“Community Policing” in the Oxford English Dictionary

Just happened to be looking this up today in the OED:

community policing n. policing at a local or community level; spec. a system of policing by officers who have personal knowledge of and involvement in the community they police.

1934   New Castle (Pa.) News 20 Feb. 16/3   Major Adams asserted that the modern principles of community policing are based on antiquated methods.

1973   Times 24 Sept. 2/6   Community policing, at present one of the most controversial talking points in Andersontown.

2000   P. Beatty Tuff i. 4   The mayor think rhyming sound bites, community policing, and the death penalty going to stop fools from getting paid.

Not sure exactly who major Adams is or what he’s about, but it is interesting to think that the newness of “community policing” was in question even way back in 1934.  Of course, I’m also not sure what Adams meant by “community policing” had anything to do with what we mean today, or even by the second (1974) entry.

Conference: XIst Colloquium for Police History (University of Cologne, July 14th-17th, 2010)

Next week I’ll be heading off to Germany for a conference on Police History at the University of Cologne.   You can read more about it over at Anthropoliteia, or through the clipped segment below