Securing the city: emerging markets in the private provision of security services in Chicago.

Theodore, Nik ; Martin, Nina ; Hollon, Ryan 等

THE PAST 30 Y EARS HAVE WITNESSED A TRANSFORMATION IN THE GOVERNANCE OF RISK and security, one that has been marked by a distinct movement away from the public provision of policing and toward both marketized and community-based forms of security (Bayley and Shearing, 2001; see also Crawford, 1997; Eick, 2003; Garland, 2001 ; Rigakos, 2002; Rosenbaum, 1988; Ward, 2006). In U.S. cities this double movement has been executed through a proliferation of community policing initiatives and a sharp rise in the use of private security contractors, not just by the private sector, but by the public sector as well. This movement downward and outward from the state has followed the popular ascendancy of a new discourse of insecurity--a root-and-branch critique of the role and effectiveness of public policing in contemporary society. Since the 1960s, frequent depictions of mounting urban unrest--"bombed out" inner-city neighborhoods, street-gang warfare, and urban rioting (see Banfieid, 1968; Chicago Tribune, 1986; Welch, Price, and Yankey, 2002)--have formed the backdrop and been the justification for renewed calls for law-and-order style policing. The ideo-political arguments that underpin this critique are varied, and include notions about state failure and a concomitant expansion of the role of civil society and markets in managing security concerns.

The state's ability to effectively deter crime and punish offenders has frequently been described by proponents of law-and-order policing as having been fundamentally eroded by bureaucratic constraints and cumbersome procedural rules that have hamstrung public policing efforts and undermined the capacity of the criminal justice system to mete out appropriate punishment (see Braithwaite and Pettit, 1990; Reinharz, 1996; Garland, 2000; Bayley and Shearing, 2001). This critique of public policing in the contemporary context strikes at the core of modernist ideas of crime and antisocial behavior. Whereas these traditionally have been seen as problems arising out of deprivation and limited economic opportunity, they now are viewed as resulting from inadequate social and self-control. Citing varying interpretations of crime rates as an example of the shift in the commonsense understanding of insecurity, David Garland (200l: 20) notes that "where high crime ... rates would once have been attributed to implementation-failure ... they are now interpreted as evidence of theory-failure: as signs that crime control is based upon an institutional model that is singularly inappropriate for its task." In other words, proponents of this critique charge that rather than simply stepping up existing law enforcement efforts, a paradigm shift that re-conceptualizes policing is necessary. If public law enforcement is to rise to this challenge, new partners, technologies, and strategies will be required. This has led to, among other things, increased calls for non-state forms of policing, particularly commoditized forms of security that can be made available and purchased through markets.

The dominant critique of public policing is laced with neoliberal ideology that lauds the virtues of private-sector managerialism (which is seen as an antidote to the overly bureaucratic public sector) and market efficiencies that are said to come from privatization. Neoconservative social commentators have seized on this critique to advance their own vision of policing, one that has been extraordinarily successful in reshaping popular opinion on policing and public safety. The resulting commonsense understanding of security--that the police cannot be everywhere, that more security is needed, and that effective crime control begins with the maintenance of social order (along the lines of the "broken windows" thesis)--has (unintentionally perhaps) laid the foundation for the rapid growth of the private security industry in major U.S. cities.

This article explores the expansion of private security provision that has been underway in Chicago. Our focus is on how the private security industry has been able to exploit the opportunities created by rising fears of insecurity to make markets for commoditized policing. Specifically, we examine how the private security industry has capitalized on these security concerns to expand its reach into formerly public-sector domains such as the policing of public space. We begin by briefly reviewing narratives of order-maintenance policing. This is followed by an examination of the rise of the private security industry in Chicago, which traces the industry's development and its expansion into previously public-sector responsibilities for securing urban space. Through case studies of the privatization of security in Chicago's public transit system and public housing sector, we explore the ways in which markets for private security services are constructed and draw out implications of the privatization of security on public safety in urban areas.

