Police and Government Relations: Who's Calling the Shots? explores the question of police governance and independence from a number of different points of view. This book stems from an Ipperwash Inquiry symposium on police/government relations. The subtitle alludes to the shooting of Dudley George in 1995 by Ontario Provincial Police. The book offers extracts from the Ipperwash Inquiry transcripts and an Ipperwash discussion paper in the epilogue. Editors Margaret E. Beare and Tonita Murray offer multi-disciplinary, comparative, and case-study methodologies written by scholars from law, political science, and criminology to illustrate the diversity of opinion that exists on the topic and to explore how the operating tension between police independence and democratic governance and accountability has played out, both in Canada and other countries. This book does not attempt to find final answers; its goal is to provide a framework for a continuing discussion that may lead to helpful and workable recommendations for the future. It serves as an academic and intellectual contribution to an important matter of public policy. Margaret E. Beare is an associate professor in the Department of Sociology and the Osgoode Hall Law School at York University. Tonita Murray is a consultant and gender advisor to the Afghan Ministry of Interior Affairs and former director of the Canadian Police College.
