholars are trained in different disciplines, employ different methodologies, and pursue different questions involving people's relationship with the law. Much like in 1971, today many people are questioning the role of law in society, its purpose, its function, its history, and its efficacy. It is more important than ever to understand how people develop their orientation toward this social institution and the influence of that orientation on legal behavior. This issue features an eclectic group of scholars and a broad array of legal socialization research. This body of scholarship is intended to push the boundaries of the field both theoretically and in scope. This introduction situates each article within the rich historical tradition of legal socialization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Forensic genomics now enables law enforcement agencies to undertake rapid and detailed analysis of suspect samples using a technique known as massively parallel sequencing (MPS), including information such as physical traits, biological ancestry, and medical conditions. This article discusses the implications of MPS and provides ethical analysis, drawing on the concept of joint rights applicable to genomic data, and the concept of collective moral responsibility (understood as joint moral responsibility) that are applicable to law enforcement investigations that utilize genomic data. The widespread and unconstrained use of this technology without appropriate legal protections of individual moral rights and associated accountability mechanisms, could potentially not only involve violations of individual moral rights but also lead to an unacceptable shift in the balance of power between governments and the citizenry. We argue that in light of the rights of victims and the security benefits for society, there is a collective moral responsibility for individuals to submit their DNA to law enforcement and for MPS to be used where other, less invasive techniques are not effective. However, this application should be limited by legislation, including that any data obtained should be directly relevant to the investigation and should be destroyed at the conclusion of the investigation., (© 2023. Journal of Bioethical Inquiry Pty Ltd.)

Criminal justice contact is increasingly routine for Americans, and preemptive policing tactics render contact a feature of everyday life for minorities and the poor. Scholars interested in the impact of criminal justice contact on political outcomes largely find that all types of contact decrease voting and trust in government. Yet, qualitative evidence suggests that sometimes individuals are mobilized by their experiences. I leverage theoretical differences between custodial citizenship and having a loved one who is a custodial citizen, referred to as proximal contact, to identify the conditions under which criminal justice experiences catalyze political action. Individuals with proximal contact face fewer barriers to participation than do custodial citizens, and when they view negative experiences as a product of a system that targets people like them on the basis of group affiliation, contact can spur participation in activities other than voting. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Legitimate political institutions sometimes produce clearly unjust laws. It is widely recognized, especially in the context of war, that agents of the state may not enforce political decisions that are very seriously unjust or are the decisions of illegitimate governments. But may agents of legitimate states enforce unjust, but not massively unjust, laws? In this paper, I respond to three defences of the view that it is permissible to enforce these unjust laws. Analogues of the Walzerian argument from patriotism, the Vitorian epistemic argument, and the proceduralist argument found in Rawls, Estlund, and others do not show that law enforcement is usually permitted to enforce unjust laws. Finally, I develop a proceduralist argument for the thesis that law enforcement is permitted to disregard unjust laws. I conclude by considering objections concerning the problem of optimizing society for justice and the problem of law enforcement agents with deplorable moral beliefs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper defines 'stochastic governance' as the governance of populations and territory by reference to the statistical representations of metadata. Stochastic governance aims at achieving social order through algorithmic calculation made actionable through policing and regulatory means. Stochastic governance aims to improve the efficiency and sustainability of populations and territory while reducing costs and resource consumption. The algorithmic administration of populations and territory has recourse to 'Big Data'. The big claim of Big Data is that it will revolutionize the governance of big cities and that, since stochastic governance is data driven, evidence-led and algorithmically analysed, it is based on morally neutral technology. The paper defines moral economy - understood to be the production, distribution, circulation and use of moral sentiments emotions and values, norms and obligations in social space - through which it advances a contribution to the critique of stochastic governance. In essence the argument is that certain technological developments in relation to policing, regulation, law and governance are taking place in the context of a neo-liberal moral economy that is shaping the social outcomes of stochastic governance. Thinking about policing in both the narrow sense of crime fighting and more broadly in its Foucaldian sense as governance, empirical manifestations of 'policing with Big Data' exhibit the hallmarks of the moral economy of neo-liberalism. This suggests that a hardening of the socio-legal and technical structures of stochastic governance has already largely taken place. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ethical psychological practice is essential for beneficiaries’ protection and welfare. This survey research addressed a specific issue, namely compliance with and beliefs about ethical principles and standards of psychologists from the Romanian national law enforcement and firefighting organizations. A total of 140 psychologists, 60.08% of target group members, rated frequency and ethical character of 139 ethically questionable behaviors. Several positive ethical elements were found as lack of almost universal behaviors and many rare behaviors (46.04%). Among the ethical problems found were counted: behaviors and beliefs related to the involvement in ethical practice promotion among psychologists and to the interaction with coordinating and homologous psychologists in the professional or ethical impasse situations. The highest quality ratings of resources for ethical practice guiding and training were made for Code of Deontology and the lowest for legal cases. Several solutions were proposed to improve ethical professional awareness and practice of target group members. The present research showed the difficulty of finding benchmarks to interpret results of an ethical research and the need to approach ethical issues not only from the quantitative view but also from qualitative and/or transcultural view. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The author argues that the core values and principles of policing must be reformed in order to alter how police officers view their duties and relationship with the communities they police, particularly concerning an adjustment in what is referred to as law enforcement's adherence to a Warrior ethos to the concept of rightful policing. The article discusses the London, England, Metropolitan Police Force, the concept of Community Policing, and offers several guiding principles.

