Reforming police forces is the only way to reduce the slaughter on America’s streets
Save time by listening to our audio articles as you multitaskToday, few people think that is a good idea. As our special report in this issue explains, murders have surged in America. In 2020 the number of people killed was 28% higher than it was in 2019—the single biggest increase recorded in more than a century. In 2021 many cities saw further rises. Almost nowhere has been spared, including suburbs and rural areas.
By rich-world standards, America is a staggeringly violent country. The murder rate is six times higher than it is in Britain, France or Germany and 20 times higher than in Japan. In 2020, one in 700 black men aged 18 to 24 was murdered. Violence is now not only cutting short the lives of over 24,000 people a year. It is also devastating entire communities, as businesses and middle-class people leave crime-ridden neighbourhoods.
The rise in violence since 2020 has many causes. Gun sales have soared; the pandemic shut many social services. But the fact that violence has not risen as much in any other comparable country suggests that the American public’s loss of faith in their police that summer played a part. People in high-crime areas became more reluctant to call or co-operate with the cops. Many officers, sensing a loss of political support, pulled back from such places, or stayed in their cars.
The share of murders that result in an arrest or identification of a dead suspect has dropped from about 70% in the 1980s to 54% in 2020. If criminals get away with murder, others will resort to “street justice”. As Robert Peel, founder of London’s police, argued, good policing requires “the willing co-operation of the public”.
The protesters who raged that hot summer were right to demand change. But that should mean reform, not retrenchment. Mr Biden’s programme to hire more cops is a necessary start. Though it spends vastly more on prisons, America devotes roughly 20% less as a share of itsHowever, more money will produce lasting improvement only if it is coupled with sustained reform aimed at rebuilding trust in the police.
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