Why policing the risk society became a footnote in American police studies: A missed opportunity to move police theorizing forward

Abstract

Written in 1997, Ericson and Haggerty’s book Policing the Risk Society (PRS) should have had profound effects on police theorizing and research in the United States. In this article, we attempt to explain why this book failed to gain traction within the American policing literature. We argue that PRS was ignored for three reasons: (1) incommensurable theoretical frameworks, (2) timing and aim of the book’s publication, and (3) the intrusiveness of deductive surveillance technologies in the policing of identities. We conclude by discussing how Ericson and Haggerty’s theorizing should be revisited in the light of recent developments in policing.