Legal cynicism and the enduring legacy of abusive policing - Dr Thiago R. Oliveira

This article advances an analytical model of how abusive policing fosters cynicism toward legal norms and institutions, which in turn fosters the persistence of violence over time. Linking civilian complaints about police use of force and other abuses filed against Chicago Police Department officers from 1991 to 2016 with community and longitudinal survey data from the Project on Human Development in Chicago Neighborhoods, as well as police-recorded crime and the U.S. Census, we test mechanisms that operate both as a place-oriented cultural frame and a person-oriented cognitive frame. At the neighborhood level, we show that concentrations of complaints about abusive policing are associated with subsequent increases in violent crime, and that a culture of cynicism about police capacity and intentions mediates these effects. At the individual level, we show that cumulative neighborhood exposure to abusive policing is associated with violent and offending behavior, and that adolescents growing up in such neighborhoods develop persistent cynicism about collective moral rules that lasts into adulthood, up to 20 years later. The results provide key insights into the enduring legacy of abusive policing for legal cynicism and the reproduction of violence. Further information and registration: crim.cam.ac.uk/events (opens in a new tab)