Community policing involves the partnership between the law enforcement police officers and the member of the local community to promote safety and well-being in the neighborhoods. Community policing aims at building trust between the members of the community and the law enforcement offices which in turn increases the productivity of their implemented organizational features. This partnership substantially changes the role of law enforcement and crime reduction from being solely a police officers’ job to a joint responsibility between the officers and the local community citizens (Stein & Griffith, 2017).
The community policing achieves this function by proactively dealing with potential situations that could negatively affect public safety such as fear mongering, social unrest, drug abuse and other criminal activities. Partnering with the community members decentralizes the responsibility of public security and helps the police officers improve people's lives in the community by acting as mediators in conflict resolution besides enforcing law and order (Johnson, 2017). The functions of this partnership also involve an active social network to provide a public platform where the members of the community can address their common concerns. Instead of relying on arresting the criminals and other law breakers as the only means of promoting peace and stability in the community, community policing facilitates the rehabilitation of the reformed criminals and drug users to help them become productive once more.
Community policing promotes organizational improvement by involving individuals and organizations from various levels of the community in law enforcement (Situmorang, 2015). These may include the private businesses, the citizens, non-governmental organizations, and civic agencies. All these parties come together to ensure the reduction of crime and promotion of a peaceful co-existence. This strategy is based on the philosophy of community policing that partnering with the community members makes law enforcement more efficient.