The Violent Police-Citizen Encounter

Abstract

While the emphasis in this article is on physical force by police officers, the perspective adopted is one of a transaction affected by police characteristics, citizen charac teristics, and their interactions in a given setting. The violent police-citizen encounter, moreover, is considered a develop mental process in which successive decisions and behaviors by either police officer or citizen, or both, make the violent outcome more or less likely. The emphasis upon mutual con tributions in the encounter carries policy implications that have not always been carefully considered in the past.