Vol. 9 No. 9 (September 1999) pp. 398-401.
INVADING THE PRIVATE: STATE ACCOUNTABILITY AND NEW INVESTIGATIVE METHODS IN EUROPE by Steward Field and
Caroline Pelser (Editors). Brookfield, VT: Ashgate-Dartmouth, 1998. 388 pp. Cloth $76.95.
Reviewed by Jane Beckett-Camarata, Department of Political Science, Kent State University.
Criminals are expanding their illegal activities and operations in an increasingly complex, political, social,
legal, and technologically driven environment. In response
police have developed new techniques to counter and restrict such activities. Scholars are busy analyzing and critiquing
the efforts of investigators who continue to
labor to develop and maintain an appropriate balance between the use of new investigative methods and techniques
on the one hand and the privacy rights of individuals on the other. The emergence of new investigative tactics
in Britain and the Netherlands and the scandals that have resulted from their application is the stated framework
of the book, INVADING THE PRIVATE.
The book is a timely and interesting exploration into the implications of pushing of the boundaries of investigative
methods in an attempt to dampen and curtail
criminal activities while respecting and not infringing on individual privacy rights. This reviewer's assessment
of the book is along four dimensions: (1) organization, (2)
generation of new ideas, (3) comprehensive coverage of the topic, and (4) usefulness to scholars and practitioners.
Two of the questions at the heart of the struggle between good and evil in democratic societies have changed little
over time. What is the appropriate balance between effective crime fighting and due process and effective investigative
techniques and their regulation? (p. 108) Field and Pelser, in editing the book, offer the insights and findings
of many scholars to address the issue of state accountability. The editors focus the readings to present attempts
at oversight and accountability and to explicate the mechanisms of state procedure, the methods of their development
and the implications the mechanisms hold for ensuring investigative fairness and individual privacy. Their book
provides clearly focused chapters containing relevant, high quality readings on comparative works and the regulatory
methods of investigative accountability. Field and Pelser, through the readings, examine a range of Northern European
investigative policing techniques through emerging cases or cases that have increased in importance as they reflect
more clearly and illuminate more sophisticated criminality. In addition to sketching the themes and plan of the
book in the Introductory Chapter, they use the chapters to examine the full range of
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investigative techniques. The chapters are organized under the headings of: (1) "The New Intelligence Gathering:
Covert and proactive Policing Practices, (2) New
Information Gathering: 'Some New Sources' and (3) Accountability and Control: some potential strategies.
The chapters generate new ideas and raise issues about individual rights to privacy and state accountability that
are over and above those that have been part of the
conversation of scholars and practitioners for some time. Woven into all the chapters is a concern for understanding
the unique legal and environmental context in which intelligence gathering takes place. Thus, we are presented
actual accounts of situations that describe the ongoing tensions between traditional methods of investigatory accountability
and those deemed applicable to new investigation approaches.
In Part I the editors set the stage for the reader through an examination of the importance of proactive policing
of investigatory behavior and technique. The
editors define proactive policing as secret investigative methods targeted at specific individuals or groups and
put into operation before an offense is committed. This
policing technique is placed in the broader context of the development of new possibilities for intelligence gathering.
There are useful examples of covert and
proactive policing as intelligence gathering. The editors also point out that one of the problems with current
Dutch overt and covert policing methods is that it clearly
illustrates focuses on the issue of intelligence service work but appears to ignore any notion of prosecution for
failure to comply. On the other hand, Britain citizens
appeared to break away from an established cultural hostility to certain types of covert policing with the increased
threat of organized crime and, to an extent,
growing sports "hooliganism".
In Part II the editors discuss new sources of information gathering to broaden the reader's awareness of the increasing
scope of investigatory technique. They raise
the question of new ways of knowing an individual in a way that may constitute an invasion of privacy (p. 21).
