Australian Police Case Study

In the mid 1970’s Australia’s police organisations in all states and territories adopted a paramilitary policing model, creating hierarchical structure to police members response to crime; however in the past 30 years, Victoria’s policing has since adopted a community-based model, aimed to focus on ‘service’ rather than ‘force’ (Bull & Stratta, 1995). Although police and public perception is to catch criminals, the job role has evolved, resulting in specialized units; for instance, the Victorian Police Force has a liaison officer service, unit services and referral services with a shift from focusing just on targeting ‘real crime’ (Clifford, 2010). However, studies show increasing numbers of police members encountering individuals experiencing

This influenced a new Police Board to be established, appointing John Avery as NSW Police Commissioner in 1984 (Chan, 2006). Avery’s mission for the NSW Police Force was to rid it of internal corruption and create a new police culture to better service the community as the main focus for police work (Reynolds, 1996). Many of the changes that were introduced included a complete reorganisation of the command structure, implementing new recruitment criteria and training programmes (Reynolds, 1996). Avery realised that police were not succeeding in reducing crime and that there was fear within the community, therefore radical changes within traditional policing needed to take place (Reynolds, 1996). Avery influenced the core operating strategy for police reform in the NSW Police, focusing towards ‘community policing’, and the notion of ‘force’ was replaced with ‘service’ (Reynolds, 1996). Due to the popular and successful results, many other Australasian police agencies have followed John Avery’s lead and have introduced community policing since the radical restructure of the NSW Police began in 1987 (Etter & Palmer,