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It was clear that officers did not differentiate between the varying types of ‘visibility’ that the Home Office (2001a: 23) highlighted in their white paper ‘Open All Hours’. All types of visibility (on foot, in vehicles, different ranks) were referred to generally under the umbrella term of ‘public reassurance’. Yet it must be emphasised that the different types

of visibility send out very different messages: ‘unhurried foot patrol suggests ‘all is well with the world’, versus the ‘far from reassuring’ blue light runs (Home Office, 2001a: 23).

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residents could feel more reassured with a police presence, while other more affluent areas could feel ‘unnerved’ with increased visibility though it was merely officer speculation. From the fieldwork data, it became clear that wearing the uniform provoked different reactions and responses dependent on the time of day or night, weekday or weekend, and area the patrolling officer(s) were in. I was alerted to this pattern by officers on numerous occasions:

‘There are very different reactions to our uniform for day and night and in different situations. I think in the day it is probably a deterrent, when everything’s calmer. But at night, especially in the city centre, the [police] presence actually makes people play up. Like they know they can have a fight and won’t get hurt, like they can throw the first punch and then we will step in and they won’t have to get the punch back if you know what I mean.’

(PC Mauve)

Although this public reaction was cited as ‘unusual’, and limited to a small demographic (namely young inebriated adult males in the city centre on a Friday or Saturday night), it nevertheless indicated that a uniformed presence acted as a deterrent only in certain situations, and encouraged violence in others. Although these instances were few and far between, it was a consensus among officers that their uniforms could cause this unusual effect, therefore putting an interesting spin on previous findings that suggest the police

deter criminal activity with their mere presence: ‘officers… intimidate persons and thus deter offences’ (Manning, 1979: 46). To further illustrate this, a PC and sergeant recalled testing the ‘playing up’ theory over a number of weeks:

‘We actually wanted to test the theory out didn’t we? [Sergeant Indigo nods]. We were in the city a few weeks ago and we were watching two groups of lads sparring outside [the nightclub] and we thought “ah, I wonder what they’ll do if we leave”, we got back in the van and drove around the corner. We went back after a minute, and surprise surprise they’d gone. No problems. It’s really strange, it’s like they act up because they can see you’re there. You’d think it’d be the opposite way around, wouldn’t you?’

(PC Mauve) One significant difference in visibility that the public has seen in the last few years, is the regular use of high-visibility jackets. All front-line officers are required to wear them when they are out on patrol to make them easily identifiable to the public. In contrast, at the beginning of the twentieth century officers dark (blue/black) uniforms aided ‘invisibility’ to ‘catch criminals by surprise’ (Broady and Tetlow, 2005: 39). The use of high visibility

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on the streets, something the government is keen to encourage. However, accountability may also play a part:

‘I don’t know if it’s about visibility, maybe it is, they say that’s what the public want and they can all certainly see us from a distance with the garish yellow!’

(PC Mint) ‘It helps people see us more easily, especially from a distance. Whether they actually need our assistance or not, they probably feel reassured that they can see us, that we’re just there.’

(PC Moss) ‘It’s definitely to do with ‘elf and safety [mocking tone used] to make sure we’re not hit on the road or anything maybe. Can’t have any compensation culture going on [laughs].’

(Sergeant Indigo) ‘They [the public] are always trying to fuck us over. If we weren’t wearing it at an incident or something I can just bloody imagine them attacking us and saying “oh well I didn’t recognise him as a copper” and getting off with it.’

(PCSO Amber) Previous research suggests that public reactions to seeing police officers are considerably more complex than just visibility. In a visibility survey in 2006, 50% of respondents thought that high visibility jackets were necessary to make officers more visible, but an equal number of those interviewed disapproved of the jackets because the luminous yellow colour had emergency-situation connotations (Innes, 2007). Furthermore, there was an almost unanimous negative reaction when pictures were shown of three or more officers in the high-visibility jackets indicating that too much police visibility conveyed messages that it must be a crime hot-spot to warrant a larger police presence.

It is therefore indicated that for some sections of the population, increased police presence

‘will increase insecurities rather than reassure’ but this is also dependant on other

variables (such as prejudices and prior contact with the police) (Millie, 2010: 227), and confusion over who is doing what. Across many UK cities, the public has to make clear distinctions between PCs, PCSOs, special constables, private security, street wardens, city-centre night marshals, environmental crime officers… and this list is far from exhaustive. This presentation of ‘hybrid’ police may actually ‘heighten anxiety in the community’ (Cooke, 2005: 233). It could be just that there is actually too much patrol

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(Millie, 2010), and thus it may not be about increased or decreased police presence; it is quite simply a question of who is being reassured.

6.4 Conclusion

The contradictions that exist in policing are extensive. The binary distinctions that emerged in this chapter are the basis for a much wider and deeper set of conflicting pairs in a vast number of different contexts in police work. Firstly, ‘wearing safety’ by ‘wrapping’ officers in ‘military security’ (Doran, 2000: 1) offers some sort of psychological protection. This psychosomatic ‘protection’ is, at best, unrealistic. The occupation is, by

its very nature, dangerous and unpredictable and wearing clothing that is more militarised

than its previous counterparts is more ‘emotional’ than anything else (Doran, 2000: 1).

