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New York City Police Department Chevy Impala patrol car

Police or law enforcement agents or agencies are those empowered to use force and other forms of coercion and legal means to effect public and social order. The term is most commonly associated with police departments of a state that are authorized to exercise the police power of that state within a defined legal or territorial area of responsibility.

The word police comes from the Latin politia (“civil administration”), which itself derives from the Ancient Greek ?????, for polis ("city"). [1] Alternative names for police force include constabulary, gendarmerie, police department, police service, or law enforcement agency, and members can be police officers, constables, troopers, sheriffs, rangers, or peace officers.

In ancient times, the military was mostly responsible for maintaining law and order in cities. The Roman Empire had a reasonably effective law enforcement' system until the decline of the empire, though there was never an actual police force in the city of Rome. When under the reign of Augustus the capital had grown to almost one million inhabitants, he created 14 wards, which were protected by seven squads of 1,000 men. If necessary, they might have called the Praetorian Guard for assistance. Beginning in the fifth century, policing became a function of clan chiefs and heads of state.

All civilizations and cultures. from the Babylonians onwards, had a group comparable to the concept of "police." The Anglo-Saxon system was a private system of tithings, since the Norman conquest lead by a constable, which was based on a social obligation for the good conduct of the others; more common was that local lords and nobles were responsible to maintain order in their lands, and often appointed a constable, sometimes unpaid, to enforce the law.

In Western culture, the contemporary concept of a police paid by the government was developed by French legal scholars and practitioners in the seventeenth century and early eighteenth century. As a result of this development of jurisprudence, the first police force in the modern sense was created by the government of King Louis XIV in 1667 to police the city of Paris. then the largest city of Europe and considered the most dangerous. The royal edict, registered by the Parlement of Paris on March 15, 1667 created the office of lieutenant general de police ("lieutenant general of police"), who was to be the head of the new Paris police force, and defined police as the task of "ensuring the peace and quiet of the public and of private individuals, purging the city of what may cause disturbances, procuring abundance, and having each and everyone live according to their station and their duties." The lieutenant general de police had under his authority 44 commissaires de police ("police commissioners"). The city of Paris was divided into 16 districts policed by the 44 commissaires de police, each assigned to a particular district and assisted in their districts by clerks and a growing bureaucracy. The scheme of the Paris police force was extended to the rest of France by a royal edict of October 1699, resulting in the creation of lieutenant generals of police in all large French cities or towns. These police forces were later assisted by inspecteurs de police (“police inspectors”), created in 1709.

After the troubles of the French Revolution. the Paris police force was reorganized by Napoleon I on February 17, 1800, as the Prefecture of Police, along with the reorganization of police forces in all French cities with more than 5,000 inhabitants. On March 12, 1829, a government decree created the first uniformed policemen in Paris and all French cities, known as sergents de ville ("city sergeants"), which the Paris Prefecture of Police's website claims were the first uniformed policemen in the world. [2]

In the United Kingdom. the development of police forces was much slower than in the rest of Europe. The word "police" was borrowed from French into the English language in the eighteenth century, but for a long time it applied only to French and continental European police forces. The word and the concept of police were "disliked as a symbol of foreign oppression." Prior to the nineteenth century, the only official use of the word "police" recorded in the United Kingdom was the appointment of Commissioners of Police for Scotland in 1714 and the creation of the Marine Police in 1798 (set up to protect merchandise at the Port of London).

On June 30, 1800, the authorities of Glasgow, Scotland successfully petitioned the government to pass the Glasgow Police Act establishing the City of Glasgow Police. This was the first professional police service in the country that differed from previous law enforcement in that it was a preventive police force. This was quickly followed in other Scottish towns, which set up their own police forces by individual acts of Parliament. [3] In London. there existed watchmen hired to guard the streets at night since 1663, the first paid law enforcement body in the country, augmenting the force of unpaid constables. On September 29, 1829, the Metropolitan Police Act was passed by Parliament, allowing Sir Robert Peel, then Home Secretary, to found the London Metropolitan Police. This group of police is often referred to as “Bobbies” or “Peelers” due to their being established by Peel. They were regarded as the most efficient forerunners of a modern police force and became a model for the police forces in most countries, such as the United States. Many of the Commonwealth Countries developed police forces using similar models, such as Australia and New Zealand .