For Aristotle, virtues are neither transcendent nor universal, but socially interdependent; they need to be understood chronologically and with respect to character and context. This paper uses an Aristotelian lens to analyse an especially interesting context in which to study virtue-the state's response when social order breaks down. During such periods, questions relating to right action by citizens, the state, and state agents are pronounced. To study this, we analyse data from interviews, observation, and documents gathered during a 3-year study of riot policing in the U.K. In doing so, we contribute by joining a number of other conversations within JBE, suggesting detailed empirical examination of this context is useful in opening up considerations relevant to 'virtue' elsewhere. This extreme context helps us raise interesting and empirically informed questions that can encourage future theoretical and empirical contributions to virtue in business ethics. One such question is on the role of habituation in virtue, which is not just the inculcation of a reflex or automaticity, but can also refer to a trained and developed tendency to behave in the right way, for the right reasons, at the right time. Whilst we stop short of a simplistic alignment of habituation and virtue, we show ways in which it can inform understanding of both courage and phronēsis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses how the misappropriation of press and media identities are employed by law enforcement agencies to capture criminals.

The article contends that criminal entrapment is wrong because it subverts the moral capacities of entrapped people. Topics covered include the author's argument that the initial act of inducement in an entrapment operation contributes to its wrongness, the commonality between official entrapment by state officials and private instigation to criminal offense by fellow citizens, and the case of urban injustice in the U.S., which illustrates structural subversion.

The U.S. Prohibition experience shows a remarkable policy reversal. In only 14 years, a drastic shift in public opinion required two constitutional amendments. I develop and estimate a model of endogenous law enforcement, determined by beliefs about the Prohibition-crime nexus and alcohol-related moral views. In turn, the policy outcomes shape subsequent learning about Prohibition enforcement costs. I estimate the model through maximum likelihood on Prohibition Era city-level data on police enforcement, crime, and alcohol-related legislation. The model can account for the variation in public opinion changes, and the heterogeneous responses of law enforcement and violence across cities. Results show that a 15% increase in the homicide rate can be attributed to Prohibition enforcement. The subsequent learning-driven adjustment of local law enforcement allowed for the alcohol market to rebound to 60% of its pre-Prohibition size. I conclude with counterfactual exercises exploring the welfare implications of policy learning, prior beliefs, preference polarization, and alternative political environments. Results illustrate the importance of incorporating the endogenous nature of law enforcement into our understanding of policy failure and policy success. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The use of law enforcement officers in American schools has rapidly expanded since its inception in the 1950s. This growth can in part be attributed to the Safe Schools Act of 1994, the establishment of the Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) Office, and tragic events that have occurred in our nation's schools. Law enforcement officers in the school environment traditionally have primary roles of protection and enforcement, although many have ancillary roles of educating and mentoring students. However, the use of police in schools has also been associated with the formalization of student discipline and the criminalization of minor misconduct. Specifically, an increase in the number of officers in schools has mirrored an increase in the number of arrests and citations for relatively minor offenses. We argue that officers' socialization and training create role conflict in that the duty to enforce the law competes with other duties to mentor and nurture students. We present several hypothetical dilemmas and then illustrate how the “right thing to do” is determined by the perceived duties of the school safety officer. We conclude by presenting some modest suggestions on how to address the potential role conflict experienced by law enforcement officers working in schools. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

An essay analyzing the moral politics of policing practices between 1993-2003 in the New York City, is presented. It discusses the significance of campaigns led by critical activists against the excessive stop-and-frisk policing practices of the New York Police Department (NYPD) Street Crime Unit to protect the black and Latino New Yorkers. It informs that campaign also aims to decriminalize marijuana in state law and prohibit violent crimes.

