Book Reviews / Compte Rendus: American Catholics and the Church of Tomorrow: Building Churches for the Future, 1925–1975, Catherine R. Osborne

Abstract

The literature on policing in Canada is well developed, but under-populated by law scholars. Kent Roach, our most accomplished scholar of criminal law and public policy, has intervened in current debates about policing by offering something unique—a work that surveys four decades of inquiries and commissions, special investigations, case law, and legislation to render an extensive overview of Canadian policing that seeks to shed equal light on legal, political, and social facets of the subject. He concludes that policing here “needs to become less violent and discriminatory, better governed, and more effective” (p. 1). He offers overwhelming evidence for a decades-long prevalence of the over-policing of Indigenous, Black, and other minorities in Canada and a grossly disproportionate amount of police violence—often shocking in nature—against minorities in recent decades, with no sign of abating. His most pointed criticism targets the failure of civilian boards and councils to effectively govern and oversee police conduct due to an erroneous belief that only police can decide “operational matters.” Many illusions about policing here being better than in theUnited States—or not as bad—are dispelled. Notmuch hope for change is offered. Roachmakes his case for the “vicious circle of overpolicing and underprotection” (p. 25) by canvassing a lengthy history of inquiries and investigations into police violence, most involving racialized victims, women, and, more recently, Muslim Canadians—with countless recommendations ignored and forgotten, only to be reprised in later commissions. Another chapter looks at failures to impose accountability on police or to effectively reduce violent and abusive conduct. In one of the more striking passages in the book, Roach traces the impact of the Supreme Court’s 2001 decision in Golden, a case in which the Court refused to impose a warrant requirement for strip searches, instead setting out a series of guidelines. Three years later, Toronto police were “strip searching 37.4% of themore than 61,000 people they arrested” (p. 57). By 2015, this had increased to 40% of all arrests, a disproportionate number ofwhomwere Black, Brown, or Indigenous.Deadly shootings by police have continued to increase in the past two decades, rising sharply in 2021—also involving a disproportionate number of racialized deceased.