Order-Maintenance Policing and the New Discourse of Insecurity

Wicked people exist. Nothing avails except to set them apart from innocent people (James Q. Wilson, 1975: 209).

Over the past three decades, the increasingly common belief that "nothing has worked" to deter crime, rehabilitate offenders, and otherwise ensure the safety and security of the community has created an "ideological vacuum in the criminal policy sphere" (Garland, 2001: 62). In the absence of an overarching theory that could adequately explain the rising perception of insecurity in U.S. cities, the "broken windows" thesis initially advanced by James Q. Wilson and George L. Keeling (1982) emerged as a leading explanation for the persistent threat of urban insecurity. The argument put forward by Wilson and Keeling is deceptively simple, yet it contains far-reaching implications for policing and public safety. According to Wilson and Keeling (1982: 31), "disorder and crime are usually inextricably linked, in a kind of developmental sequence." If minor disorders, such as panhandling, littering, and loitering go unchecked, they send a signal to the community at large that crime is tolerated. At the neighborhood level, when broken windows are left unattended, according to this theory, the "area [becomes] vulnerable to criminal invasion" (Ibid.: 32).

Wilson and Keeling's understanding of urban crime and its perpetrators is based upon a series of binary categories that distinguish insiders (who "knew their place") from outsiders who might be prone to serious criminal activity (1982: 30): regulars versus strangers, decent folk versus drunks and derelicts, and so forth. The implications for policing are clear: to ensure the security of community residents, law enforcement officials must engage in identifying and excluding those who might commit crimes. The broken windows thesis then offers a justification for profiling as a legitimate form of preemptive policing--identifying potential offenders is of paramount importance if crime is to be contained. Wilson and Keeling single out the "ill-smelling drunk," "disorderly people," and the "importuning beggar" as the types of potential offenders who might pose a risk to the community (1982: 30, 32). Even if such individuals do not actually break the law, their violation of community norms might send a signal to others that social order in the neighborhood has broken down, thus setting in motion forces that lead to rising crime. Though clearly resonating with the now widely discredited tactic of police profiling, Wilson and Keeling, as well as others who seek to justify similar measures (see Meares and Kahan, 1999), unabashedly rationalize this form of preemptive policing as a way of staving off serious crime. The more sinister implication of these arguments is that they can be used to legitimize furtively racist policing tactics.

Broken windows policing and related approaches such as "zero tolerance" are among the most prominent "control theories" that have emerged alongside a new discourse of insecurity (Garland, 2001). These theories have profoundly shaped public perceptions of how community safety is to be achieved. In broadening the definition of perpetrators of crime to include the unruly, the offensive, and the unconventional, proponents of order-maintenance policing have been able to advance a wholesale redefinition of risk and insecurity. In executing a "rhetorical maneuver ... [that] transform[s] offensive conduct into harmful conduct" (Harcourt, 2001: 183), order-maintenance theorists have dramatically extended the purview of policing to include the close surveillance of urban space and its inhabitants--neighborhood-by-neighborhood and block-by-block.

Wilson and Keeling provided the theoretical justification for order-maintenance policing, rooted in notions of deviance and social pathology, and based on the allegedly corrosive effects of "disorder" on urban areas. New York City in the 1980s and early 1990s, perhaps the quintessential example of a U.S. city struggling to restore a sense of authority and public safety, embraced the order-maintenance approach to crime prevention and further propelled Wilson and Keeling's analysis into the national debate on effective policing strategies. (1) Police activities were directed toward the streets and away from bureaucratic "desk work"; law enforcement authorities were charged with achieving demonstrable reductions in crime, and a mode of aggressive policing was actively encouraged by police commanders. Law-and-order policing has been aided by the deployment of new technologies, such as video surveillance systems, computerized crime databases, and geographic information systems, that have been developed by the private sector. Investments in advanced technology have been prioritized by law enforcement departments that are determined to "get tough" on crime. Although this form of policing has enjoyed widespread public support, mounting violations of individuals' civil rights and allegations of police harassment have led to legal challenges to this new orthodoxy. Police profiling--a central feature of the order-maintenance approach--has been repeatedly challenged in the courts as unconstitutional and rebuffed as racist by elected officials and community leaders in cities throughout the United States. But legal opposition to this policing tactic has done little to quell public demand for aggressive policing tactics in major U.S. cities. Faced with new restrictions on legitimate methods of law-and-order policing, some decision-makers have concluded that if the public police are unable to provide the type of protection needed to safeguard urban space, perhaps the private sector would be willing to assume more of the responsibility for securing cities.

