Research in the past decade has documented the number and patterns of vehicle pursuits by police officers. Drawing upon this research base, this paper shifts the focus away from pursuits as isolated individual events to study vehicle pursuits as departmental products occurring within organizational contexts (both physical and cultural). Positing that the structure and environment of police organizations constrain the activities of officers through the intervening effects of departmental policy, the paper examines the variations in vehicle pursuit policies across a sample of 51 Illinois police departments. The results indicate that organizational features are substantially related to departmental pursuit policies and to officer pursuit behaviors.
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