How practical is tactical? Political sociology,militarization,and police tactical teams in Canada

Abstract

Emergency Response Teams (ERT), commonly referred to as Special Weapons And Tactics (SWAT) teams, are the specialized police unit responsible for mitigating violent and dangerous conflict beyond the capacity of general duty to handle effectively. Debates surrounding the application and effectiveness of ERTs in policing highlight a need to keep ERT members safe due to adequacy and occupational health and safety standards while concurrently managing the expectations of community groups. These groups include those calling for defunding or de-militarization. Explored in the current article, is a thematic analysis of popularized media to unpack the arguments that police, government officials and community activist groups make to help shift opinions on police militarization. However, we frame these media account within Bourdieusian concepts of symbolic power, habitus or field struggle to provide insight into, arguably conflicting, interpretations of police militarization.

Keywords

Police police militarization criminology sociology emergency response teams

Introduction

Police are a government-contracted and sanctioned social service responsible for the enforcement and protection of public safety – that is, social order within a democracy (Martin, 2018; Reiner, 2010). The specialized police unit that stretches this conceptual understanding further is Emergency Response Teams (ERTs; commonly referred to as Special Weapons and Tactics (SWAT)) which are a group of highly specialized police officers trained and equipped to deal with high-risk and violent calls for service beyond the capabilities of patrol (Jenkins et al., 2021). These specialized police units share several similarities to the armed forces, namely in their political orientation to use government-sanctioned use of force (Kraksa and Kappeler, 1997; Kraska, 2021; McCulloch, 2001). Established as an emergency response to calls for service that were unfamiliar to the police (i.e., the Munich Incident, North Hollywood Shootout, Columbine Shooting), police ERTs are intended to mitigate calls for service such as barricaded persons, sniper situations, hostage takings and warrant work (Kraska, 1999, 2007; Myrick, 2013). Since their implementation during the 1970s, scholars, among others, have criticized police services for relying on ERTs more proactively, suggesting a shift in their mandate to take on additional calls like emotionally disturbed persons, hyper-aggressive calls, traffic enforcement or community policing (Alvaro, 2000; Mummolo, 2018; Roziere and Walby, 2018, 2019). This is problematic, given police militarization discussions lace interpretations of ERT, considering the ERT is taken up in opposition to community policing and sometimes counter to what the community expects from the police (Bickel, 2013; Kraska, 2021).

Our objective in the current article is to advance understanding of how society (i.e., those who contribute arguments in popularized media about police militarization) conceptualize ERT through media and the diverse applications of the concept of police militarization. To do so, we consider Bourdieu’s attention to understanding the struggles for recognition within dimensions of social life (Bourdieu, 1990), and how these struggles can vary based on different lived through structure-in-processes’ based on occupation, education, or training (Bourdieu, 1984, 1990; Crossley, 2001, 2004). By looking at media portrayals, we elucidate how the policing ‘field’ creates conflicting constitutions of police capital (i.e., militarized equipment), where some are considered legitimate and accepted versus others that are contested and how different parties defended or rejected notions of legitimacy. We use our approach to examine the tensions of ERT – the idea of tactical policing as including the use of force as militarized versus protection, as safety versus risk, and the implications for interpretations of the police in society.

Police militarization

The militarization of the police is directly connected to the equipment, deployments, and activities of ERTs. The National Tactical Officers Association (NTOA) is a professional organization of ERT officers in the United States that outlines how ERTs must be “mission capable” in hostage rescue, barricaded gunman, sniper operations, security operations, and terrorism response (NTOA, 2018). On average, ERTs are trained to use a variety of specialized equipment including weapon systems, handguns (i.e., with holster/magazines), submachine guns, communications equipment, robots, night vision goggles, restraint devices, fortified vehicles, ballistic vests, and helmets (NTOA, 2018). Beyond these specialized activities, ERTs have taken on a proactive role in routine policing activities (Alvaro, 2000), such as executing warrant work, traffic enforcement, community-based policing initiatives, domestic disturbances, and even mental health calls (Roziere and Walby, 2018). Some argue the regularized use of ERT is problematic because the “proactive use of SWAT falls outside of their intended purpose and frequently outside of what is revealed to the public” (Roziere and Walby, 2018: 45). Because of the proactive and reactive use of ERT, Roziere and Walby (2018, 2019, 2020) argue ERTs increase police violence suggesting there is little evidence to suggest they lower the frequency or severity of crime despite the high costs and consequences of the police mission (see also McQuoid et al., 2017; Mummolo, 2018). Therefore, using ERTs for calls beyond their “original function” is interpreted by some to suggest the police are choosing to use an “an extreme and highly dangerous tactic” as opposed to liberal police practices when called to service (Roziere and Walby, 2018: 46). They continue to suggest the increased annual call outs of ERTs suggest a “high degree” of normalization which is “indicative of militarization” and considered to be a “failed public policy that should be scaled back immediately” (Roziere and Walby, 2018: 46).

