10 Lessons from the past: women and policing

For most of its history, policing in Britain has been either exclusively or overwhelmingly male. Women were only admitted to police forces in the early decades of the twentieth century and for much of the subsequent fifty years were only employed in separate women’s departments, with a limited range of duties and promotion opportunities. Integration began during the 1970s but even today there is a marked gender imbalance in police forces.

Due in part to this imbalance, historians have also traced a pervasive ‘macho’ culture in twentieth century policing, and the persistence of levels of sexism and misogyny increasingly out of step with social norms. This undoubtedly made professional life difficult for many female officers and adversely affected recruitment. But the historic prevalence of sexism and misogyny on the part of some police officers and forces is not simply an internal problem.

Historically, the lack of female police officers (particularly in senior positions) and the prevalence of sexism and misogyny in police working culture affected the treatment of female members of the public (as both victims and suspects) by the police. This went above and beyond the very high-profile crimes committed by some serving police officers against women.

If we link these historic factors to the contemporary situation then three lessons can be drawn:

• The lack of representation of women in policing is a long-standing problem. Progress to date has been insufficient to redress an issue which was identified early in the history of policing in Britain. Police forces are now focused on this key metric, but history suggests that the long-standing nature of recruitment disparities are highly likely to be linked to the working professional culture prevalent within policing.
• Police working cultures have historically been constructed in ways which have excluded, marginalised and mistreated women. This has been long recognised, and many initiatives and policies have been trialled. Progress has been made but recent official reports (Casey; Angiolini; IOPC are these three separate refs?), alongside research by campaigning organisations, shows that these have had only limited success. History demonstrates that the problems with (and solutions for) cultural change within the police and the recruitment and promotion of female officers are likely to be linked.
• The history of policing demonstrates clearly that the above issues are not simply ‘internal’ to the police. Rather, they have clear, real-world consequences which hinder the job of policing and lead to problems with trust in the police. While the policies and procedures which guide police forces in their treatment of violence against women and girls are immeasurably more sophisticated than they were even two decades ago, long-standing cultural attitudes and assumptions are harder to change. A survey after the murder of Sarah Everard and the police’s subsequent handling of a protest vigil indicate that 47 per cent of women questioned now trusted police less than they did before (EVAW, 2021).