They also raise several other significant and relevant
questions, such as: what happens to the information; who has access to information that is gathered; and (3) what
purposes can be served as a result of having access to such gathered information? Of particular importance is
the notion of "cross-over effect" by which techniques developed by defense ministries and business corporations
can be later exploited by law enforcement agencies. This again raises the question of accountability in the use
of mechanisms designed for one purpose but put to a wholly different use.
Chapter 11 contains a discussion of the challenge confronting states by organized crime and illustrates the interaction
of different jurisdictional and cultural
traditions in countries with high-powered financial structures. For example, Lamp et al. Point out that there
has been a two-part change in the examination of financial
records in a financial investigation where the nature of the investigation does not have to be specified. There
has been an easing of restrictions relative to violations of
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privacy in pursuit of already opened investigations and in the use of the private sector as an extension of
the public to generate information about 'suspicious persons' (p.199). In Chapter 13 the problem of protecting
journalists and their sources is juxtaposed against the growth of the power of policing agencies to secure information
held by third parties unsuspected of criminal activity themselves. We see that the public interest in the free
flow of information is weighed against the interests of justice, but the outcome of the balancing act seems to
differ by situation and country (p. 222).
In Part III the editors present readings that address proactive policing accountability and control and offer some
potential strategies for accomplishing such a task.
Here the chapters begin to analyze possible responses to new intelligence gathering approaches. Contrasting evidential
and substantive criteria for intervention and
competing political and agency priorities create a need for coordination and cooperation between agencies that
is even more acute then in covert policing within national boundaries. The question is whether the structures of
accountability that have been created for nation-states are viable within certain regions of a country as well
as outside its borders. Chapter 18 on limiting the role of the defense lawyer provides excellent examples of the
imbalance of power and resources between the suspect or defendants and the state (p. 322). It highlights the uphill
battle that defense lawyers and defendants face as a result of proactive policing. The reading on Judicial Regulation
(p.323) present and discuss three forms of regulation of proactive and/or covert policing and contrasts judicial
regulation with prior authority. The Netherlands example points out that the police move toward using intelligence
to destabilize criminal organizations by methods other than criminal prosecution and conviction was a factor in
enabling some police investigations to step outside of the judicial regulatory framework prior to the IRT scandal
(p. 325).
In summary, the book is quite comprehensive in scope on the issue of INVADING THE PRIVATE. The chapter readings
invite and expose the reader to an abundant and growing amount of research on new investigative techniques as they
relate to individual privacy rights and investigatory accountability. The integration of the readings to focus
on the book's main issue suggests that scholars can serve a valuable function and be seen as an asset by the citizenry
as they develop and transform research findings of colleagues of like or opposing minds. The book inclines toward
particular perspectives on investigative methods and state
accountability, tending to focus on a legal approach, rather than including economic, social or public policy approaches.
The reviewer feels the book fell short in this
one area. Future work might better incorporate a diverse range of ideas about new investigative methods, individual
rights and state accountability from public policy, economics, and sociology perspectives. Such inclusion could
aid researchers in their quest to develop, and test ideas related to the balance between new investigative methods,
individual privacy rights and state accountability.
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INVADING THE PRIVATE: State Accountability and New Investigative Methods in Europe is a fine contribution to the
literature. The book will be useful o researchers who are interested individually or collectively in the concept
of individual privacy rights, those practitioners interested in new investigative methods of policing, as well
as those interested in state accountability for behavior interfacing with individual privacy. The topic of the
book, the writing style and efforts to raise research questions are motivating. At the same time, the in-depth,
behind the scenes opportunity to see points of ambiguity, dilemmas and contradictions in how individual privacy
rights can be invaded by new investigative methods and how it informs research and practice also motivates the
reader. The book eases accessibility to the ideas, expedites identification of trouble spots and helps future
researchers more fully contextualize the conversation on individual privacy rights vis-a-vis new investigative
methods that is only captured in a well-integrated stream of articles on the topic such as our editors have provided.