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The University of Southampton
Economic, Social and Political Sciences

The slow race for change. Minority ethnic officers in UK constabularies. Free public lecture Event

Origin: 
Sociology, Social Policy and Criminology
Black History Month
Time:
17:30 - 18:30
Date:
23 October 2013
Venue:
Highfield Campus Building 58, lecture room 1067

For more information regarding this event, please email j.fleming@soton.ac.uk .

Event details

As part of Black History Month during October, we are holding a free lecture for the public to explore issues around low numbers of BME groups joining the police

Despite changes advocated by successive governments, especially after the Stephen Lawrence Inquiry Report was published, ethnic minority officers still form a small percentage of the police workforce.

Why has this situation persisted for so long and why does it matter? Is it because they are reluctant to join the police? Maybe the explanation lies elsewhere, not least in discrimination experienced by officers working in constabularies?

In this public lecture Professor Simon Holdaway, a former police officer, discusses his extensive research about the experiences of Black and minority ethnic police officers in the UK. His research for over more than a decade is based on interviews with serving officers throughout England and Wales. He will describe changes in their views of understanding their experiences of being police officers and, crucially, of being Black and minority ethnic police officers.

 

Attending

The event is free and there is no need to pre-book. There will be a reception afterwards, hosted jointly by Simon Hayes, the Police and Crime Commissioner for Hampshire and members from the Commissioner’s Office along with the Institute of Criminal Justice Research.

Prof Holdaway will discuss his research on BME experiences in the police force
Professor Holdaway

Speaker information

Professor Simon Holdaway,University of Sheffield,Simon Holdaway is Professor Emeritus of Criminology and Sociology the University of Sheffield and part-time Professor of Criminology at Nottingham Trent University. He left school at 16 with minimal qualifications, later joining the Metropolitan Police Service and serving for eleven years. During this time he was seconded to university as a mature student, returning to his force for two years, in which time he undertook doctoral research, a covert study of routine police work. His doctorate was published as ‘Inside the British Police: A Force at Work’ in which he described and analysed for the first time the occupational culture of the police. The book remains a classic of sociological analysis of the police. He has published 5 further books and many articles about aspects of policing, especially the work experience of Black and minority ethnic officers and the police occupational culture. His last book was ‘Black Police Associations in the UK: An analysis of race and ethnicity within constabularies’. Simon has been concerned with policy development throughout his career, researching in many constabularies in the UK, Europe and Canada. He wrote, for example, the erstwhile Commission for Racial Equality’s evidence for the Stephen Lawrence Inquiry and was consultant on policing to The Commission on the Future of Multi-Ethnic Britain.

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