Drawing a line: boundary work in victim support police work

Abstract

Victim support entails one of the most intense stress- and trauma-laden interactions faced by law enforcement professionals, and this function or role frequently triggers long lasting negative effects on officers’ psychological health and wellbeing. As police officers interact daily with victims, but also with other officers, social services, and institutions, the limits between tasks and needs may directly affect how they manage stress, trauma, and notions of individual and organisational responsibility. As such, boundary work may be a useful framework to understand and even improve how victim support police officers interact with other individuals and organisations. Drawing from a groundbreaking qualitative, in-depth research with police officers that provide support to victims of gender-based and domestic violence, this paper analyses conscious and unconscious boundaries as key elements in the officers’ wellbeing. Informed by the empirical findings of a case study of Catalonia’s Mossos d’Esquadra police corps, this paper explores how victim support officers negotiate their individual and organisational boundaries as they interact with other agents and institutions, and how these negotiations affect them. This paper argues for the relevance of an officer’s agency and discretion for distinguishing between conscious and unconscious boundaries, as their limits may be blurred throughout the wide range of interactions.