A Comparative Analysis of VOLUNTEER Officers from the United States and the United Kingdom

Abstract

The use of volunteer officers provides numerous benefits for law enforcement agencies, including the ability to increase trust between police and the community, to reduce the workload of a department, and to maintain or extend services without further depleting a budget. The United States and the United Kingdom both employ the use of volunteer officers. However, there has been little comparative work on these two areas of the policing system. This research first discusses the volunteer system of policing in both the United States and United Kingdom, followed by findings on the confidence of officers from both areas as they relate to police duties. While Britain’s form of policing greatly influenced American policing, the two do not have the same policing system. There are a few major differences between these aspects of the policing system for both countries. First, the decentralized system in the United States does not have a standardized recruitment or training procedure. However, there are minimum requirements set forth by the individual state or federal agencies(e.g., the FBI, CIA, DEA, etc.). Within the United Kingdom, the centralized nature sets forth a standardized recruitment and training procedure that, for every department, is overseen by the government. Aside from the nature of the policing system, when compared to reserve deputies in Florida, special constables(who are similar in function and power to reserve deputies) receive much less training. Further, special constables echo this reality in their self-reporting, where far fewer special constables believed their training to be adequate in preparation for police duties compared to reserve deputies in Florida(3.2% vs. 37.5%). Additionally, special constables were less confident in their ability to conduct interviews and administrative tasks. Policy implications and limitations of the present study are also discussed.