Private Security Services

The private security services industry operates at the intersection of routine public safety concerns, threats to homeland security, and the restructuring of urban economies. One of the fastest growing industries in the United States, security services have the highest rate of labor turnover in the service sector. The industry's remarkable expansion into new markets has been contingent on the restructuring of public-sector security work, as well as on the perception that sufficient threats exist to justify greater (public and private) expenditures on security. However, intense competition in the industry has placed stubborn limits on operating margins and this has served to hold down wage rates, even as the industry has grown. Employment conditions in private security work are the industry's Achilles' heel, and this multi-billion dollar industry has struggled to raise wages and improve working conditions, factors that primarily are governed through the contracting process. According to USA Today (Hall, 2003),

 Most of the nation's 1 million-plus guards are unlicensed,
 untrained, and not subject to background checks. Their
 burgeoning, $12 billion-a-year industry is marked by high
 turnover, low pay, few benefits, and scant oversight. And
 according to government officials and industry experts,
 little has changed since Sept. 11, 2001.

The rapid growth of the security services industry--private security workers now outnumber public-sector security workers on the order of three to one (Blakely and Snyder, 1999)--reflects a loosening of the grip of the state's monopoly on policing. As in other areas of public-sector provision (see Peck, 2001, 2003), the state itself has in part orchestrated its own hollowing out through privatization and the discursive reframing of its own (limited) capacities. The private sector has seized upon the opportunity to deepen its penetration into formerly public-sector markets, bidding on contracts for the safeguarding of nuclear energy plants, prisons, transit systems, public housing developments, and tourist attractions. In gaining an increased share of public sector "markets," the security services industry has benefited from the general climate of fiscal austerity that has permeated the public sector. According to the National Association of Security Companies (NASCO, 2006), despite an ever-increasing demand for greater security, "public law enforcement departments have not escaped these fiscal pressures, and more and more, cost-conscious decision makers are examining privatization of certain services traditionally performed by police" as a way to meet the public's expectations of visible signs of policing and community safety.

The tension between demands for enhanced security and imperatives to rein in government spending is encouraging the ongoing reworking of the division of labor between public- and private-sector security personnel. Many U.S. cities are moving toward a strategy in which "the public police increasingly specialize in investigations and counterforce operations while private police become decentralized, full-service providers of visible crime prevention" (Bayley and Shearing, 2001: 19). Given this tension between demands for security and constraints on spending, it is perhaps not surprising that this shift from public to private provision has been accompanied by a downgrading of employment conditions for security workers. Mike Davis (1992: 251) asserts that:

 The private sector, exploiting an army of non-union, low-wage
 employees, has increasingly captured the labor-intensive roles
 (guard duty, residential patrol, apprehension of retail crime,
 maintenance of security passages and checkpoints, monitoring of
 electronic surveillance, and so on), while public law enforcement
 has retrenched behind the supervision of security macro-systems
 (maintenance of major crime databases, aerial surveillance, jail
 systems, paramilitary responses to terrorism and street
 insurgency, and so on).

Rapid technological advances in the security field have been implicated both in expanding the market for private security services and in placing downward wage pressures on personnel in the security services industry. "Technology development creates more advanced functionality at lower cost, which drives the rationalization of guard work even further" (Securitas, 2004: 15). This leads to a recursive relationship between technology development and the extension of employment insecurity within the workforce of the security services industry.

