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'I wannabe a copper': The engagement of Police Community Support Officers (PCSOs) with the dominant police occupational culture

Cosgrove, Faye (2016) 'I wannabe a copper': The engagement of Police Community Support Officers (PCSOs) with the dominant police occupational culture. Criminology and Criminal Justice, 16 (1). pp. 119-138. ISSN 1748-8958

Item Type: Article

Abstract

Drawing upon ethnographic research with PCSOs working in two neighbourhood policing teams in Northern England, this article presents a typology of PCSO orientations to work and for the first time details the ways in which PCSOs utilise aspects of the dominant culture to manage the discord between aspirations and opportunities within the PCSO role. Engagement with aspects of the dominant culture varied according to career aspirations and orientations to work; ‘Frustrated PCSOs’ were most likely to endorse cultural characteristics as a means of facilitating integration and enhancing opportunities for crime control, whilst Professional PCSOs adopted aspects of the dominant culture when doing so diversified their deployment, enhanced effectiveness and the acquisition of craft skills to support future applications to become police officers. The article concludes by considering the resilience of the traditional police culture, particularly the dominant crimefighting ethos therein and the implications presented for the future of the PCSO role.

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More Information

Depositing User: Faye Cosgrove

Identifiers

Item ID: 6735
Identification Number: https://doi.org/10.1177/1748895815599580
ISSN: 1748-8958
URI: http://sure.sunderland.ac.uk/id/eprint/6735
Official URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/17488...

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Catalogue record

Date Deposited: 31 Oct 2016 14:39
Last Modified: 25 Feb 2021 14:45

Contributors

Author: Faye Cosgrove

University Divisions

Faculty of Education and Society

Subjects

Social Sciences > Criminology
Social Sciences

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