Polisiärt förtroendeskapande arbete : Fallstudie på polisens arbete med medborgardialoger

Sammanfattning: Swedish police implemented 2015 a nationwide model for increasing feelings of safety, preventing crime and building trust with the citizens - Citizen promises. The model combines community policing and problem-oriented policing by involving members of the local community and identifying local problems. The core idea is that cooperation between local communities and the police will increase trust with so called “medborgardialoger” – dialogues with citizens. Research shows that this type of police work can have positive effects on feelings of safety and trust to the police, if done in a proper way. By evaluating previous work with citizen dialogues, this study aims at identifying which factors for trust to the police are most important for people in a rural area in Sweden. Challenges such as distance and police presence are considered, and if a structured dialogue with citizens can be a way of gaining trust. The findings in this specific case indicates that the dialogues might not have the impact on citizens trust that Swedish police would hope for. The results suggest that police visibility, crime fighting, and local presence are much more important factors, and that dialogues can be seen primarily as a tool for maintaining trust, not creating it.