Course summary

Police play a crucial role in society, and policing has a direct impact on the lives, freedoms and security of citizens. This programme examines key challenges in contemporary policing. You will have the opportunity to gain an advanced understanding of how policing works in and tries to adapt to our contemporary world. You'll explore how policing responds to challenges such as political polarisation, cybercrimes, and the globalisation of crime. Students will address cutting-edge critical, conceptual and theoretical analyses of policing, human rights, privacy and surveillance studies, domestic violence, hate crime, and gender-based violence. You will have the opportunity to hear from police themselves about how they respond to these challenges and be taught by our academic experts who have worked closely with police as well as campaigning for police reform to address brutality, abuse and misconduct. The module equips you with the necessary skills to evaluate the current academic and policy literature on policing and develop a critical understanding of key topics in policing.

• Cybercrime, the dark net, policing the cybersphere

• Cop culture through history

• AI, big tech, and digital policing

• Policing contested crimes: hate, crimes of abuse, and political protest.

• Globalisation and crime

• Vulnerability, harm and protecting the public

• Police in the media and popular culture

• International policing and borders

• Crime in the city

• Police ethics

• Gender, race, and crime

• Human rights