Democratic consolidation and community policing: Conflicting imperatives in South Africa

Abstract

Community policing is currently seen as essential to public policing in a democracy. Yet the consolidation of a new democracy poses potentially conflicting demands that may defeat efforts to move in this direction. The study reported here examines the rise and decline of Community Police Forums in South Africa, a high‐priority effort to democratize the state police during the 1994–1999 transition from apartheid to democracy. The South African experience of building a durable democracy suggests that once the legitimacy of the new government has been established the imperative of regime performance carries more weight than the need to deepen democracy, and that the high crime levels that often accompany greater political freedom are likely to determine a definition of police effectiveness antithetical to community policing. The author notes the irony that the democratization process set in motion political and social forces that increased the political utility of demonstrating the state's authority through policing policy.

Key words:

• Community Police Forums
• South African Police
• democratic policing
• democratic consolidation