This article addresses a number of obscurities surrounding the role of the various Sudanese police units often referred to as the ‘religious police’ or ‘morality police’. These include the Popular Police, Society Police and Public Order Police. Although these units have often been analysed as agents of ‘Arabization’, ‘Islamization’ and the cultural domination of peripheral groups by the hegemonic northern riverain faction within the state, this article focuses instead primarily on the intra-northern debate over these units, which is suggestive of a variety of internal crises the northern government will need to resolve in the wake of secession. It contends that the Sudanese government has never resolved the ambiguity over whether these units function as local crime fighters or as guardians of religious morality. Although a number of analysts argue that the Sudanese regime has become less ideological and thus scaled back the morality police, this ambiguity remains highly relevant today, to the extent that it causes divisions within the security forces and even the government itself. The article further identifies the centrality of the debate over the public order units to the period of self-questioning that has characterized the ‘post-Islamist’ phase in Sudanese politics. It discusses the ambiguous social status of these units, who have been represented as guardians of urban Sudanese culture by their champions and a threat to it by their detractors. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper presents the results of a survey that asked 1084 undergraduates from nine colleges across the northeastern USA to evaluate the intrusiveness and reasonableness of searches conducted by police and other agents of social control. Five versions of the survey tool, a self-administered questionnaire, were created. Each of the five versions varied the target/nature of the search, and participants received only one version of the survey. The five variations varied scenarios with the participant as the target of the search, with another unspecified person as the target, and with search specifically directed towards drugs, crimes against children, and homeland security. The current analysis focused on a subset of the sample addressing perceptions of 17 search scenarios targeting homeland security, immigration control, and border security. Participants’ attitudes towards homeland security searches were also compared to similar searches directed against oneself to provide insights into whether participants rate searches directed against themselves as more intrusive than searches conducted for homeland security purposes. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The article provides information on the U.S. Dodd-Frank Act (Act), considering how it could help the financial sector. It states that the Act was enacted by the Congress to limit financial instability. It adds that although Dodd-Frank Act's impact is still hanging, it could improve the capitalist system through financial cycle mitigation if the implementation is in good faith.

Past research has grounded young people’s experiences with the police in their neighborhoods and schools, yet lacking from the literature is how the interconnection between these two domains contributes to the hypercriminalization of Latino and African American youth. Forty interviews were conducted with nondelinquent Latino and African American youth who reside in disadvantaged and high-crime neighborhoods. Youths’ reports suggest a tidal wave of violence throughout their neighborhoods and schools, coupled with heavy surveillance and policing. Policy implications are discussed in terms of the school to criminal justice pipeline prevalent in disadvantaged neighborhoods. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The article focuses on the principle of precautionary reasoning based from the research of Deryck Beyleveld and Shaun Pattinson. It notes that the principle offers internally coherent action framework that will guide agents in analyzing morality of law and the behaviour of other agents. It focuses on the fundamental features and differences between interest theory and choice theory as well as the application of the principle of proportionality. It emphasizes on the type of entities that the precautionary reasoning may be applied and details the basis for the justification and the avoidance of more probable harm.

This paper provides a brief review and critique of the procedural fairness conception of police legitimacy. It is argued that the theoretical framework is too limited to constitute the basis for any overall legitimacy-based model of policing. Rather, its potential stands to be greatly enhanced if it incorporates other crucial variables such as the role of police self-legitimating activities in shaping police treatment of the public, and the contexts in which procedural fairness and outcome issues are singularly or collectively influential. It is also argued that, while it is well and good if procedural fairness enhances the quality of public compliance and cooperation with the police, it is unhealthy if procedural fairness is taken seriously only for its utilitarian value. Procedural fairness, and by extension police legitimacy, must be pursued as something of intrinsic value, a good in and of itself; treating people fairly should not be an issue of choice contingent simply on demonstrable evidence of the facilitation of the task of the police in maintaining order. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the study which opposes the classic research "The Serpent Beguiled Me And I Did Eat," by Gerald Dworkin, and examines the exceptions to the Dworkin's Rule (DR). The DR establishes that the use of Proactive Law Enforcement Techniques (PALETs) is morally impermissible without a probable cause. The authors argue that there are reasonable exceptions to the use of PALETs and are justified even without probable cause when employed against High Level Government Officials (HLGOs) and High Level Business Officials (HLBOs). It adds that the exceptions are consistent with Dworkin's Ideal Criminal Sanctioning which disposes the nemesis of the American business through the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002.

