Abstract
Robette Ann Dias has been the executive co-director of Crossroads Antiracism Organizing & Training since 2002. Crossroads is a national organization that works in institutions and communities to create antiracist policy, practice and culture. In this article Ms. Dias briefly reflects on four barriers to building trust and legitimacy in community policing that are created by racism: US society is built on a foundation of racism, every system including the legal system and law enforcement were originally designed to perpetuate white supremacy; denial of racism as a continued problem and policing as part of the problem, the prevalence of violence and our desensitization to it; and finally, the formation of police officers and increased militarization of policing. Four suggestions to begin to address racism in policing are also named as necessary steps forward.
Recommended Citation
Robette A. Dias,
Racism Creates Barriers to Effective Community Policing,
40
S. Ill. U. L.J.
501
(2016).
Available at:
https://opensiuc.lib.siu.edu/siulj/vol40/iss3/8