Book Review: Ferguson, Andrew G., The Rise of Big Data Policing: Surveillance, Race, and the Future of Law Enforcement
Robert Angus Smith · Theory in Action · 2019
In The Rise of Big Data Policing: Surveillance, Race, and the Future of Law Enforcement, Andrew G. Ferguson, addresses how 'high tech' data collection, surveillance technology, and predictive targeting are utilized and applied in modern police practices and how minorities and poor communities are policed and affected.Throughout the book, the author discusses how these same technologies can be used to identify police misconduct and improve effectiveness and accountability within law enforcement agencies.And, he suggests these technologies could potentially be used to identify underlying influences for high risk factors, such as, socioeconomic perils, environmental risks, education, and job training deficiencies and ameliorate these with social service resources rather than merely focus on crime control.Professor Ferguson has taught law at the David A. Clark School of Law in the District of Columbia since 2010 and is a Senior Visiting Fellow at the Harvard Law School's Criminal Justice Policy Program and a Policing Data Fellow at the NYU Law School's Policing Project.The author was also a Law Clerk in the US 5th Circuit Court of Appeals in 2000