For its part, the security services industry has portrayed itself--with considerable success--as a partner in crime reduction, and the expansion of the private-sector policing of public spaces has involved an elaborate positioning of the industry on the front lines of public safety. In attempting to position itself as an effective and legitimate law enforcement partner, the security services industry emphasizes its visibility and an exaggerated sense of its authority. Often with guards dressed in paramilitary uniforms replete with military-style insignia and job titles associated with a military chain of command (e.g., lieutenant, sergeant, captain), security services companies seek to convey to the public that they are "in charge." However, the privatization of security work represents a shift in boundaries, not authority (which continues to predominantly reside with the state), of who delivers security services. Most security guards do not possess police powers. Yet the lines of authority remain deliberately blurred, with the perception of the power of private security forces being far greater than their actual authority.

The top three security services firms operating in the United States are Allied Barton, Group 4 Securicor, and Securitas. Industry leaders commanded approximately 45% of the U.S. market in 2004, up from 30% in 1990 (Securitas, 2004). This reflects the acquisition of local security firms by multinational corporations, as well as a decline in market share for many of the 13,000 smaller operators in the U.S. who are unable to provide a wide range of services on a large scale. The influence of multinational corporations on the security industry is considerable. Besides affecting wage rates and profitability by virtue of their size and scope of activities, industry leaders also shape the ways in which the market for security services operates. According to Securitas (2005: 18-19), "market leadership requires size in order to influence the local society's laws, rules, norms, and wages for employees in the security industry and, not least of all, their professionalism in order to change opinions about what can be entrusted to a security company. Together with development of the service offering, this expands the market's potential." Like the other industry leaders, Securitas has targeted government contracting as an emerging market that offers significant growth opportunities. For example, the federal government market has grown by more than 10% annually in recent years, making it a prime target for growth-oriented firms (Ibid.: 45). The further push into public-sector contracting reflects a maturing business-development strategy in the security services industry. The government sector is one in which an array of staffing and technological solutions can be deployed in the pursuit of growth opportunities, market share, and higher-margin business. This can be seen in the area of guarding. "The 'old' market for permanent guarding is growing by about 4 percent per year, with a gross margin of approximately 15 to 18 percent. The 'new' guarding market comprises specialized guarding ... [and] growth is twice as high, approximately 8 percent per year, with a significantly higher gross margin" (Ibid.: 16).

The expansion of the security services industry requires an ongoing identification of new risk markets (Rigakos, 2002), and in the wake of the September 11 terrorist attacks, U.S. cities provide the industry with numerous opportunities for growth. Mass transit systems, major tourist attractions, and government buildings have been among the many components of the urban infrastructure that have received priority designation for stepped-up policing. Cities have moved quickly to bolster their ability to respond to threats, and increasingly are relying on a combination of government and private-sector personnel to secure public areas. From the standpoint of public safety, city space is extremely difficult to regulate. With multiple entry points and flows of pedestrian and vehicular traffic, urban space poses unique challenges to comprehensive policing strategies. Chicago, along with many other U.S. cities, has attempted to respond to these challenges by making substantial investments in advanced security technology that can allow security personnel to closely monitor protected areas. The combination of a growing privatized security workforce and major investments in leading-edge surveillance equipment has placed Chicago at the forefront of a mode of urban policing modeled on the close supervision of urban space.

Policing Urban Space

Over the past four decades, U.S. cities have been the site of extensive experimentation with novel approaches to policing. These efforts have grown in response to widespread public perceptions that crime and insecurity are on the rise, and that traditional policing methods have been ineffective in deterring offenders. In recent years, this experimentation has prominently featured both the expansion of community policing strategies and the growing movement to outsource public security functions to private-sector companies. Law enforcement authorities have been charged with anticipating threats, deterring crime, and responding to demands for expanded security services. But in an era of rising anxiety and limited budgets, the geography of effective police response has been highly uneven. As a result, urban space has become an ever-changing grid of more protected/less protected zones, patrol led by a patchwork of private, quasi-public, and public-sector security details that deploy an array of surveillance instruments. Within the zones of protection, security services are charged with establishing norms of behavior, regulating conduct, and maintaining order. Meanwhile, crime and antisocial behavior are channeled to less-protected areas, where risk levels are elevated.

