POLICE ETHICS: A Case Study of Turkey
1.0 Introduction
The personnel of official law enforcement agencies such as the police and the
gendarmerie have authorities and responsibilities that other public personnel do
not. These are important powers that limit civil liberties, such as stopping,
searching, asking for identification, confiscation, apprehending, using force, and
interrogation. The performance of these duties has significant effects on people’s
quality of life, and especially on civil liberties and social life. Taking into account
the degree of discretion allowed to security personnel to enforce the law, it
becomes clear that there is a need for a code of professional ethics, in addition to
existing legislation, in order to increase the quality of the service they provide. In
this light, in this section questions such as ‘what are police ethics,’ ‘to which
security personnel do police eth ics apply,’ and ‘why is a code of ethics necessary’
will be considered. The section will also address the sources of ethical rules and
their relation to police ethics, social morality and religious beliefs. Finally, the
relationship between police ethics and professionalism will be addressed.
Emphasis will be made on the necessity of compliance with the code of ethics by
all full-time official and private security personnel currently active in the field of
internal security services.
2.0 Objectives
Students are expected to
1. Understand the concept of police ethics, what they are and to whom do they
apply.
2. Secondly this unit material why police ethics, source of ethical values and
police ethics and professionalism.
3.0 Main body
The term ‘police ethics’ is a shorter phrase whose full meaning is actually
‘professional policing ethics.’ The term does not o nly cover the members of the
police organization, but also the members of all other organizations providing internal
security services, such as the gendarmerie, coast guard, and even
private security organizations. In Turkey, these services are being provided by
three separate public organizations, the police, the gendarmerie, and the coast
guard. Therefore, police ethics can also be referred to as ‘law enforcement ethics;’
a term that is not commonly used in everyday speech, but which is relevant for all
internal security personnel. The term ‘law enforcement ethics’ includes, without
exception, all security personnel. In this book, the term ‘police ethics’ is mostly
used and is meant to incl ude all organizations providing internal security services.
Although the European Code of Police Ethics (ECPE) produced within the
Council of Europe (CoE) involved the participation of gendarmerie officials from
countries such as France and Spain, it was titled European Code of Police Ethics.
As a result, the document addresses not only the police, but also gendarmerie
organizations providing internal security services in European countries.
Moreover, the ECPE was translated into Turkish and published by the Turkish
Gendarmerie. The fact that these principles have been included in the book
Jandarma Eti¤i (Gendarmerie Ethics) (2002) published by the gendarmerie
demonstrates most clearly that police ethics includes gendarmerie ethics. In short,
in order to determine which organizations are covered by the ECPE, the service
provided rather than the organizational structure of the internal security unit has
to be taken into account. While the police, one of the official law enforcement
agencies, is under the control of the political authority and is organized as a semi-
military institution, the other two, the gendarmerie and the coast guard, are
organized in a completely military manner. However, regardless of the
organizational structure of the units, all internal security services in democratic
governments are defined as ‘policing.’ Therefore, t he term ‘police ethics’ used in
this book addresses all organizations that provide internal security services and,
therefore, practice policing, not just those that have the organizational aspects and
titles of the law enforcement agencies.
3.1. Why police ethics? One of the reasons why a code of ethics addressing security
personnel is needed is the insufficiency of internal legal arrangements in controlling
their actions. For this reason, ethical rules prepared and accepted by the members of
this profession are needed in addition to existing legal arrangements. The healthier
operation of security services and the minimization of human rights abuses depend on
the establishment and acceptance of professional ethical principles and rules. It is
obvious that it is not possible to control the behaviors and actions of the members of
any given profession through laws that entail penal sanctions. While legislation has
primarily penal sanctions, ethical rules have more professional, conscientious
sanctions. In places and cases where the enforcement of the law is under the
enforcement personnel’s own initiative, the most effective element is professional
consciousness, conscience, and ethics (Kleinig, 1996). It is a reality that the security
personnel whose main duty is to enforce the law have more freedom in choosing
whether to obey the law or not. Therefore, professional ethical rules prepared by
security members and addressing their conscience will be more effective in
controlling the actions and behaviours of the police than just legislation.