The contested opinions surrounding police ERTs sit in tension with the lack of consensus surrounding their use, application, and definitions, “there appears to be no universal definition of police militarization” (Blaskovits et al., 2021: 2), and instead a large reliance on Kraska’s (2007) framework, which suggests militarization is how police draw on military tactics to increase the state’s social and bureaucratic control over citizens. In Kraska’s (2007) interpretation, ‘militarism’ stresses the use of force and threat of violence as the way most efficacious way to solve problems, with ‘militarization’ being a process of “arming, training for, threatening and sometimes implementing violent conflict” into police practices (Kraska, 2007: 3). The military model applied includes four dimensions; material, cultural, organizational, and operational, each usable to measure the degree of militarization of a police service. Dimension one, the material component, incorporates how military-style equipment, weapons, and technologies are used by police, which Kraska (2007) argues has been going on for decades through military transfers to police services. Dimension two, cultural, refers to the martial language, style of appearance, beliefs, values, and mindsets shared amongst police. The first two dimensions collectively relate to the implied messaging underpinning diverse types of police equipment. For instance, Madsen (2020: 116) writes “purpose built armoured vehicles, helicopters, and green-coloured fatigues add visually to the perception of greater militarization,” suggesting specific equipment portrays to the public how the police are increasingly militarized. The third dimension, organizational, refers to the military structure of command and control, and the operational dimension, four, is the ‘patterns of activity’ police use rooted in military-style tactics (Kraska, 2007).

The police militarization argument rests too on how, as per Mummolo (2018), once ERTs receive military equipment, they are more likely to find reasons to use the equipment beyond their traditional demarcations, representing a “heightened commitment to the use of militarized equipment and tactics” (p. 2). In his experimental survey design, Mummolo (2018) found no firm evidence to suggest tactical teams lower police departments’ violent crime rate nor the rates at which officers lose their lives in the line of duty (a difficult claim to confirm given the lack of a control group possible). Mummolo (2018), however, did find citizens negatively react to the appearance of militarized police units, are less willing to fund agencies, and less willing to support police patrols in their own neighborhoods. Lockwood et al. (2018) echo Mummolo’s findings, suggesting education, gender, political affiliation, and positive perceptions of policing affect support for police militarization. They find males were more likely to show support in favour of police having military weapons in comparison to those more liberal-leaning or citizens with college degrees. Black respondents were also less in favour of police ERTs, including weapons and equipment, for crowd control and riot suppression. Echoed by findings from the American Civil Liberties Union (2014) report on the militarization of United States policing, which suggests Black and Latino United States citizens are impacted by ERT operations three times the rate at which white citizens are affected by ERT operations. Moreover, research suggests police tactics may be disproportionately used in the policing of racialized minorities, including as a tool to combat the “war on drugs”, suppressing gang violence, or use-of-force rates (see Kraska, 2007; Mummolo, 2018; Murch, 2015; Owusu-Bempah and Wortley, 2014). Urbanik and Greene (2020: 19) also suggest direct and indirect experiences of unduly aggressive police tactics, such as exposure or dealings with police ERTs, “may further alienate community members-particularly in racialized inner-city residents.” Thus, consequently, potentially discouraging desistance, perpetuating a cycle of crime, and further reverberating negative relationships between police and racialized communities.

Tension, nevertheless, exists. Jenkins et al. (2021), for example, suggest ERTs are a patrol support unit relied on for call types “beyond the capabilities of patrol to resolve optimally,” to “reduce threat to officer and public safety,” or “to remove strain on general patrol”—indicating a shift in resources not normalization (Jenkins et al., 2021: 532). den Heyer (2013) too suggests increases in ERT annual deployments do not suggest police services’ militarizing and instead supports the rational use of resources and appropriate use of highly expensive and well-trained police units (den Heyer, 2013). Similarly, Jenkins et al. (2023) found initial call classifications may conceal the potential risk factors during apparent “routine” (i.e., traffic stop, warrant work, domestic) calls. How calls are classified can conceal if dangers typically considered outside the ERT mandate are present—if such factors appear as “routine” may not correlate to the need for ERT intervention (Jenkins et al., 2023). Building on Jenkins et al. (2021) seminal work, Lair et al. (2024) re-coded Roziere and Walby’s (2018, 2019, 2020) FOI data about the annual deployments of police ERTs in Canada and found strong evidence to suggest tactical teams are not responding to routine calls. Lair et al. (2024) highlighted how the call types included in the 1300 annual deployments put forth by Roziere and Walby (2018, 2019, 2020) failed to account for a deployment criterion that did not differentiate between full-team ERT deployments versus calls where ERT members tangentially participated in the call – or when placed on standby (i.e., surveillance operations or mental health apprehensions where someone might become barricaded) and had no interaction with public. Leading to miscellaneous conclusions about the role of ERT in ‘routine’ policing operations, as the authors found most police services do not release data on full-team deployments and argue there is little statistical possibility of distinguishing between full-team deployments and incidents when only a pair of tactical officers responded to calls to assist patrol.