The construction and enforcement of these zones of protection suggests a need to be attentive to the micro-geographies of (in)security--the safe school zone, the pedestrian mall, the drug-free area, the crime "hot spot." These shifting zones of (in)security set in motion a dialectical process producing safe/unsafe spaces. They demarcate risk markets and constitute the "emerging markets" of the private security industry. This section examines recent attempts by city officials to better regulate public space in Chicago, focusing on two prominent cases: securing the city's mass transit system and extending surveillance tactics to the public housing arena.

Emerging Risk Markets I: The Chicago Transit Authority

Securing public transit systems in the United States has become an important emerging market for private security firms and technology companies vying to increase their government contracts. In Chicago, spending on security services by the Chicago Transit Authority (CTA), the body responsible for providing public transportation, increased by 90% to $35 million between 2000 and 2005 (CTA, 2006). This sharp increase in spending is dedicated to a range of projects and has been justified in terms of deterring crime and preventing the types of urban terror acts that befell the London and Madrid mass transit systems. Expenditures on advanced technology and private security provision account for most of the spending increases authorized by the CTA since 2000. Closed-circuit television cameras on buses and subway platforms, bomb-sniffing dogs, and private security personnel are now part of the new toolbox of urban transit security available to one of the nation's largest transit systems.

Securitas began providing security services to the CTA in 1997 and has incrementally assumed greater responsibility for the protection of subway stations, transit vehicles, and passengers. Securitas personnel are now ubiquitous in CTA subway stations, replacing many of the CTA employees who previously were responsible for customer service and public safety. Securitas recently was awarded a four-year, $13 million contract to secure the mass transit system (Main, 2006), marking a major expansion of the security firm's duties for the CTA. Having private security personnel assume the oversight of CTA property and passengers is a landmark contract in efforts to privatize the security of urban infrastructure. According to industry publications, security firms are mindful that the general public may not have confidence in their ability to appropriately patrol and respond to emergency situations, despite the fact that, according to industry advocates, "the industry's track record to date in serving highly sophisticated assignments traditionally employed by public employees is excellent" (NASCO, 2006). The high visibility of security guards in transit stations, often working alongside public-sector employees, is said to build the public's trust in the quality of services provided by the private sector. One industry expert envisions "the security industry exploiting opportunities for participation in accredited community safety schemes" (Saunders, 2004) to gain credibility and further embed itself in the public's perception of what constitutes a safe environment. The contract between the CTA and Securitas marks the culmination of years of contracting and relationship-building as the company worked to build trust and a reputation of reliability with the CTA by taking on smaller assignments and demonstrating its eagerness and ability to undertake this work (Interview, private security company manager, November 2005).

Replacing public-sector, unionized subway station workers with private security personnel is not simply an issue of public safety. Public-sector station workers command levels of wages and benefits that are well above those offered to most private security officers, even those guards who are members of the Service Employees International Union, which campaigned to unionize private security workers beginning in 2000. The CTA's budget report details the heavy burden borne by the Authority in terms of labor costs, especially those resulting from health insurance and pension payments. It proudly acknowledges the number of public-sector workers eliminated each year through workforce reductions and attrition. The work of the CTA is steadily being shifted from public-sector employees to private-sector workers who have weak claims on their employer for increases in wages, control over schedules, and improvements in fringe benefit packages.

