ng (POP) in eradicating the root causes of crime (Stephens, 2003).
COP is premised on the collaboration between the community and the police. Through the establishment of this partnership, the police and the community exchange information with another and work together in formulating and implementing solutions to resolve recurrent problems (Aberdeen, n. d.). A related approach to COP, POP involves the use of S.A.R.A. (scanning, analysis, response, assessment) to resolve problems in a methodical process. The objective of POP is to utilize a systematic process to identify recurrent problems and analyze their underlying causes in order to formulate cost-effective solutions ("Problem Solving - SARA," 2003).
For the remainder of the paper, the approaches of COP, POP and S.A.R.A. and their interrelationships will be described and discussed in greater detail. The assessment of the effectiveness of these approaches in reducing crime will also be provided.
In this section, the interrelated concepts of COP, POP and S.A.R.A. will be examined in order to illuminate their differences from the traditional law enforcement approaches. Just as importantly, their interrelationships with one another will also be explored.
As described briefly in the previous section, COP is based on the establishment of a partnership between the police and the community. With this collaborative approach, both the police and the community are expected to adopt new perspectives about their roles with regard to law enforcement. In COP, members of the community are challenged to take responsibility for addressing the problems within the community and improving the quality of life. Concomitantly, police officers are also asked to move beyond their conventional enforcement of the law to work with the community in identifying a plethora of creative solutions in order to resolve problems within the community. Ideally, the collaboration of the...