Fuelled by the popularity of citizen participation in community safety and by an ongoing pluralisation of policing, there is increasing acknowledgement of volunteer policing around the Western world. Starting with a review of the small body of knowledge that has been built up, our paper outlines the origins and background of police volunteers, their management, their role and the activities they carry out, and records their job satisfaction and working experience. Empirical findings from the Netherlands show that most police volunteers are positive about having the opportunity to do something worthwhile for society, to improve personal skills, and to make connection with regular police colleagues. Yet, at the same time, they are disappointed with their position within the force and feel uncertain about their role. As an institution, the Dutch police tends to undervalue and neglect the work of police volunteers, not least because of slow policy making processes, an unclear vision about the future of volunteer policing, and suspicion about the unwanted substitution of salaried work by voluntary work. This ambiguous attitude runs counter to the current political agenda in favour of a participatory society and active citizenship in the Netherlands, and bears striking resembles to what is known about the position of police volunteers in UK and in the US. ARTICLE HISTORY

WhatsApp Neighbourhood Crime Prevention (WNCP) groups are popular in the Netherlands. As a basic assumption, this kind of digital neighbourhood watch could prevent crime, but what is the evidence? Drawing on a mixture of qualitative research and a review of additional publications, we conclude that WNCP groups stimulate social cohesion rather than prevent crime. We reach our conclusion by applying the evaluation EMMIE framework – an acronym for Effect, Mechanisms, Moderators, Implementation and Economics – to the available data. A point for further discussion is the limited scope of the economic dimension. Moral costs must be calculated, too, as WNCP groups tend to deepen divisions between groups of citizens and fuel exclusionary practices in the name of community safety.