As the presence of private security personnel in Chicago's transportation system grows, the main industry players are not satisfied with simply augmenting and assisting public law enforcement officers. Rather, they aspire to rework the division of responsibilities between the police and private security firms. As a branch manager of a security firm responsible for managing public-sector accounts explains, "the police have an emergency, not a patrol, focus. Think about it: a safe, stable, and predictable environment. Isn't that what any community would want?" (Interview, November 2005). The promised "safe, stable, and predictable environment" stems from a mix of private guards and the latest in crime-fighting technology. In the words of CTA president Frank Kruesi, "security cameras are an increasingly important component of enhancing security on our system because they serve as a deterrent to crime and to assist law enforcement in identifying perpetrators" (CTA, 2005). The visibility of privatized security and advanced technology is central to this strategy of deterrence. For example, in the case of video surveillance technology, no attempts are made to conceal the location of video equipment. On the contrary, the cameras are purposefully conspicuous, clearly in public view, and often accompanied by signs warning that activities are being recorded. In this way, the use of surveillance equipment increases police presence without requiring the deployment of additional officers.

The cash-strapped CTA is staking a lot on the popularity and effectiveness of advanced public safety technology. Expenditures related to the installation of cameras throughout the mass transit system will exceed $60 million at a time when fares are being raised, service cuts are threatened, and employees are being laid off. Since the end of 2003, every bus in the fleet (serving 150 routes) has been equipped with an on-board security camera. To make similar technology available for subway stations, the CTA is undertaking a massive upgrade of its fiber optics infrastructure to meet the requirements of a visual surveillance system. By the close of 2006, the CTA plans to have installed 1,200 cameras at 48 subway stations. Selective installation of these cameras means that 96 stations are omitted from this plan, though outfitting one-third of all stations has been touted by officials as a "significant step in the right direction" (CTA, 2005). Additional funds will be needed before the other stations can be secured through the installation of surveillance cameras.

Emerging Risk Markets H: The Chicago Housing Authority

The city of Chicago has pioneered the use of advanced technology equipment in the fight against urban crime. For example, it has installed an estimated 2,000 cameras to watch over city-owned property. Yet the most advanced video surveillance equipment has been installed in residential neighborhoods and public housing developments, where dozens of "blue cherries," the nickname given to video surveillance cameras that are equipped with blue flashing lights to alert people to their presence, are in use. In the 1990s, the Chicago Police Department partnered with a private contractor to develop concealed video surveillance systems to monitor drug dealing in public housing buildings. Since 2003, Chicago has undertaken a multimillion-dollar program to install cameras in high-crime areas and in newly redeveloped mixed-income public housing developments. To date, 170 cameras have been installed. Building on night-vision technology originally developed for the U.S. military during World War II and the Korean War, this network of cameras is packaged as a flagship project "Operation Disruption." The cameras can transmit visual images at night, rotate 360 degrees, and allow the surveillance of suspects up to four blocks away. In addition, they are outfitted with bulletproof casing and acoustic sensors that can detect the sound of gunfire and triangulate its position. A computer database, connected to the bulletproof cameras, provides Chicago Police Department detectives daily access to 8.5 million arrest records. Due in large part to its extensive use of advanced technology, the Chicago Police Department is widely regarded as a leader in the new era of crime fighting. As the chief information officer of Raytheon put it, "the Chicago Police Department totally changed the game" for urban policing with an intelligence-driven crime fighting system that is serving as a model for other cities (quoted in Pastore, 2004).

The stated goal of Operation Disruption is "not to increase arrests, but to create a visible crime deterrent in communities that have experienced a high incidence of violent crime" (RMS, 2004). Though concerns have been raised regarding infringements on privacy, the city has flatly rejected assertions that 24-hour video surveillance might pose a threat to civil liberties. Chicago's Mayor Richard M. Daley has argued that the diffusion of cameras across the city in no way violates individuals' civil liberties: "In America, there's no such thing as a police state.... It's a public way.... You want safety in public ways" (quoted in Spielman, 2004). The commonsense idea of a safe "public way" belies the reality that certain neighborhoods are the target for this technology based on the demographic profile of their populations; African American and Latino neighborhoods are the principal target for the blue cherries.