Officers suggested that there is a contradiction between ‘looking militarised’ and then carrying out their duties with ‘friendliness’ and it is increasingly challenging. Similarly, high visibility, shown by the wearing of illuminous jackets versus the invisibility of police individuality through uniformity and muted colours offers a complex binary. Young (1991a: 67-68) argued that it is ‘no accident that the politics of the times seems to parallel

the growing toughness of the police image, or that the police have taken on an increasing resemblance to the black-clothed enemies of goodness who sprinkle the popular science

fantasy films such as Star Wars, Superman and the like’.

Secondly, the fieldwork data suggests that the police uniform is actually not uniform in style. While the overall clothing and equipment is instantly recognisable and contributory to the collective force identity, it is clear that wearing the uniform is a very personal affair. This is interesting in terms of developing a contradictory pair; the uniformity, that is, the expected homogeneity of a uniform, is deviated from in the way in which officers personalise their uniforms through the addition of discretionary equipment and embellishments. Officers were keen to discreetly eradicate elements of a collective identity: they amended and modified elements of their clothing and equipment to personalise and individualise. Some police community support officers in particular went out of their way to actively disguise their status in wearing black cycling tops and concealing their PCSO markings to look more like police constables which invited ridicule from other ranks.

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These adjustments seemed to temporarily increase PCSO morale. Similarly, when new

tops were recently issued to Hampshire police officers with the word ‘police’ mistakenly

stitched upside down, officers were allowed to keep them ‘to boost morale… because it’s funny’ (Hickney, 2015: Police Oracle), indicating that personal modifications to clothing (mistaken or otherwise) can boost self-esteem, albeit temporarily. While some of these alterations were conscious personal choices, around half of officers were wearing (noticeably) outdated versions of uniform, demonstrating another example of a uniform not uniform in style.

Lastly, the types of visibility that the police offer is dependent on a considerable number of variables. The fieldwork shows that police presence is often perceived differently

dependent on the area, previous dealings with the police and various other things and ‘the

uniform is instantly recognisable and fraught with a complex of ingrained stereotypes’

(Gunderson, 1987: 192). It is difficult to separate the police uniform and police presence in general within the binary pair of reassurance versus anxiety (see Millie, 2010: 227). Similarly, officers recalled varying reactions to their uniform depending on the time of day

and had undertaken informal ‘tests’ to prove their hypotheses and therefore day versus night effects offers its own contradictions of how officers ‘use’ their uniform. As aforementioned, the binary of visibility versus invisibility is complex in the sense that another binary pair emerges within this context; reassurance, provided by an increased

police presence, versus anxiety, where ‘too much’ police presence results in unease and

disquiet is perhaps more dependent on who is being reassured (see Millie, 2010).

Goffman’s (1959) concept of dramatic realisation is a useful tool to explore the aspects of the police uniform discussed in this chapter. Goffman (1959: 30) stated that an actor

‘typically infuses his activity with signs which dramatically highlight and portray confirmatory facts that might otherwise remain unapparent and obscure’. He astutely notes that in some cases, such as the ‘roles of prize-fighters, surgeons, violinists, and

policemen’, dramatic realisation ‘presents no problem’ as these roles allow for such high levels of ‘dramatic self-expression’ their performances become ‘famous’ (1959: 30-1). The appearance and manner of police officers (as described in Chapter 4.2 and throughout this chapter) ultimately supports this. The image of a police officer in uniform, and indeed their vehicles and many accoutrements, act as visible symbols of authorised use of force and power (Westmarland, 2001). Reiner (2000: 170) argued that the ‘historical and

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sociological evidence should have made clear that crime-fighting has never been, is not, and cannot be the prime activity of the police, although it is part of the mythology of media images, cop culture, and, in recent years, government policy’. Manning (1997) also

discussed how police officers must use dramaturgic tools and strategies because there are many inconsistencies between what the police can do and what they are expected to do, much like the inconsistencies that the police community support officers show in this chapter. By altering and modifying their uniform, the symbolic relevance of a different role (that of their police officer counterparts), is in conflict with what their actual job entails. People ‘read’ signals such as patrolling PCSOs not on face value: with the position

and context of social situations influencing the reception, dissemination and consumption

of semiotics and dramaturgy. As dramaturgical sociology (Manning, 1997: 6) ‘focuses on

social control’, and presumes that actions are symbolic in the way that everything relays

messages and explores how they are interpreted, visibility and patrol carry much more contested mixtures of emotions, feelings and perceptions, which are often contradictory.

These paradoxes are problematic, much more than the government’s assertion that the

police image and how it is managed through the uniform is simply a reassurance or

deterrence factor (Innes, 2004). It is indeed, a ‘masterful costume drama’ (Manning, 1997: 5) from all sides. The effectiveness of these roles and dramatic realisations were noted by

Heidensohn (1992: 299) in the way that authority is ‘projected’ and physical presence is

used as a type of interaction in itself. Goffman (1959: 30) stated that ‘policemen’ have ‘no problem’ in dramatic realisation, but there is evidently not much dramatising to do because of their iconic uniform, accoutrements and vehicles.

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