Assessing the impact of participatory action research on police perceptions and engagement with homeless people - the homeless project

Abstract

Homelessness in Great Britain is a deeply intricate yet pressing social and humanitarian issue, with homeless people across the country experiencing hardship and vulnerability. Police views, police culture and the policing response to homelessness is equally complex. The literature on police culture in relation to homelessness suggests entrenched, challenging cultural perceptions towards this social group that requires urgent improvement.

Against this backdrop, this research seeks to answer important questions regarding how this requisite change can be realised through the introduction of Participatory Action Research (PAR). This thesis also examines the impact of police organisational priorities and policies on the police response to homelessness.

The methodology involved the development of a novel operationalised analytical tool (developed through PAR collaborative practices) that was used to assess the impact of PAR on police views and culture regarding homelessness. Thematic analysis of several core police data sets was undertaken, and the key data themes were utilised as refined indicators in the analytical tool to further the assessment of PAR.

This study revealed challenges and opportunities in terms of using PAR as a means of changing police views and culture towards homelessness. While this thesis demonstrates that local culture change is possible, it also revealed that organisational priorities are an over-riding factor to both wider culture change and to the success of PAR in police research. This study also demonstrated that police cultural perceptions of the ‘challenger’ citizen category (Reiner, 2010) are evident in contemporary police culture, which has implications for future PAR research involving external organisations.

This study has wider implications for academics conducting PAR in police research in terms of the key findings, the potential of the operationalised analytical tool as a means of understanding the impact of PAR on police culture regarding virtually any subject or social group, as well as the importance of understanding the risks associated with incorporating external partners into police research. This study also has implications regarding future research into homelessness and homeless cultures.

Date of Award	2024
Original language	English