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Bestseller
BestsellerE-book
Author Ellison, Graham.

Title The crowned harp : policing Northern Ireland / Graham Ellison and Jim Smyth.

Publication Info. London ; Sterling, Va. : Pluto Press, 2000.

Item Status

Description 1 online resource (xix, 218 pages).
Physical Medium polychrome
Description text file
Series Contemporary Irish studies
Contemporary Irish studies.
Bibliography Includes bibliographical references (pages 196-209) and index.
Contents Policing Nineteenth-century Ireland: Setting the Parameters -- Policing After Partition: Constructing the Security Apparatus -- Policing under Stormont -- The Impact of Civil Rights on Policing: Collapse and Failed Reform -- Criminalisation and Normalisation: The Counter-Insurgency Solution -- Legitimacy, Counter-Insurgency and Policing: The Legacy of the 1970s -- Shooting to Kill? -- Collusion and Death Squads -- Symbolism, Surveys and Police Legitimacy -- Epilogue: The Patten Report on the RUC.
Summary Annotation The Crowned Harp provides a detailed analysis of policing in Northern Ireland. Tracing its history from 1922, Ellison and Smyth portray the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) as an organisation burdened by its past as a colonial police force. They analyse its perceived close relationship with unionism and why, for many nationalists, the RUC embodied the problem of the legitimacy of Northern Ireland, arguing that decisions made on the organisation, composition and ideology of policing in the early years of the state had consequences which went beyond the everyday practice of policing. The authors provide an extended discussion of policing after the outbreak of civil unrest in 1969, ask why policing was cast in a paramilitary mould, and look at the use of special constabularies and the way in which the police dealt with social unrest which threatened to break down sectarian divisions. Examining the reorganisations of the RUC in the 1970s and 1980s, Ellison and Smyth focus on the various structural, legal and ideological components, the professionalisation of the force and the development of a coherent, if contradictory, ideology. The analysis of the RUC during this period sheds light on the problematic nature of using the police as a counter insurgency force in a divided society. Perceptions of the police, and the opinions of rank and file members are examined and an assessment is made of the various alternative models of policing, such as community policing and local control. This book offers important lessons about the nature of policing in divided societies.
Local Note eBooks on EBSCOhost EBSCO eBook Subscription Academic Collection - North America
Subject Royal Ulster Constabulary.
Royal Ulster Constabulary.
Royal Ulster Constabulary.
Police -- Northern Ireland.
Police.
Northern Ireland.
Genre/Form Electronic books.
Subject Police.
Added Author Smyth, Jim.
Other Form: Print version: Ellison, Graham. Crowned harp. London ; Sterling, Va. : Pluto Press, 2000 (DLC) 99089714
ISBN 9781849640329 (electronic book)
1849640327 (electronic book)
0745313981
9780745313986