In North America, the Toronto Police was founded in Canada in 1834, one of the first municipal police departments on that continent; followed by police forces in Montreal and Quebec City, both founded in 1838. In the United States, the first organized police services were established in Boston in 1838, New York in 1844, and Philadelphia in 1854.

Polish policeman from Prevention Detachment

Most police forces contain subgroups whose job it is to investigate particular types of crime .

In most Western police forces, perhaps the most significant division is between "uniformed" police and detectives. Uniformed police, as the name suggests, wear uniforms and perform functions that require an immediate recognition of an officer's legal authority, such as traffic control, stopping and detaining motorists, and more active crime response and prevention. Detectives, by contrast, wear business attire in bureaucratic and investigative functions where a uniformed presence would be either a distraction or intimidating, but a need to establish police authority still exists. "Plainclothes" officers dress in attire consistent with that worn by the general public for purposes of blending in. In some cases, police are assigned to work "undercover," where they conceal their police identity, sometimes for long periods, to investigate crimes, such as organized crime. unsolvable by other means. This type of policing shares much with espionage .

Specialized groups exist within many law enforcement organizations either for dealing with particular types of crime, such as traffic law enforcement and crash investigation, homicide. or fraud; or for situations requiring specialized skills, such as underwater search. aviation, explosive device disposal ("bomb squad"), and computer crime. Larger jurisdictions also employ specially selected and trained quasi-military units armed with military-grade weapons for the purposes of dealing with particularly violent situations beyond the capability of a patrol officer response, including high-risk warrant service and barricaded suspects. In the United States these units go by a variety of names, but are commonly known as SWAT (Special Weapons and Tactics) teams. Because their situational mandate typically focuses on removing innocent bystanders from dangerous people and dangerous situations, not violent resolution, they are often equipped with non-lethal tactical tools like chemical agents, "flashbang" and concussion grenades, and rubber bullets.

Western law enforcement commonly employs "internal affairs" police whose job is to oversee and investigate the officers themselves. They limit their work to fighting bribery. political corruption, and other forms of internal corruption.

Despite popular conceptions promoted by movies and television. many U.S. police departments prefer not to maintain officers in non-patrol bureaus and divisions beyond a certain period of time, such as in the detective bureau, and instead maintain policies that limit service in such divisions to a specified period of time, after which officers must transfer out or return to patrol duties. This is done in part based upon the perception that the most important and essential police work is accomplished on patrol in which officers become acquainted with their beats, prevent crime by their presence, respond to crimes in progress, manage crises, and practice their skills. Detectives, by contrast, usually investigate crimes after they have occurred and after patrol officers have responded first to a situation. Investigations often take weeks or months to complete, during which time detectives spend much of their time away from the streets, in interviews and courtrooms, for example. Rotating officers also promotes cross-training in a wider variety of skills, and serves to prevent "cliques" that can contribute to corruption or other unethical behavior.

Many law enforcement agencies have heavily armed units for dealing with dangerous situations, such as these U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers.

In many jurisdictions, police officers carry firearms. primarily handguns, in the normal course of their duties.

Modern police forces make extensive use of radio communications equipment, carried both on the person and installed in vehicles, to coordinate their work, share information, and get help quickly. In recent years, vehicle-installed computers have enhanced the ability of police communications, enabling easier dispatching of calls, criminal background checks on persons of interest to be completed in a matter of seconds, and updating the officer's daily activity log and other required reports on a real-time basis. Other common pieces of police equipment include flashlights, whistles, and, most importantly, notebooks and "ticketbooks" or citations.