The Policing Machine: Enforcement, Endorsements, and the Illusion of Public Input

The Policing Machine: Enforcement, Endorsements, and the Illusion of Public Input

Friday, March 29, 2024  •  12-1pm  •  Milne 200

The past few years have seen Americans express passionate demands for police transformation. But even as discussion of no-knock warrants, chokeholds, and body cameras has exploded, police departments have successfully stonewalled change. Drawing on his recent book, The Policing Machine (University of Chicago Press, 2023), Tony Cheng will discuss the stages of police departments’ resistance, offering a close look at the deep engagement strategies that NYPD precincts have developed with only subsets of the community in order to counter any truly meaningful, democratic oversight. The fundamental challenge with police-community relationships, Dr. Cheng shows, is not to build them. It is that they already exist and are motivated by a machinery designed to stymie reform.

Presenter:

Tony Cheng, Assistant Professor of Sociology, Duke University

This event is sponsored by The Hindelang Criminal Justice Research Center and hosted by the Justice, Law, and Inequality Working Group.