‘We need to use the entire toolbox’ storytelling in the unarmed Norwegian police

ABSTRACT

Norway is one of the few European countries in which the police, in the course of their normal duties, are unarmed. Based on a risk assessment, Norwegian police were permanently armed from 25th November 2014 and 3rd February 2016. This was the longest period during which the police in Norway had been routinely armed, and an evaluation of their experience was required, the aim being to collect police officers’ own experiences from this period. The police interviewees (n = 30) answered specific and detailed questions. Surprisingly, they answered more than the questions asked of them, they told stories before, during and after the interviews which highlighted uncertainty in the service indicating the need to be armed. The evaluation found that these stories were repeated in every police district used in the data collection. They described observable phenomena; they meant something central to those who were interviewed. The question was: What were the stories about? Which challenges did these stories point to? What forms of justification for the arming of the police do we find in them? In the article we see storytelling through a (cultural) sociological approach as attempts at justification and legitimation

KEYWORDS:

• Unarmed police
• storytelling
• societal and political justification

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank Professor Jan Ove Tangen (University of South-Eastern Norway) for his useful and valuable input in the work on this text. Professor Tangen’s support and contribution to the work has been crucial in completing the project.

Notes

1 Other European countries are Iceland, Ireland and United Kingdom (except Northern Ireland) regjeringen.no.

2 This will be discussed in depth in sub section 1.2.

3 The position of the unarmed Norwegian police is to be understood as unarmed with firearms. They carry expandable batons, pepper spray and handcuffs in the belt as standard equipment. Since 2013 standard procedure has been to have Heckler & Koch MP5s (submachine gun) stored in police vehicles and officers are regularly trained in the use of firearms (Hendy 2021, 2022).

4 The governmental Official Report: Arming the police. Legality, necessity, proportionality and accountability (NOU 2017:9, 2017).

5 There was also an important principle of visibility using the blue uniform easy to distinguish from green military uniforms (Ellefsen 2015).

6 IP refers to operational level. In Norway this is divided into categories 1-4. Category 1 = member of tactical response unit; Category 2 = Bodyguard service, Category 3 = member of an emergency response unit (UEH): Category 4 = other operational officers.

7 The dates are from graduation from the Police University College.

8 https://www.forskningsetikk.no/en/guidelines/social-sciences-humanities-law-and-theology/guidelines-for-research-ethics-in-the-social-sciences-humanities-law-and-theology/.

9 The quotes that begin these sections are verbatim quotes from the interviews of the main report (Barland et al. 2022).

10 IP refers to operational level. In Norway this is divided into categories 1-4. Category 1 = member of tactical response unit; Category 2 = Bodyguard service, Category 3 = member of an emergency response unit (UEH): Category 4 = other operational officers.

11 The Norwegian police also carry expandable batons, pepper spray and handcuffs in the belt as standard equipment.

12 https://www.regjeringen.no/no/dokumenter/horing---nou-20179-politiet-og-bevapning/id2554465/.