"Police cooperation, Community governance and regulatory regimes"

den Boer, Monica. (1993) "Police cooperation, Community governance and regulatory regimes". In: UNSPECIFIED, Washington, DC. (Unpublished)

Preview

PDF Download (1790Kb) | Preview

Abstract

[From the Introduction]. International police co-operation is not an entirely new policy issue in Europe, as it has been preceded by various initiatives across the field. The best-known initiative is probably Interpol, which is a "global" or supranational International Criminal Police Organisation with legal statutes that "do not correspond to contemporary realities" (Anderson 1989: 60). Interpol's principal remit is the facilitation of the international exchange of criminal information. It acts as a "letterbox" or "service-hatch" for requests that are codified, translated and then sent to relevant destinations across the world. During the last decade, Interpol has been subject of criticism, for three reasons in particular: I) Interpol is a nonoperational police organisation, and can therefore neither independently perform criminal investigations nor actively enforce the law; 2) Membership of Interpol is accessible for all recognised states in the world, and the mixture of political regimes (Libya and Britain are both members for instance) resulting from that complicates action in pursuit of anti-terrorist objectives (Anderson 1989: 146); 3). The global nature of Interpol has also meant that, despite the creation of regional secretariats, a targeted, regional approach to crime is exceedingly difficult.

Actions (login required)