Investigating New Types of Engagement, Response and Contact Technologies in Policing (INTERACT)
Online
13th May 2025 to 13th May 2025
The Canterbury Centre for Policing Research at Canterbury Christ Church University and the Centre for Global City Policing at UCL present:
Investigating New Types of Engagement, Response and Contact Technologies in Policing (INTERACT)
Tuesday 13th May 14:30 – 16:00 GMT+1 (online event)
Speakers:
Prof Liz Aston, Edinburgh Napier University
Prof Ben Bradford, University College London
INTERACT is a wide-ranging study of the use of technology in interactions between the police and public. It explores recent shifts towards technologically-mediated contact, to explore whether, and how, police organisations can pursue their aims of providing a procedurally just experience for users, and build legitimacy with various publics, at a time when the nature and form of police contact is, arguably, fundamentally changing.
In this seminar, members of the INTERACT research team will present key findings from the project. Drawing on research conducted inside police organisations, observations of public-facing police work and surveys, interviews and focus groups with multiple ‘publics’, they will address questions including: how the police and public experience and perceive technologically-mediated contact; what ‘visible’ and ‘accessible’ policing mean in the digital age; the potential impact of different types of technologically mediated contact on police legitimacy; the role of technologically mediated contact in building legitimacy; and whether theories of legitimacy and procedural justice need to developed to make them applicable in times of rapid technological development.