Despite claims of tactical teams being aggressive, Klinger and Rojek (2008) reviewed the operational records of n = 341 tactical units in the United States, concluding tactical units resolve high-risk incidents while using minimal force, suggesting lethal force was used in less than 0.03% of calls. The diverse research suggests existing debates about police militarization are rooted as much in the community’s concern/public opinion about ERTs’ use in regular policing as they are around lethal force use, despite research suggesting ERTs professionalism and training results in more favourable outcomes during critical incidents (Brimo, 2012; Rojek, 2005). Vickers and Lewinski (2012) found the increased training ERT operators undergo develops their critical thinking and concentration skills – which informs decisions about discharging weapons as they learn to distinguish lethal threats from “benign objects” at a stronger threshold than patrol officers (Vickers and Lewinski, 2012: 103). Supported by the systematic review findings of Jenkins et al. (2024) – that ERT officers average enhanced decision-making abilities above patrol – and make more accurate use-of-force decisions in comparison to patrol. Stressing how deploying ERT (vs patrol) units may reduce the likelihood of police using lethal force or force that is “likely a product of the high-risk incidents they respond to, rather than some predisposition to favour force over other alternative responses” (Jenkins et al., 2024: 14).

Symbolic power, fields, and habitus

To interrogate the police, government officials, and community activist groups arguments for shifting opinions about police militarization we use Bourdieusian concepts of symbolic power and habitus (Bourdieu, 1984). Within political sociology, policing and police militarization are distinct fields that, as defined by Swartz (2013: 35), “denote arenas of production, circulation, appropriation and exchange of goods, services, knowledge or status, and the competitive positions held by actors in their struggle to accumulate, exchange and monopolize these different kinds of capital.” Fields connect to valued resources, where different fields extend across social, economic, cultural, and symbolic capital. Further, fields create divisions of power because actors are placed relationally, including in adversary positions, as symbolic power reaffirms existing social hierarchies through cultural resources and symbolic classifications. Bourdieu argued symbolic power and domination requires discipline, each can be used in opposition to confirm certain groups’ placement within the hierarchy and thus reinforce (and are reinforced by) existing social institutions (Bourdieu, 1984; Bourdieu et al., 2010). Power imbalances demand a dominator and a dominated group exist who exchange their status for social value (Swartz, 2013). The misrecognition of power and maintenance/reinforcement of the power imbalances through societal institutions result in subjugated groups remaining dominated, although research is needed to elucidate how subjugated groups accumulate the required symbolic capital for resisting dominated labels.

Individuals develop through socialization and life experiences, Bourdieu argues, and ‘habitus’ or the ingrained set of dispositions, habits, and preferences we develop helps with individual agency and to navigate social structures (Bourdieu, 1972). The competing narratives tied to police militarization are oriented toward different habitus’, each affecting interpretations of tactical teams—where they can be viewed as supportive of their efforts (Cyr et al., 2020; Jenkins et al., 2021, 2023, 2024; Lair et al., 2024) or not supportive where their efforts are interpreted as militarized (Delehanty et al., 2017, Dodge et al., 2010; Roziere and Walby, 2018, 2019, 2020). On one side, ERT operators possess unique emic perspectives (i.e., habitus) based on the increased physiological and psychological dangers they experience because of their occupational mandates (McCormack and Riley, 2016; Orr et al., 2021; Papazoglou, 2013; Stearns and Moore, 1993). On the other side, ERT practices may result in citizens suffering physical property damage, vicarious trauma, or collateral consequences due to an ERT operation, increasing the likelihood of citizens interpreting ERTs’ actions as militarized (see Dubinsky et al., 2021).

Because the Bourdieusian account of habitus proves challenging for accounting “for change at the individual or group level” (Jenkins, 2002; Spencer, 2009: 126; Spencer, 2013), scholars, like Crossley (2001), expand the concept to include how actors’ “active residue or sediment” from past functions interact with the present to shape their actions, thoughts, and perceptions as they “mould” social practice (p. 83). An actor’s habitus is shaped by their past lived-through experiences (i.e., structure-in-process), and influences their future perceptions of “competent specific goals” (Crossley, 2001: 84), collectively shaping interpretations in society. Therefore, the different habitus’ of actors from the ‘field’ of police militarization impact their perceptions of ERTs, where different experiences (good or bad) shape actors’ opinions, thoughts, and actions surrounding police militarization.

We contribute to the current literature by exploring how the different habitus’ of actors exposed to arguments in media can mould their perceptions of ERTs and their potential militarization. We focus on if subjugated groups can accumulate symbolic capital to resist dominated labels—however, we remain unclear on if ERTs are subjugated or not and the diversity of how ERTs are interpreted. To do so the current article has two primary research questions: (1) What arguments do police, government officials, and community actors make to influence public opinion on police ERTs? and (2) how can these arguments add to, or be explained through, Bourdieusian concepts (i.e., habitus, symbolic power, journalism, field struggle)?

Methods

Our methods focus on revealing the arguments presented in popularized media about police ERTs and police militarization. We use thematic analysis, drawing from Vaismoradi et al.’s (2013) argument where thematic analysis; different from a content analysis despite both aiming to examine narrative materials and break them down into segments of content for descriptive analysis. Although content analysis is useful for describing the characteristics of data (i.e., who says what, to whom and with what effect), thematic analysis displays qualitative descriptions focused on “identifying, analysing and reporting patterns (themes) within data” (Braun and Clarke, 2006: 79). Relying thematic analysis allows for an abductive approach to qualitative descriptions, because thematic analysis accounts for both the deductive approach, operationalizing Bourdieusian concepts as a previous theory (i.e., habitus, symbolic power, field struggle), and inductive, comparing them to the inductive themes that naturally emerge from the coding process (Braun and Clarke, 2006; Vaismoradi et al., 2013). Thematic analysis allows for the study of more data to extrapolate the meanings and beliefs about police militarization based on data from across interest groups (Hesse-Biber, 2017; Short 2016).