Most recently, the surveillance technology has been extended to public housing, particularly newly constructed mixed-income developments that are part of Chicago's highly touted "Plan for Transformation." Chicago is in the process of dismantling its high-rise public housing developments in favor of mixed-income, mixed-ownership properties. A decline in the total number of public housing units has led to the displacement of many long-time residents, clearing the way for the demolition of high-rises and the construction of new units that are well beyond the price range of most current residents (Bennett, Smith, and Wright, 2006). The announcement that new security cameras will be installed at Chicago Housing Authority (CHA) properties coincided with the groundbreaking of a new mixed-income project at the Cabrini-Green complex. Occupying extremely valuable land close to the city's downtown core, redevelopment efforts at Cabrini-Green signal a new era for Chicago's public housing, and the security cameras are a key element of the revitalization effort. According to Terry Peterson, CHA's chief executive officer, "if we are to attract working families and professionals, we must be able to bring some level of safety" (quoted in Baldauf, 2005).

The nature of the technology means that officers can be players in what is in effect a high-tech video game, watching the feed from the cameras on a monitor in their patrol cars and manipulating the video view with a joystick. Using the kind of language one might expect from a teenage boy playing a video game, the Assistant Deputy Superintendent spearheading the effort effuses: "engage in violence and Operation Disruption will shoot you down" (quoted in RMS, 2004). Police no longer need to have a local resident call and report a crime or hear the sound of gunfire; the cameras are the new "eyes on the street." In the words of Steve Caluris, the Chicago Police Department commander overseeing the video surveillance system, the network of cameras "has served as an effective force multiplier; the cameras allow us to watch a neighborhood without deploying additional officers to the area" (Ibid.). However, this "force multiplier" distances the police from those they are serving and protecting, and removes many officers from a field of social relationships with community members that have long provided the most in-depth and invaluable information for fighting and preventing crime.

At City Hall, the decision makers clearly are enamored with the concept of an urban security system that closely monitors high-crime areas through a bulletproof surveillance apparatus. Although community residents have often welcomed the Chicago Police Department's technological advancements given historically high crime rates in some neighborhoods, new technologies are fetishized amid the continued absence of substantive social programs to accompany such advancements. Moreover, as police officers are now charged with patrolling from a physical distance, they are further alienated from the marginalized communities they are charged to protect.

For Mayor Richard M. Daley, surveillance cameras do not constitute a threat to privacy or an infringement on civil liberties, but rather an expansion of the type of technology that previously was monopolized by the wealthy: "When we first started [Operation Disruption], it was very controversial. Some elected officials said they don't want [security cameras] in their communities. But I'll be very frank, if you go into any wealthy community, any high-rise in suburban areas, they have guards, they have technology, they have cameras. You can't get into their buildings" (NBC5, 2005). In this view, the privilege of installing the latest surveillance technology is trickling down to society's most disadvantaged communities. But rather than democratizing technology, the surveillance equipment stigmatizes neighborhoods as "blue light districts" by virtue of their highly conspicuous strobe lights.

The success of Operation Disruption in lowering crime rates is mixed. The police department is unable to make crime statistics publicly available for the areas near the surveillance cameras because of the way the crime data are collected (Konkol, 2006). It is therefore difficult to empirically evaluate Police Superintendent Phil Cline's claims that the surveillance system is "not just dispersing it [crime]. It's actually having an effect in cutting crime" (quoted in Spielman, 2006). However, such clear-cut claims are in doubt; even a spokesperson for the International Association of Chiefs of Police contends that "there's too many variables" to know for certain the impact of cameras on crime and its prevention (quoted in Konkol, 2006). Yet at the neighborhood level, where the politics of (in)security are played out, many residents welcome the introduction of security technology in what have been high-crime areas. In commenting on the difference that the cameras have made in one neighborhood, a resident explained that "you can come out and you're safe, at least around the camera" (quoted in Konkol, 2006; emphasis added).

