An African-centered approach to community policing

ABSTRACT

The relationship between the Black community and law enforcement has received increased attention in the media in the last 3 years. Much of the conversation has centered around Black males and females being killed by police officers and the negative relationship between law enforcement and Black communities. This article focuses on how Afrocentricity can be applied to community policing as an option to address these issues. While much has been stated about community policing, nothing has been discussed that grounds the experience and the response in an African-centered perspective. By centering the discussion from a cultural perspective, African-centered theory can be utilized to frame the response within the Black experience and not from a Eurocentric perspective. Principles of the African-centered paradigm are identified and discussed as applied to creating a newly envisioned community policing initiative. Recommendations for the role of social workers are also offered with regards to having social workers interface with the criminal justice system from an African-centered perspective.

KEYWORDS:

• African-centered
• Afrocentric
• Afrocentricity
• Black community
• Black males
• community policing
• community practice
• criminal justice
• law enforcement