In short, laws by themselves are not sufficient to control the behaviours of law
enforcement personnel and institutions. The healthier performance of security
services and the minimization of human rights abuses require the establishment of
professional ethics in addition to legislation. For this reason, professional ethical
rules prepared by parties representing many sectors of the society, and led by the
members of the profession, are needed. Police personnel’s values and perceptions
of events are largely a product of the structure of the society to which they belong,
the pre-professional training they receive, their work environments, and social
lives. It is impossible to deny the impact of the society in which security personnel
are born into and brought up on their moral and religious values. Although the
ECPE prepared under the Council of Europe was prepared as a secular document,
it is natural that certain social values pre-exist in the subconscious of the persons
preparing it. However, the committee members made a special effort to ensure that
the prepared document covers universal principles transcending Europe, instead of
just reflecting Europe’s social and cultural values.
3.2. By whom and how was the ECPE prepared?
High-level police officers, social scientists, jurists, and representatives of
nongovernmental organizations participated in this study, which began towards the
end of the 1990s and was finalized in the 2001 under the Council of Europe. The
preparation of the ECPE took place in an overall democratic and scientific
environment. Each member of the committee was given the chance to express
her/his opinions and ideas on behalf of her/his country and society. The
committee’s studies represented the problems and reflected the opinions of
security personnel at every level, not only high-level officials and bureaucrats. In
particular, the problems of police officers - lower - and middle-level personnel
providing services defined as ‘street policing’ - found a place. By ensuring the
participation of personnel from every level in preparation of the document, the
resulting ethical code was made more acceptable to non-ranked police officers. In
short, the study was not only prepared by high-level security personnel but
incorporated the contributions of all parties concerned. The committee facilitated
the contributions of certain non-governmental organizations such as human rights
organizations, as well as of law and social science academics. The sixth and last
meeting took place in Strasbourg between 28 – 30 March 2001, where the
document was finalized and presented to the police organizations of all member
countries as a recommendation document.
3.3. Ethical Values
The source of ethical values and rules is an issue discussed by social scientists,
especially philosophers. The crux of the matter is whether the source of ethics is
human nature or socialization. In other words, is it nature or nurture that defines
them? Morality, related to the word ‘creation,’ implies that the good values of
humans result from their nature. According to the opposite opinion, while ethical
values are produced by humans, they are a product of their nurture, and not of their
nature. This approach, which perceives of ethical principles as the product of the
individual’s socialization processes, argues that these principles are more universal
compared to moral principles, regardless of their source. According to this
opinion, moral rules are local and relative, whereas ethical rules are universal. On
the other hand, human properties are more universal than the properties a person
achieves through socialization. Apart from some physical details, such as skin-
color, hair-color, and height, people the world over share similarities. People’s
socialization is more variable and relative compared to their physical properties.
People can produce different, even conflicting ethical rules, as a result of their
socialization in different societies and historical periods. The socialization of
individuals is more diverse and contingent compared to their physical aspects.
People growing up in different environments and under different conditions
accordingly present different lifestyles and values. In this case, morality, which
includes the notions of ‘nature’ and ‘good things’ - and, which as used in Turkish
comes from the Arabic word meaning creation - will be more universal compared
to the ethical principles that humans will produce as a result of social relations. In
short, socialization processes that lead to differences and the resulting social
morality or professional ethical principles will be more local compared to the
universal values that are allegedly inherent in human beings. There may be a direct
or indirect relationship between professional ethics and religious beliefs. Religion
is one of the oldest existing social institutions, and all people are influenced by
religion to a lesser or greater degree. For this reason, ethical rules of a profession
cannot be thought of as completely independent of the moral principles of the
belief system to which the members of that profession belong or in which they
live. Whether the source of ethical values is a person’s nature and beliefs or her/his
socialization, it is natural, even inevitable, that there will be a hidden or distinct
relationship between the general moral rules of a society and the ethical rules of
any given profession. Instead of completely rejecting or excluding the social moral
principles of a society, those principles can be accepted as a foundation on which
professional ethical rules can be built when establishing the ethical code of a
profession. Ethical rules taking the sensibilities of different belief systems into
account will have secular characteristics. In addition, they will be more
comprehensive than ethical rules established according to the sensibilities of a
single belief system.
This sensitive balance was maintained very well in the preparation of the ECPE.
Although the resulting study was prepared as a secular document, it has taken into
account different belief systems and lifestyles. The emphasis on the secular
character of the document aims to avoid giving the impression that the document
was prepared in accordance with moral values of any one particular religion; and it
does not mean that the document is devoid of any traces of moral principles of any
society or religion. For instance, it will not be convincing to claim that the ideas of
a person who accepts as ethical principles not to profit unfairly or to abuse one’s
power are not based on her/his moral and religious beliefs. The influences of
religious beliefs or social moral principles on ethical principles can be direct, or
they can be in the form of values embedded in the subconscious of the individual.
