Civilian Oversight for Democratic Policing and its Challenges: Overcoming Obstacles for Improved Police Accountability

Abstract

Civilian oversight has emerged as the preferred approach for policing the police in support of more democratic societies. This work provides an analytical review of formal civilian oversight for democratic policing outlining the benefits as well as the key challenges such oversight encounters. It then offers some insights on the required framework and environment for overcoming those challenges for improved police accountability, drawing on the author’s field experience. It also extends the comparative analysis about formal civilian oversight for democratic policing by providing a much more international perspective including a typology of the various classifications and approaches to such oversight.

Keywords:

• Civilian oversight
• democratic policing
• oversight model types
• oversight challenges
• police accountability

Correction Statement

This article has been republished with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.