er the decades of the 20th century, from welcome dinner guests in community homes to brutal, racist enforcers often as corrupt as those they police. Crank surveys the situation from the law enforcement perspective, such as how funeral rites are rituals that underscore police values and promote solidarity. However, some of those values are questioned in regards to racism in police work. Crank (1998) calls this aspect of law enforcement, ôan astonishingly polarizing topic. The debate is played out in national politics: The æMark FurmansÆ of the world are weighted against the æWillie HortonsÆ, the bad cop versus the bad blackö (205).
Crank shows how social changes altered the perspective with which citizens viewed law enforcement officials. Increasing development of urban, heavily minority neighborhoods helped increase the division between police and communities. From a time in the 1930s and 1940s when law enforcement officers were looked upon as a welcome dinner guest to contemporary times with its ôusö against ôthemö mentality, Crank (1998) explores the growing separation between law enforcement officers and the communities they serve: ô[His] attitude reflects the inevitable convergence of values that mark the current national climate supportive of harsh law-and-order crime policies, the æwe-themÆ fostered by heavy-handed law enforcement tactics, and the presence of geographically bounde
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