The Democratic Deficit in American Policing

Abstract

This dissertation examines the tools residents have at their disposal to facilitate democratic accountability for carceral state actors more broadly, and municipal police, more narrowly. First, I evaluate an increasingly common institutional reform in municipal governance – civilian oversight boards. This research demonstrates that oversight boards are systematically underpowered and unable to improve police behavior. Second, I examine civilian coproduction of accountability, through complaint reporting and meeting attendance. Across two survey based experiments, I show that residents are more willing to engage in coproduction when oversight agencies have strong sanctioning powers and direct democratic influence. Finally, I display how proximal carceral exposure shapes voter turnout when residents are given direct electoral influence over policymaking. Here, I use voter files from California to show that residents of the most high carceral exposure neighborhoods are mobilized to polls in order to support a ballot measure that reduces the reach of the carceral state.