We analyzed content from 37 news media reports and 13 governmental reports for a total of n = 50 articles. Given the focus on popular newsmedia, we started by using search engines through the University of Ottawa virtual library to find articles concerning police militarization. We also visited the virtual websites of popular and mainstream newspaper companies such as the Sun, The Globe and Mail, CityNews, CBC News, the Star and the Citizen and searched the ProQuest Databases online tool¹ (i.e., keywords included: violence specialists, police militarization, large armoured vehicle, demilitarization, police association/union AND police militarization, Black Lives Matter AND police militarization and police militarization AND use of force). We excluded articles that did not reference “police militarization” or police tactical units in the Canadian context to focus on societal discourses.

Wheeler (2022: 4) asserts thematic analysis helps search a sample of documents for recurring themes that are inductively developed by the researcher who has “fully immersed themselves with the data corpus through immersive and repeated reading.” In response, we focused on developing a wider understanding of what is going on, reflexively understanding the researcher may share opinions with those investigated in the research – across contested opinions (Downe-Wamboldt, 1992).

Every article was analyzed using the qualitative data analysis software NVivo (Lumivero, 2023), first through open-focused coding to document latent contents (developing themes). Next, inductively, we identified major themes and sub-themes based on the deductive categories from existing literature (i.e., understanding arguments from certain groups). For example, we analyzed the theme of officer and community safety which led to the major sub-theme of equipment. Or the theme of police perceptions led to the major sub-theme of implied messaging. Here, we relied on Braun and Clarke’s (2006) six-step process, beginning with focused coding, refinement and comparison of the initial major themes and sub-themes across the texts. Leading to another round of sorting and grouping of these themes to become “overarching themes” (Braun and Clarke, 2006) which were then named and defined.

Limitations

Like all research, there are limitations when interpreting the results. First, time constraints and related lack of discourse in the media restricted the scope of the review—we could not include data that did not exist. Relatedly, given the current projects alignment with a grounded constructivist approach, a limitation is the lack of inter-rater coding. Next, although central to our research question, were secondary sources. News media select phrases and opinions from police associations and representatives that best serve their own interests and the interests of their media company.. Then, the opinions and statements of a select few police officers in media do not represent the opinions of all ERT members or the service. Thus, accuracy is dependent on journalism and interpretations, which we can not verify. The same can be said for the demands made by civil society groups and advocates. However, the sample of articles used for the current project is consistent with other sampling frameworks used for existing research on tactical police studies (see Roziere and Walby, 2019).

Results

We structure the results around two central emergent themes suggestive of police militarization: (i) perceptions from the public about police equipment, and, (ii) the need for military equipment for officer and public safety (see Appendix A for data references).

Perceptions of ERTs: “it looks like their ready to go to war with the public”

Grassroots community activists largely argued against police militarization. Of the articles analyzed where community groups (e.g., civil activists) were referenced, they largely problematized police militarization and how ERTs present (i.e., the uniforms, equipment, battle dress uniforms [BDU]; Kraska, 2007). Centrally, they raised concerns about Tactical Armoured Vehicles (TAVs) used during critical incidents and their optics, due to their close resemblance to military vehicles used. Outspoken community members who disapproved of police TAVs tended to reference TAV optics and the related implicit messaging (e.g., TAVs as implying the police are “ready to go to war with the public,” or, “it makes it seem like they are ready to go to war with the public” (Issawi, 2020)). TAVs also raise concerns in smaller rural communities, where some citizens ponder the need for their service. For instance, citizens in Brandon, Manitoba asked about TAVs application in their small farming community: “what imminent threat called for such a show of force” (Hamdi, 2020). Some even suggested TAVs imply the police are “afraid of the people” (Canadian Press, 2015).

Particularly challenging are community members’ arguments about the legacy of military equipment – the reverberation of the pain of previous fatalities when used. For instance, after Michael Brown’s 2014 death and that of George Floyd in 2020, the media suggested Canadian police services were experiencing “creeping militarization.” They challenged how city officials and governments are potentially buying “toys for boys” without considering the public’s interpretations of TAVs during police calls for service. Some community groups align police militarization arguments with police racism and some civil activist members fearing their names being on the signs chanted at rallies protesting police brutality (Issawi, 2020). Others believe police equipment, intended for public safety, increases community members’ pre-existing fears of police.

In 2020, Amnesty International official stated to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau a way Canada can address protestors’ concerns, those outraged “around the killings of George Floyd by Minneapolis police officers,” by changing policing to address anti-black and anti-Indigenous racism (Amnesty International, 2020). They suggest change can occur by curtailing police services’ militarization and reducing their spending. Other activist groups like the Mining Injustice Solidarity Network (MISN) directed attention to how ERTs can be used to negatively impact racialized and marginalized communities (e.g., the Wet’suwet’en, who were subject to ERT intervention on their land because of the Coastal Gaslink pipeline). Problematizing how “militarized police practices are more likely to be used against marginalized communities including Indigenous communities” (West, 2022; see also Mummolo, 2018), concern was voiced regarding the use of police militarization among Indigenous people to secure resource extraction and reinforce transnational corporations’ agendas (MSIN, 2020; West, 2022). As the Wet’suwet’en argue, under the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous people, they were “forcibly removed/evicted, racially profiled, surveilled, harassed, unlawfully and jailed” because of the “militarized raids on our territories” (Gidimt’en Land Defenders, 2022).