When the relationship between morality and ethics is considered in this way, a
professional code of ethics can be conceptualized as the adaptation of social and
religious principles in accordance with the needs and priorities of different
professions. For this reason, the fact that the ECPE is a secular document does not
mean that none of the ethical principles in this document has any relation to
religious or moral principles.
The secular nature of the document is emphasized in order to express that it was
not shaped solely by beliefs and values of Christianity, which is the dominant
religion in Europe. The ECPE’s introduction emphasizes that the concept of ethics
is different than the concept of morality. However, the introduction also mentions
the relationship between the terms ‘ethics’ and ‘morality.’ It has been pointed out
that ethics is a kind of reflection of the concept of morality, as it is used in
everyday speech, on professional policing actions. In other words, professional
ethics is the reflection of morality as a concept that is related to an individual’s
values at a professional level. It is known that beliefs and cultural systems of
different societies have important effects on shaping the understanding of morality
in those societies. The understanding of morality in European societies is also
naturally formed according to Christian beliefs. So as not to give the impression to
non-Christian Europeans that a morality based on Christian beliefs is being
imposed on them, the more secular term ‘ethics’ is used instead of ‘ morality,’
which is affiliated with religion. Thus, care was taken so that the ECPE prepared
under the CoE would be a secular document rather than a religious or a moral one.
However, the particular and insistent stress on the difference between ethics and
morality throughout the committee’s studies compels one to think that there can be
a larger or smaller relation between the two concepts. Otherwise, a non-existent
issue would not have been discussed so insistently. In this case, we can ponder the
persistent denial of this link. If the issue is considered in depth, two reasons are
revealed.
The first of these reasons is that the committee members wished to keep the
concept of ethics distinct from religion, and especially from the concept of
morality as related to Christianity. Although this study was prepared by the
Council of Europe, the resulting code did not only concern the police forces of
European countries. Some countries whose inhabitants identify themselves
predominately as Muslims, such as Turkey and Azerbaijan, were also represented
in the committee. Furthermore, minorities with various religious affiliations live in
every European country, in numbers that cannot be underestimated. European
countries no longer consist of a single race, religion, or culture as in the Middle
Ages. Therefore, the ethical code produced by the committee intended to address
both religious minorities living in Europe as well as people living in
predominately Muslim countries. In conclusion, the sensibilities of non-Christian
communities such as the Turks living in Europe, and of Turkey - a member of the
Council of Europe and a country with a predominately Muslim population – were
taken into c onsideration. Secondly, other religious minorities living in Europe and
some non-European countries might not have accepted a code that explicitly and
predominantly contains moral values shaped according to Christian beliefs. It can
be said that this idea is behind the elaboration of the concept of ethics as
particularly distinct from morality. It was out of a desire not to impose moral
values reflecting primarily Christian beliefs on all people under the guise of
professional ethics, or to leave such an impression. Only this kind of an approach
would have been appropriate to the spirit of the prepared ethical code. According
to the committee, the ethical code prepared in this way will be a document
accepted by the various religious, ethnic, social, and cultural minorities living in
Europe. The committee is of the opinion that such acceptance will be possible only
when the concept of ethics is based on humanity, and not on any particular
religious belief.
3.4 POLICE ETHICS AND PROFESSIONALISM
The issue of how and who will control the personnel providing security services
has existed since the time when these services first appeared. The need for a
professional ethics code in guiding the actions of security personnel is a result of
such efforts. There have been other police ethics studies in Western countries prior
to the European Code of Police Ethics (Kleinig, 1996). The book The Principles
of Policing and Guidance for Professional Behavior,1 published in 1985 by the
British police, is one of the first publications that established a relationship
between ethics and professionalism. Professional ethics education is also known to
have existed in the history of Turkish security services (Bal and Beren, 2003: 64).
There are documents showing that Police Ethics classes existed in Turkish police
education in the last periods of the Ottoman State (1910) and in the first years of
the Republic of Turkey (1939). Among them is a book titled Polis Efendilere
Mahsus Terbiye ve Malumat-› Meslekiye (Professional Training and Information
for Policemen) published by the educator and police chief ‹brahim Feridun in 1910
in Istanbul. This book was used as a textbook in police schools at that time. Upon
examining the book, it becomes obvious that modern principles such as
transparency, accountability, community policing, and service found inside the
contemporary European Code of Police Ethics also appeared in that book.