This paper examines police sexual misconduct (PSM). Twenty police chiefs in a major metropolitan area were interviewed about their perceptions of the nature, extent, and causes of PSM. Results suggest that chiefs believe PSM is a problem. Although they generally report that the serious/criminal forms of PSM (e.g., rape, sexual assault, and sex with a juvenile) are rare, they believe the less serious, non-criminal incidents (e.g., flirting on duty, consensual sex on duty, and pulling over a driver to get a closer look) are more common. The data reveal four factors in particular that appear to influence this behavior: lack of knowledge about PSM, police departments' complaint systems, opportunity for sexual misconduct, and the police culture. Implications of the findings for possible methods to control PSM are discussed including the need for police chiefs and administrators to make a genuine commitment to controlling this problem. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article reports the findings from a study that investigates predictors of police willingness to blow the whistle and police frequency of blowing the whistle on seven forms of misconduct. It specifically investigates the capacity of nine policy and structural variables to predict whistle-blowing. The results indicate that two variables, a policy mandating the reporting of misconduct and supervisory status, surface as the most consistent predictors of whistle-blowing. Contrary to popular belief, the results also show that police are slightly less inclined than civilian public employees to subscribe to a code of silence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Use of D NA markers in research that are used in law enforcement risks undermining public trust and participation.

The article discusses a study which investigated state-mandated basic minimum police training in ethics. The author examines the need for legal moralism based on the rule of law which implies that police departments have the obligation to strengthen the rule of law. The Peace Officer Standards and Training (POST) Commissions across the U.S. were asked to forward their curricula concerning to the courses in ethics. Various approaches to ethics training were found and it was concluded that courses on ethics were not utilized to project a moral perspective.

The article discusses the use of officially sanctioned private citizens to enforce law and more specifically to deal with political dissent. The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) is used as a case study of this official use of vigilantes such as the Druzhiny. These groups proved useful especially in preventing ties between dissidents and supporters abroad. They also serve in the role of terrorist repression of dissidents and removal of leaders of dissident groups. These vigilante groups are also cost-effective and allow the Soviet government to assume the appearance of a benevolent regime.

Maryland ’s new law provides a model for others.

Although racial/ethnic disparities in police contact are well documented, less is known about other dimensions of inequity in policing. Sexual minority groups may face disproportionate police contact. We used data from the P18 Cohort Study (Version 2), a study conducted to measure determinants of inequity in STI/HIV risk among young sexual minority men (YSMM) in New York City, to measure across-time trends, racial/ethnic disparities, and correlates of self-reported stop-and-frisk experience over the cohort follow-up (2014-2019). Over the study period, 43% reported stop-and-frisk with higher levels reported among Black (47%) and Hispanic/Latinx (45%) than White (38%) participants. Stop-and-frisk levels declined over follow-up for each racial/ethnic group. The per capita rates among P18 participants calculated based on self-reported stop-and-frisk were much higher than rates calculated based on New York City Police Department official counts. We stratified respondents' ZIP codes of residence into tertiles of per capita stop rates and observed pronounced disparities in Black versus White stop-and-frisk rates, particularly in neighborhoods with low or moderate levels of stop-and-frisk activity. YSMM facing the greatest economic vulnerability and mental disorder symptoms were most likely to report stop-and-frisk. Among White respondents levels of past year stop-and-frisk were markedly higher among those who reported past 30 day marijuana use (41%) versus those reporting no use (17%) while among Black and Hispanic/Latinx respondents stop-and-frisk levels were comparable among those reporting marijuana use (38%) versus those reporting no use (31%). These findings suggest inequity in policing is observed not only among racial/ethnic but also sexual minority groups and that racial/ethnic YSMM, who are at the intersection of multiple minority statuses, face disproportionate risk. Because the most socially vulnerable experience disproportionate stop-and-frisk risk, we need to reach YSMM with community resources to promote health and wellbeing as an alternative to targeting this group with stressful and stigmatizing police exposure., Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

An interview with former Miami Police Chief, Philadelphia Police Commissioner and New York Police Department (NYPD) First Deputy Police Commissioner John Timoney is presented. He discusses the key in maintaining order in the face of large numbers of demonstrators that plan violent reactions. Furthermore, Timoney discusses the personal highlights and low points in the years that he served in three cities including, Miami, Florida, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and New York City.