Relatedly, ERTs actions may have collateral harms to citizens, beyond interpretations of racism. In a Fifth Estate report, citizens stated having adverse mental, physical and emotional harm from the police performing dynamic entries on their homes (Dubinsky et al., 2021). Dynamic entries can be no knock (i.e., cases where circumstances posit a threat to officer safety, or have a reasonable belief that one may destroy evidence) or knock and announce (i.e., to signal the presence of belief and request they open the door) entry (Cyr et al., 2020). Dynamic entry’s impact other people within the dwelling beyond the target, the “found ins,” who experience collateral harm because they “are not suspects but are found inside the place of where police search” (Yogeretam, 2021). Within the Fifth Estate report, the Ottawa Police conducted a dynamic entry into a home of the girlfriend of a known drug dealer, only to find out that they had thrown a flash grenade at the intended targets 63-year-old mother recovering from heart surgery (Dubinsky et al., 2021). Similar instances occurred with the RCMPs ERT in Rang-Saint-Georges, Quebec. The policy of dynamic entries is contingent on the preservation of evidence found during the search, where not using dynamic entries “runs the risk of destroying those prosecutions” (Yogaretnam, 2021). Thus, the policy is necessary for conviction but devastating for the “found ins.” As the family in Rang-Saint-Georges, argued they are “Still suffering the effects of being exposed to tear gas, being dragged from their homes by police, having guns pointed at their heads and, in the case of her 14-year-old daughter, being forced naked from the shower” (Harding, 2020), which resulted in a 8 year old boy having nightmares.

The collateral harms produced by ERT tactics, have led activists to suggest alternatives, like de-militarization or defunding of tactical teams. However, what differentiates between ERTs as militarized or ERTs as well-funded? Police defunding is the process that constructively advocates for returning funds from the police to socially based programs that have been “removed over decades of austerity-based economic and social policy” (BPCSD, 2022). Defunding supporters seek to find more effective options for mitigating crime and social harm than increasing police budgets, which allow community organizers to offer alternatives to policing like police de-militarization, police disarming, police de-tasking. For example, the DefundSPVM (Service de police de la Ville de Montréal) suggests the immediate cut of “…at least 50 percent from the $665 million SPVM budget and redirect these funds to the programs and services, managed by and for affected communities” (DefundSPVM, 2021). They also suggest placing moratoriums “on buying new militarized equipment and police training or education that has potential to cause harm to community members” (604demands 2021). Moratoriums are also advocated for the removal of weapons from police including lethal and non-lethal options, and to “disband militarized police units, including SWAT teams and other units using military-grade weapons and surveillance equipment” (DefundSPVM, 2021).

Consistent arguments emerge from the No Pride in Policing Coalition (NPPC), who argue for alternatives to policing through removing all police ERTs, military-grade weapons and military surveillance technologies. These calls for de-militarization are argued to be a part of a larger framework that critically evaluates the roles and functions of the police in terms of what they are “not equipped to do, and transferring those tasks to the appropriate service provider, agency or organization” (BPCSDDP, 2022).

Equipment for officer and public safety: “we don’t do it lightly”

Members from police services across Canada hold varying interpretations of police militarization and associated physical capital (i.e., equipment) that could be considered “militarized.’ Some police representatives, like the former Commissioner of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) in 2017, stated they were sympathetic and attentive to concerns of police militarization when addressing comments surrounding decisions to give more long-barreled rifles to frontline police officers. The former Commissioner stated they too were “afraid of the trend in policing for escalating military-style tools being used by law enforcement to conduct police operations” because of the potential to increase police reliance on force (Berthiaume, 2017). Relatedly, a spokesperson for the Winnipeg Police Service too acknowledges the “risk associated with using military equipment and methods are obvious” but also that the police must “work harder to help people understand why we would choose to do that. We don’t do it lightly” (Issawi, 2020).

Conversely, community members argue armoured vehicles can send implicit messaging, despite how police highlight the TAV is for “…downed officer rescue, police officer tactical repositioning to cover, evacuation of public, high risk vehicle intercept, and a platform for de-escalation by providing two-way communication for negotiations, in addition to introducing less lethal methods of intervention to safely resolve violent incidents” (Public Safety Canada, 2020). Police voice arguments about police militarization based on their emic perspectives. A Windsor Police leader speaks of armoured vehicles: “Everybody thinks it’s over militarization, but I don’t think people realize what goes on in this city” (Willhelm, 2014). Or, the Assistant Commissioner of the RCMP from 2015 who said: “It doesn’t seem like a big step toward the militarization of this organization” when referencing armoured vehicles in policing (National Post, 2015). Thus, police services, we argue, may not support notions of police militarization (Skof, 2020), suggesting there are no reasonable arguments for police to perform their policing activities without the necessary equipment to keep them safe. The questions arise around police officer safety, public safety, and interpretations of police acts, which are likely to be scrutinized because of the inherent authority of the police and thus their status.

