Martina Feilzer - Research

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Research

Martina’s main research interests are the relationship between the public and criminal justice at local, national, and European level; the relationship between the media and public opinion of criminal justice; penal policy; and comparative and historical criminological research.

She also has a strong interest in the use of mixed methods research and the implications of particular research methods for our understanding of the social world.

Research News

Feilzer, M., Roome, D., and Trew, J. (2010-2011), collaborative project of Bangor University and North Wales Police.

The impact of value based decision making on policing in North Wales. Funded by WAG.

North Wales Police is rolling out ‘value-based decision making’ in operational policing across the force area. The concept of value based decision making (VBDM) can be described as affording staff greater discretion in determining the most appropriate resolution for minor crimes, incidents, and road traffic offences. It is an essential element of the force’s drive to provide an increasingly ‘citizen-focussed’ service, and is intended to increase the trust and confidence of people in policing services, as well as improving efficiency through streamlined processes. The research will monitor the impact of the training in value-based decision making on operational practices, including aspects of operational policing such as detection rates, and its impact on police officers’ and the public’s perceptions of frontline policing.

Feilzer, M., Plows, A., Williams, K., and Yates, J. (2010-2011), collaborative project of WISERD and WCCSJ (Welsh Centre for Crime and Social Justice), Bangor and Aberystwyth Universities.
An evaluation of the Women’s Turnaround Project in North Wales

The Women’s Turnaround project aims to engage women offenders so that they make necessary changes to stop offending, following a holistic, woman-centred, service model recommended by the Corston Report in 2007. The research will explore the women’s and stakeholder’s perspectives on what women need and whether the Turnaround project in North Wales has helped women to move forward in achieving their targets. Using a mixed methods approach, the research will evaluate whether the project has altered the behaviour/life-styles of the women participating in the research and how far any changes were internalised (from the perspective of the women) rather than just an external perception (on the part of workers). The research explores these questions in relation to the Women’s Turnaround project based in the Women’s Centre in Rhyl, North Wales.

Recent Projects

Feilzer, M. and Javed, F. (2010).
Policing the Muslim Community in North Wales: Negotiating the demands of community policing and counter-terrorism

Muslim communities in the UK have become the target of adverse media coverage; increased and mainly adversarial police attention as part of counter terrorism measures; and, in some areas, increased racially motivated crime. Additionally, young Muslims have felt the effects of an identity crisis as British Muslims negotiating traditional cultural and religious values and the demands of the majority white British culture surrounding them, while defending themselves against suspicions of religious fundamentalism, radicalisation, and terrorism. The research explores how North Wales Police can better engage with the local Muslim community, in particular, women and young people, for the purpose of counter-terrorism as well as community policing. Thus, the proposed research explores strategies to build relations between the police and Muslim communities in the particular context of North Wales.

Feilzer, M. with Yener Altunbas and Shanti Chakravarty (2008)
Interrogating the British Crime Survey from a local perspective: The case of North Wales

The British Crime Survey (BCS) is a national victim survey which assesses experiences of crime, the behaviour of victims of crime in regard to reporting of crimes to the police, and survey respondents’ attitudes to, and confidence in, the criminal justice system and its main agencies. Certain components of the BCS are now used as performance indicators which contribute to the assessment of local police force performance. This is a fairly new development and there has been limited academic discussion of the suitability of the BCS for this purpose. This research responds to concerns about the use made of BCS data in performance management and allocation of resources at a /local/ police force level. The research will explore the suitability, validity, and reliability of BCS data for performance management, production of crime estimates, and resource allocation on an individual police force level; and include a secondary analysis of British Crime Survey data using a context-sensitive ‘bottom-up’ approach.