As Police Engage with Military Equipment, Citizens Disengage with Each Other

The Cougar 4×4 Mine-Resistant Ambush Protected (MRAP) vehicle weighs 20 tons, can reach speeds of up to 65 miles per hour, and has a range of 420 miles. With a unique V-shaped hull, it was designed to endure explosions from improvised explosive devices in Iraq and Afghanistan. Now many of them drive through American neighborhoods, having been acquired by police departments from the Department of Defense (DoD) under the Excess Property Program 1033. Whether or not the presence of armored vehicles improves community safety remains unclear, but economists from the U.S. Naval Academy have found one effect of the 1033 Program: an increase in transfers of military equipment from the DoD to police agencies leads to a decrease in civic engagement, measured in terms of charitable giving, particularly among black households.

Introduced in 1997, the 1033 Program allows law enforcement agencies to request surplus military equipment. While the law enforcement agencies bear the cost of transportation and future maintenance, the equipment is otherwise free of charge. Since the program’s inception, the government has turned over $6 billion worth of equipment to law enforcement agencies. Items range from firearms and night vision equipment to vehicles and aircraft.

The debate over police militarization is prolific: should we be arming police officers with military-grade equipment to bolster neighborhood safety, or is weaponizing the police a step too far, especially given community concerns about police brutality? Perhaps the most memorable imagery surrounding the debate over police militarization comes from the broadcasts of the riots in Ferguson, Missouri, where police could be seen wielding assault rifles and donning flak jackets, Kevlar helmets, and camouflage fatigues. A few MRAPs made appearances too.

The broken windows theory argues that even the slightest visible signs of crime—like broken windows—foster an environment for more crime, and it would support the notion of officers cracking down in the toughest ways possible. In that regard, heavily arming police officers may be effective. However, Michael Insler, Bryce McMurrey, and Alexander F. McQuoid of the Naval Academy point out that there are serious second-order effects of police militarization. In their recent research, they find that an increase in police militarization actually decreases civic engagement by civilians. That effect is even worse for black households.

To examine the effects of police militarization, the authors must first address the fact that military equipment is not randomly assigned throughout the country; instead, agencies opt into the 1033 Program. This suggests that agencies that participate more are different from those that participate less. That difference may have an effect when trying to determine causal effects on civic engagement. For example, one could assume that militarized police roaming the streets leads to social fragmentation and a decrease in civic engagement. On the other hand, it may be the case that police are responding to the negative effects of social fragmentation by militarizing.

Because of the unobservable differences in agencies that choose to participate more than others, Insler et al. instead estimate levels of police militarization by looking at federal military spending. Federal military spending increases a state’s exposure to military culture. In turn, that cultural exposure increases agencies’ awareness of and participation in the 1033 Program. Moreover, federal defense spending is set years in advance by Congress and is driven by national political concerns rather than by local ones. In that sense, it is a more random variable than direct 1033 Program participation. Thus, the authors use federal defense spending per state to estimate the monetary value of DoD transfers to police forces or, in other words, police militarization. To measure civic engagement, the researchers look at charitable donations. They reason that actively donating money to charity would suggest a willingness to engage with one’s community.

Insler et al. estimate that for every $1 million of DoD transfers to local law enforcement agencies, there is a 7.4 percent decline in overall charitable giving by black households. While the decline in civic engagement holds true for all households, it is consistently worse for black ones. The effect is even more severe when the researchers restricted the categorization of DoD transfers to just weapons and aircraft. Then, each additional $1 million of transfers yielded a 13.4 percent decrease in charitable giving by black households. It appears that aggressive projections of power with military equipment may contribute to social fragmentation.

Police are intended to protect the communities they serve—to provide a greater sense of safety and security. With the 1033 Program in place, the militarization of police has instead led to communities that are socially distant from one another and less inclined to participate in civic engagement. That is not to say that the $6 billion of DoD transfers have been worthless. As supporters of the broken windows theory would suggest, militarized police may be more productive at deterring criminal offenses through the threat of punishment. But is a potentially more productive police force worth the decrease in civic engagement? Until policymakers decide, nearly 600 MRAPs will continue to roam the streets.

Article source: Insler, Michael, Bryce McMurrey, and Alexander F. McQuoid, “From Broken Windows to Broken Bonds: Militarized Police and Social Fragmentation,” United States Naval Academy Working Paper, June 2017.

Featured photo: cc/(mjf795, photo ID: 472958342, from iStock by Getty Images)