The counterarguments presented by police representatives to armoured vehicles being interpreted as militarization include how the vehicle increases officer and public safety. For instance, Former Defence Minister Bill Blair raises concerns about the occupational necessity of armoured vehicles as the result of recommendations from public inquiries such as the Mayerthorpe, Alberta shootings. Confirming “there have been numerous recommendations following several fatality inquiries stating that the RCMP should have TAVs accessible to ERTs, including recommendations of the Galloway-Ostopovich Fatality Inquiry and Mayerthorpe Fatality Inquiry Report, which supported the RCMPs acquisition of TAVs.” (Public Safety Canada, 2020). Likewise, the critical incident from Moncton, New Brunswick in 2014, which led to the Independent Review of the RCMP, suggested the standardization of RCMP ERT equipment across the country because “An ERT assaulter in British Columbia should be in possession of the same kit items as one in Newfoundland if the teams are to assume identical mission profiles” (RCMP, 2014). Focusing on ERTs roles in public safety, the Independent report suggested ERTs transition from a part-time to full-time function to ensure “all ERT members can devote the time necessary to developing and maintaining highly-perishable skills” (RCMP, 2014). Thus, the police continue to grapple with the moral, legal, and ethical considerations of needing military equipment while managing the public’s concerns surrounding police militarization which tends to be tied to equipment acquisition and use. Such considerations for officer safety are sensitive because police services must balance fully utilizing their ERT resources while being wary of perceptions of militarization despite the fatal shootings of police officers at Mayerthorpe, Moncton, and contemporarily Portapique (see MacIvor, 2022).

In some articles, services attempted to nuance the tactical capabilities of the equipment, like armoured vehicles, to inform the public of the equipment’s purpose within policing. In Windsor, their tactical team explains how their armoured vehicle, “It is going to provide us with some major cover” “If somebody ever was to get shot, we can drive that truck right up to the person. I know in London they’ve been shot at in that vehicle and they’ve had to use it to transport. That’s what it’s going to be used for mostly. Rescue and rolling cover” (Wilhelm, 2014). The vehicle’s other lifesaving capabilities are noted like the New Glasgow Police Service reports the TAV is for “hostage-takings, incidents involving barricaded gunman or active shooters and the execution of high-risk warrants” as well as “…in a variety of situations like life-threatening situations that may include our officers… it can be used to transfer people, to rescue people, that kind of stuff” (Boutillier, 2014). Police services who had procured equipment from the military (or Department of National Defence) stressed not using the vehicle offensively, and rather, had undergone a process of “de-militarization” by having its weapon systems removed. Suggesting that armoured vehicles are a necessary piece of equipment, and similar to the suggestions from Independent Inquiries, is an adequacy standard provision “providing the basic tools that members need to do their job and protect the public” (National Post, 2020). Police representatives, like police unions, conclude that the purpose of tactical units is the preservation of life and property, and any notion that this makes them “militarized” is “misguided and self-serving” (Skof, 2020).

Discussion

In the current article, like within our democracy, we reveal the public need to pressure police services for accountability and to “scrutinize standards” because the lack of such political pressure “means that there is little political risk for police organizations that ignore or pay only notional attention to police deviance” (Chan, 1997: 82). Thus, despite Bourdieu problematizing journalism and popular media, we show how, on one side, the general public and those who are critical of police interventions scrutinize the standards of the other side where police intervention by way of ERT serves to protect safety (Bourdieu et al., 2010). The two dominant themes across our analysis were conflicting understandings of ERT and militarization, both sides trying to sway public opinion in their favour. We are not for or against ERT or militarization, but we wanted to understand how the police, community activists, government officials, etc. conceptualize police militarization through a political sociological lens. Understanding the contested arguments, and how the public “scrutinize [s] standards,” helps apply political sociology to interpret tactical teams as, or as not, an extreme form of social control (Reiner, 2010). We draw on Bourdieu (1984, 1990, Bourdieu et al., 2010) to unpack struggles from certain actors within the policing ‘field’ to reveal a struggle tied to the forms of police capital that should be considered legitimate and accepted.

No matter what position one takes on ERT or militarization, the sides grapple with the moral implications of tactical unit equipment, as activists raise valid concerns regarding the application of equipment as reverberating existing issues regarding racism, and the police struggle with the late-modern risk implications of not having equipment for officer safety if they need it to preserve life (and to meet adequacy standards). Yet, there really was not a balance in media coverage between ERT and militarization – thus, as per Bourdieu’s problematization “journalism shows us a world full of ethnic wars, racist hatred, violence and crime – a world full of incomprehensible and unsettling dangers from which we must withdraw for our own protections”, highlighting a potential police justification for military-style equipment for officer and public safety. They largely rely on senior ranking officials to show the journalism evocation is “… the delusion that crime and violence are always and everywhere on the rise feeds anxieties and phobias about safety in the street and at home” (Bourdieu et al., 2010: 9). Police may feed into such anxieties, or try to mobilize favourable opinions toward their equipment and sway public opinion in their favour. Here, for example, was said: “Everybody thinks it’s over militarization, but I don’t think people realize what goes on in this city” (Willhelm, 2014).