However, for some reason police ethics courses were not offered in
preprofessional or professional institutional training of the Turkish police in later
years.
Towards the end of the 1990s, police ethics courses started to be offered again in
formal police education in Turkey, in parallel with police ethics studies carried out
under the Council of Europe. In reality, the acceptance of a profession as a
professionally practiced field must be accompanied by the development of some
professional ethics principles. Such a connection also exists between police ethics
and professional policing. If policing is a service branch that must be practiced
professionally, there must be ethical rules covering the rights and wrongs of this
profession. These ethical rules are defined by the members of that profession, who
are its representatives and the providers of its services. Their own colleagues
punish those who do not comply with those rules according to ethical rules. This is
one of the musts for a field to be considered professional. In other words,
professionalism requires compliance with ethical rules. A police officer who works
in accordance with ethical rules is a professional police officer. The idea of
professionalism does not merely bring some additional responsibilities upon the
members of a profession. In this light, the code of police ethics should not be
viewed as a document that restrains security service personnel and makes their
task more difficult. The existence of code of ethics and compliance with it will
ensure that the people who are providing this service and those who receive it will
be in a healthier relationship. Security personnel performing their duties with
professionalism will internalize the ethical code of their profession and will
transform it into normal and routine behavioural patterns over time. Moreover, a
professional individual does not perceive acting ethically as something
extraordinary that should be rewarded. Ethical behaviour will not only benefit
those to whom it is directed, but will also give happiness to the person who acts
ethically. In fact, security personnel who practice proper behaviours in line with
professional principles will live a more peaceful life. They will at the same time
extend this happiness to their environments. Those who violate the law and ethical
codes will make their colleagues, their close environments, family members, and
even themselves unhappy. In short, individuals who provide services
professionally and in accordance with ethical codes will not benefit only the
society they are serving; individuals who act ethically in their professional lives
also will be happier in their private and family lives. For this reason, security
personnel should not view ethical rules and principles as an additional arrangement
that limits and controls them. They should accept compliance with the ethical code
as benefiting both themselves and others, and as a requirement of their
professionalism.
Self Assessment Exercise
What is the source of ethical values?
4.0 Conclusion
There is a close relationship between professionalism and professional ethics.
Being a professional member of a service sector requires willingness to comply
with that profession’s ethical code. This requirement covers all personnel that
have chosen internal security as a full-time service area. For this reason, although
the ECPE is a document prepared for official security personnel, personnel of
private security organizations that, according to recent legislation, assist official
security organizations in providing security services are also bound by these
ethical principles. In short, since their duty is to provide security services, it is
necessary and useful for these organizations and their personnel to become aware
of and adopt basic ethical rules of security service established for official security
personnel.
5.0 Summary
This unit highlight some of the important powers that limit civil liberties, such as
stopping, searching, asking for identification, confiscation, apprehending, using
force, and interrogation. From which The term ‘police ethics’ was described as a
shorter phrase whose full meaning is actually professional policing ethics.
Similarly the reason for code of ethics in policing revealed that the need for
control in the actions of police personnel is paramount in the light of existing legal
arrangements which characterised the police as professionals..
6.0 Tutor Marked Assignment
1. What is police ethics?
2. What are the reasons for ethics in any organisation?
7.0 References/ Further Reading
Bryden, A. and Fluri, H. P. (Eds) (2003) Security Sector Reform: Institutions,
Society and Good Governance, Baden-Baden: Nomos Verlagsgesellschaft.
Hanggi, H. Winkler, T. H. (2003) Challenges of Security Sector Governance,
Geneva Center for the Democratic Control of Armed Forces.
Lynch, G. W. (1999) Human Dignity and the Police: Ethics and Integrity in
Police Work, Illinois: Charles C Thomas.
Munteanu, T. (2005) ‘Reforming the security sector: The experience of the SEE
and the Black Sea region’, paper presented to the Halki International Seminars
2005 – on Security Sector Reform in South Eastern Europe and the
Mediterranean: Lessons and Challenges, 7-11 September 2005, Greece.
Qatarneh, Y. (2005) ‘Civil-military realations and security sector reform in the
Arab world’, paper presented to Halki International Seminars 2005- on Security
Sector Reform in South Eastern Europe and the Mediterranean: Lessons and
Challenges, 7-11 September 2005, Greece.
