Race and ethnicity as a victimogenic predisposition of exceeding and abuse of police authority

The unique position in society and the specific functions make the police one of the key holders of protection of the fundamental rights and freedoms of citizens. At the same time, their position and function provide police officers significant opportunities to violate the same freedoms and rights, by resorting to various forms of violation and abuse of power. This dual nature of the police authority gives us reason to question the police from a completely different angle - as a source of a specific form of victimization. The risk degree of victimization by police authority is determined by the different predispositions, and above all by the victim’s behavior. However, some individual characteristics (gender, age, sexual orientation, ethnic and social origin) are also a kind of victimogenic predisposition, as they contribute to the process of victimization independently or in combination with the behavior of the victim. In this work we draw attention to the fact that race (ethnicity) often makes an independent criterion which the police use when deciding how to act in the concrete case. This circumstance contributes to a distinctive form of police procedure, known as racial profiling. The fact that the race of a person is taken as a criterion for treatment suggests the conclusion that here is actually about a form of discriminatory behavior. Considered in this context, race may be treated as victimogenic predisposition of police authority, and racial profiling as a process of victimization. [Projekat Ministarstva nauke Republike Srbije, br. 179045: Razvoj institucionalnih kapaciteta, standarda i procedura za suprotstavljanje organizovanom kriminalu i terorizmu u uslovima me unarodnih integracija]