Police Transparency

President Obama did well in focusing his attention on the mistrust between the police and the communities it surveys in his response to the Ferguson unrest. The racial issue is the backdrop that, as in other areas of the U.S. society, often manifests itself when white officers and minority individuals meet.

Clearly, it’s not easy for the police to do its job in a society where firearms abound. The U.S. is the country with the more guns per capita, and has the highest homicide rate of all industrialized nations. Suffice to mention that guns were among the best-selling items during the past Black Friday. It’s also unfair to make generalizations, and one cop’s bad actions should not mean that many other well-intentioned officers are stained.

But there certainly is a wide perception — regardless of race — that the police doesn’t treat all racial groups equally. A majority of those interviewed by the Pew Center — both black and white — said that it’s wrong for the police to blame the agents for their actions. According to an FBI analysis, sometimes the police departments don’t manage properly the process after a shooting, thus fostering confusion and anger among the public.

The key words are transparency and clarity about what happened in a shooting. Here, the idea of a police body camera that records the interactions with civilians is crucial. Obama is proposing to fund that measure.

It’s also good that the Department of Justice is changing the federal law enforcement guidelines on racial profiling. It is also looking to eliminate the militarization of the police, which has been equipped with war gear.

There are other more complicated areas in the police officers’ approach to minorities: A tendency to shoot to kill, a defensive “Us vs. Them” mentality that tends to overprotect their agents, and the abuse of power that stems from misplaced authority.

Racism is a hard-to-eradicate monster, but at least it can be fought using transparency to prevent it from rearing its ugly head