On the other hand, the public view, who argue the police look like they are going to war with the public based on equipment, could be nuanced to account for Bourdieu’s notions of journalism as competitive. Media content, framed in Bourdieusian theory, is consumed, where concern is directed toward internal differentiation of practices (i.e., the process of tactical units responding to ‘routine’ calls for service), their social classification (i.e., militarized or not militarized), the process of access and assimilation to them (i.e., if police should have equipment like tactical armoured vehicles), and the external rewards based on positions in the field (i.e., public sympathy on either side of the contests) (Bourdieu, 1984; Roziere and Walby, 2018; Spencer, 2013). The race to what Bourdieu et al. (2010) calls the “scoop” could explicate the lack of newspaper articles with comments from “ordinary citizens” (p. 42). Perhaps, neither group controls the public narrative over police ERTs, but rather, informs the production of what sells. Transcending boundaries of any one social reality in lieu of “censorship,” with indifference to potential symbolic expressions that “ought to reach the population as a whole” (Bourdieu et al., 2010: 43). Said another way, very little insight into balanced positioning on police ERTs was represented in the sampled media articles, which may reverberate contested opinions between the realities of ERT work and its potential collateral consequences on citizens (i.e., both positive and negative) (Bourdieu, 1984; Bourdieu et al., 2010).

Bonikowski (2015) further argues Bourdieu’s theory of state power is unfinished in relying on the interplay between bureaucratic and political fields of power and lacking a wholesome theorization for social change. He writes “ …we learn little [from Bourdieu] about how institutions are transformed over time, where and why opposition to the status quo emerges in the political field, what accounts for the success or failure of political mobilization…” (Bonikowski, 2015: 387). We too found Bourdieu undertheorized the symbolic power that “dominated groups” can possess to reject their imposed dominated labels. Here, civil activist groups sit in tension between being passive recipients of the culture that must “accept the definitions of social reality that do not correspond to their best interest” (Chan, 2004; Swartz, 2013: 39) versus being able to shape the “struggle” around definition – a criticism of Bourdieu’s interpretations of power. Thus, what we find is symbolic power may misrecognize power or power imbalances such that subjugated groups remain the dominated within political sociology. A position juxtaposed with how rudimentary understandings of “dominated groups” and the dynamics of power between the police and activist groups is nuanced. George Floyd’s death can be positioned as the catalyst for defunding campaigns, resulting in widespread support from advocacy groups and “ordinary citizens” (Bourdieu et al., 2010: 42). As such, police continue to hold physical capital (resources, equipment, money and property), but the positions of the people supporting the “dominated” group are diversifying. Bourdieu’s concept of naturalization places dominated groups under symbolic power: “misperceiving the interest of power when they adopt the dominant view of the world”—yet activist groups and community support may resist naturalization processes. Said another way, the resultant increase in police defunding arguments, and diversity in support for such, creates fewer “dominated” individuals internalizing the taken-for-granted assumptions about policing. “Dominated” groups understand if the definitions of policing remain unchallenged, this symbolic violence will continue to self-perpetuate without powerful community resistance. The growing symbolic capital held by “dominated groups” (i.e., activists) in shaping the field of policing by contesting the practices contributing to militarization, like actions and equipment, increases political pressure on police services to address and justify these practices. Therefore, we suggest community activist groups, and the wider support for their claims by “ordinary members” of the public who are made aware of concerns surrounding police militarization through their activism, accumulate their own symbolic power to shape impressions and interpretations of ERT practices.

Bourdieu’s habitus makes it difficult to “account for change at the individual or group level” (Jenkins, 2002; Spencer, 2013). Nevertheless, Crossley accounts for habitus that is fluid and dynamic – based on a lived through structure-in process, where an agent’s “active residue or sediment” of their past functions interconnects with the present that actively works to help shape their current perceptions, thoughts, and actions (Bourdieu, 1984, 1990; Crossley, 2001). Similar to how community activists resist existing capitals and powers held by police in shaping their own forms of power to create meaningful resistance, it suggests a unique form of habitus, potentially informing the differing opinions across stakeholders and groups. Concurrently, ERT members possess a unique emic perspective (habitus), best understood through lived through structure-in-process by responding to potentially dangerous, violent, and potentially life threatening calls for service and could account for why police services stress the need to keep them safe. The presence of risk factors, the potential labour code/adequacy standard violations, and high-stress calls for service informs the police habitus that stresses certain forms of physical capital (i.e., military equipment) for ERT work (Jenkins et al., 2021; McCormack and Riley, 2016; Papazoglou, 2013; Stearns and Moore, 1993). Conversely, some community activists use their prior experiences with the police to justify the end of police militarization through military equipment. Negative interactions with the police and their ERTs impose “active residue” and negatively shape future perceptions of ERTs, as some members fear becoming another name on the signs that are chanted at rallies protesting police brutality (Issawi, 2020; Urbanik and Greene, 2020). Thus, these two different habitus’ shape conflicts and values between these groups, because they oppose “not only different sectional interests but different scholastic and occupational careers, and through them, different social recruitment areas and therefore ultimate differences in habitus” (Bourdieu, 1984: 309). Therefore, some community members habitus result in despair: “One has the sense now that citizens, feeling themselves ejected from the state, reject the state, treating it as an alien power to be used so far as they can to serve their own interests” (Bourdieu et al., 2010: 89). Their past lived through experiences of negative police interactions shapes and moulds their perceptions of the police (i.e., “reject the state”) to make impossible accepting or appreciating the opposing habitus. Thus, both groups share an underlying goal of community safety and well-being, but the disparity between their lived through structure-in-process is a potential reason for the competing arguments used to shift public opinion on police militarization.

