Austerity policing, emotional labour and the boundaries of police work: an ethnography of a police force control room in England

LUMSDEN, Karen and BLACK, Alexandra (2018). Austerity policing, emotional labour and the boundaries of police work: an ethnography of a police force control room in England. The British Journal of Criminology, 58 (3), 606-623.

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Abstract

This article discusses the changing role of policing in an era of austerity from the perspective of frontline civilian police staff (call handlers and dispatchers) in a force control room (FCR). It draws on a symbolic interactionist framework and the concept of emotional labour (Hochschild 1979; 1983[2012]) in order to explore the emotional responses and strategies engaged in by staff when responding to 101 non-emergency calls and 999 emergency calls. The clash of public and police expectations, and the emotional labour expended when managing this clash, provide a valuable insight into the frontline staff perspective on the changing role of the police under austerity. Data is drawn from ethnographic fieldwork in the control room of a police force in England.

Item Type:	Article
Departments - Does NOT include content added after October 2018:	Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities > Department of Law and Criminology
Identification Number:	https://doi.org/10.1093/bjc/azx045
Page Range:	606-623
Depositing User:	Alexandra Black
Date Deposited:	11 Aug 2017 15:31
Last Modified:	18 Mar 2021 03:40
URI:	https://shura.shu.ac.uk/id/eprint/16497

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