The dubious effectiveness of the "blue cherries" in securing urban areas is perhaps best seen through the first arrest attributable to Operation Disruption. A 22-year-old man on parole was taped and arrested for smoking marijuana in his car. Police said the goal of such arrests was to discourage criminals like this from committing more serious crimes. "We are looking at potential criminals who effect quality of life. Sitting in a car smoking reefer sounds innocent enough, but you don't know what he plans to do from there," said police department spokesperson Pat Camden (quoted in Main, 2003). Broken windows policing has come full force to Chicago.

Conclusion: Securing the City?

The rising perception of urban insecurity has been a flashpoint of controversy in U.S. cities and has prompted law enforcement officials to experiment with alternative models for delivering security services. This has led to a restructuring of the governance of risk and insecurity, with important implications for how urban space is patrolled. One outcome of this restructuring of governance has been that surveillance has been quietly extended across urban space, subtly intruding on everyday activities such as entering shopping districts, taking public transportation, and strolling through parks and pedestrian malls. Ostensibly designed to protect against incidents of crime and antisocial activity, and often justified in terms of homeland security and reductions in violent crime, the diffusion of police surveillance technology paradoxically has led to "a virtually endless spiral of amplification of risk--as risk is managed in certain secure zones, the perceived riskiness of other unprotected zones is exacerbated" (Rose, 1999: 248). This underscores the dialectical relationship between "safe" and "unsafe" spaces. As zones of protection are created, areas lying outside these secure spaces bear the stigma of heightened insecurity.

A second outcome associated with the restructuring of the governance of security has been the fragmentation of policing functions. Some responsibilities have been further devolved to the community level, while others have been contracted out to private security firms. The security services industry has gone to considerable lengths to position itself as an effective partner in wider attempts to secure urban areas. Security services firms have aggressively pursued contracting opportunities at all levels of government, emphasizing their cost advantages while also promoting virtues such as responsiveness, efficiency, and flexibility. But the rapid growth of private security firms might be driven by other "benefits" to communities and decision-makers. The growth of the security industry has coincided with the emergence of order-maintenance policing as the dominant theory of law enforcement. Here the private security industry has a distinct advantage over public authorities. According to Bayley and Shearing (2001: 18), private security:

 can do what the public police have recently come under strong attack
 for doing--it can profile. [Private security] can take premonitory
 action on the basis of social criteria that do not have to be
 justified in terms of law. Unlike the public police, private police
 are not hampered in their regulatory actions by probable cause....
 Private agents can banish by regulation based on presumptive signs
 of deviancy and disorder.

The expansion of the private security industry, coupled with an increasing reliance on advanced surveillance technology, has accompanied the ascendancy of order-maintenance policing as the dominant orientation to securing public space. In many urban neighborhoods, the consequences of this shift in policing tactics have been socially regressive. The reliance on profiling, particularly racial profiling, has elevated practices of stereotyping to the level of legitimate criminological knowledge. Rather than deepening law enforcement's understanding of the dynamics of crime prevention in urban areas, however, the use of technology ironically has increased the social distance between police officers and those they serve. The epistemological shift in policing tactics that is underway takes police officers away from the community-level interactions that can help to build positive relationships between law enforcement authorities and neighborhood residents. As these relationships are eroded, the demand for more policing grows louder and residents' sense of security is undermined.

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NOTE

(1.) It is worth noting that the debate over the empirical basis for rationalizing order-maintenance policing remains intense. In particular, Bernard Harcourt's (2001) findings directly challenge studies that conclude that order-maintenance approaches result in a decrease in crime.

NIK THEODORE is the director of the Center for Urban Economic Development and assistant professor in the Urban Planning and Policy program of the University of Illinois at Chicago (e-mail: theodore@ uic.edu). NINA MARTIN is a Ph.D. candidate in Urban Planning and Policy at the University of Illinois at Chicago and a research assistant at the Center for Urban Economic Development, Chicago (e-mail: [email protected]). RVAN HOLLON is an ally organizer with the Southwest Youth Collaborative and the Community Justice for Youth Institute (e-mail: [email protected]). In addition, he works at the Institute for Policy Research of Northwestern University.