As police are increasingly relied upon to provide social services (Lane, 2019), despair may emerge as the state withdraws from sectors previously within their responsibilities (i.e., housing, schools, hospitals) (Bourdieu et al., 2010). Our findings align with those of Roziere and Walby (2019), echoing how police justify equipment based on their frequent exposure to significant risk and how failure to provide such equipment could result in legal implications. However, such equipment is very rarely drawn from direct transfers from the military, starkly different in comparison to the frequency of departmental equipment transfers in the United States (see Cyr et al., 2020; Towns et al., 2023). Considering the consistency in police justifications across samples, first Roziere and Walby (2019) and echoed in the current study, suggests the rationales provided by the police regarding equipment remain stable both pre and post George Floyd and concurrently during the movement to liberalize policing (i.e., police defunding).

However, some community activist groups/community members from the current sample, and in existing literature, suggest perceptions of police and their lack of provided safety reverberate when the police appear as though they “[are] ready to go to war with the public.” The exchange and procurement of armoured vehicles can be viewed as the circulation of capitals amongst competitive actors in a struggle to monopolize in a competitive market (Bourdieu et al., 2010; Swartz, 2013). Police militarization consists of structured spaces of “dominant and subordinate positions based on capitals” as some community groups interpret armoured vehicles to impact them more (Madsen, 2020; Mummolo, 2018; West, 2022), considering they are a more “valued form of capital” between police services (Swartz, 2013: 59). Armoured vehicles and other ERT equipment may affect community members who stratify ‘fields’ by relevant capital’s unequal distribution. Police are then in tension with the community – who may have less capital, suggesting the contests of police militarization are heightened by the relational positions between the police and certain community groups. Since actors “take up positions relationally, and in opposition to others” the disagreement on the application of armoured vehicles and police militarization under political sociology only strengthens the “systems of oppositions that gives unity to a field” (Swartz, 2013: 59). Thus, despite the intergroup struggles, who’s reality is legitimate? Police argue some military equipment “doesn’t seem like a big step toward militarization” and community groups consider surveillance equipment to be militarized. The resultant clash between habitus’ continues to unfold, and the struggle to define appropriate capitals to be used in the field is contested, as each “unwittingly reproduces the structure of power relations within and across fields” (Swartz, 2013: 60). Highlighting a unique impasse in the contested and competing ways public safety can be realized. This does not mean one side is accurate, but simply competing narratives rooted in habitus shape interpretations and their rationales.

Conclusion

Relying on Bourdieusian theory allows for a position that sheds light on the ambiguities about police militarization as a concept; the lacuna in understanding between groups based on their unique and emic habitus’ perpetuates a reality where “there appears to be no universal definition of police militarization” (Blaskovits et al., 2021: 2) because groups take up positions in opposition to each other and thus strengthens their unity and positionality on such side surrounding ERTs and police militarization. Despite competing positionalities, those for and against ERTs or police militarization share the overarching goal of improving community safety and well-being. Community groups rely on existing police ‘doxa’ – as crime fighters-to contest military equipment adequately achieves what the police argue their habitus says it does (i.e., improves community and officer safety). The police use their habitus to continually justify this ‘doxa’ to help the community appreciate their need for military equipment. Although support for community activist arguments continues to diversify through support from “ordinary citizens,” which should increase political pressure on police services to address and justify these practices, such actions on behalf of the police are still largely missing. The lack of media released from police services to suggest why their ERTs are warranted, justified, or defendable is still a lacuna in police practice. Some police services acknowledge such, despite if they take the necessary steps to ensure the public is aware of the reasons for such equipment. Such an approach fails to accurately portray the potential situational risk factors that ERTs experience (Jenkins et al., 2021, 2023), and refrains from providing the public with transparency on the reasons for ERTs in public policing. Perhaps, more civilian ride-alongs with ERTs would provide narrative accounts of their emic perspectives and potentially bridge the gap in habitus’ that perpetuates contested opinions about police militarization.

Moving into the future, police services must do better when conveying to the public the role of their ERTs during calls for service, beyond relying on media representatives to state this is for safety (Manning, 1997; Martin, 2018). Avenues for future research could investigate how national standards for ERT equipment could alleviate pressures across police organizations and remove ambiguities surrounding procurement of ERT hardware as militarization.

Footnotes

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank our two anonymous reviewers for their insightful suggestions during the revisions of this manuscript.

Declaration of conflicting interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Ethical statement

ORCID iDs

Zachary Towns

Rosemary Ricciardelli

Note

Appendix

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