加拿大犯罪學(xué)教授談美國警察的種族歧視文化

張瀾波

編者按：2020年5月25日，美國明尼阿波利斯市警察長時間跪在黑人脖子上導(dǎo)致其死亡事件，激化了美國種族割裂的社會傷口，導(dǎo)致全美多地發(fā)生騷亂，甚至導(dǎo)致該市市政委員會考慮解散并重組警察部門。

近日，加拿大曼尼托巴大學(xué)一位有著四十余年研究和教學(xué)經(jīng)驗(yàn)的著名犯罪學(xué)教授，在和中國朋友的私人信件中，對美國明尼阿波利斯市發(fā)生的白人警察蓄意造成黑人青年死亡事件進(jìn)行了憤怒譴責(zé)。其文有理有據(jù)，言詞犀利，對個別美國警察的卑劣行徑進(jìn)行了毫不留情的批判，并將話題引申至美國警察體系中長期存在的種族歧視傳統(tǒng)。經(jīng)其同意，我們將信件內(nèi)容進(jìn)行翻譯并發(fā)表，以供參考。

這個問題（本文譯者請教其對以上案例的看法）可以用一句古老的口號來簡單回答——任何時候，文化都會戰(zhàn)勝戰(zhàn)略。戰(zhàn)略可以用訓(xùn)練、篩選或其他任何活動替代。

美國的種族主義歷史悠久，這一歷史可以追溯到與原住民的接觸以及奴隸制時期。這兩種情況導(dǎo)致黑人與原住民長期處于貧窮和教育低下的狀態(tài)。

我記得，美國南方各州為黑人和白人分設(shè)洗手間，黑人職業(yè)棒球運(yùn)動員被迫住在和白人運(yùn)動員不同的酒店，在不同的餐廳就餐。雖然這些明顯的障礙已經(jīng)解除，但許多美國白人仍然希望那些所謂的美好舊時光能回來。美國現(xiàn)任總統(tǒng)以及他的黨派中的很多人，都明確無誤地讓白人至上主義者感覺得到了支持。

在美國，警察一直被用于讓黑人循規(guī)蹈矩。由于貧窮和歧視，黑人的總體犯罪率高于白人，因此他們與警察有更多的機(jī)會打交道。大量研究表明，整個司法系統(tǒng)都存在歧視黑人的事實(shí) （最近在加拿大哈利法克斯的一項(xiàng)研究發(fā)現(xiàn)，黑人在街上被警察盤查的可能性是白人的四倍——這項(xiàng)研究導(dǎo)致了該城市取消了街頭盤查）。在20世紀(jì)60年代，犯罪率的上升（部分原因是嬰兒潮）導(dǎo)致美國政客積極對犯罪宣戰(zhàn)，鼓勵警察和司法系統(tǒng)的其他部門積極打擊犯罪行為，其中許多被打擊者是黑人。這滋長了針對黑人的種族主義態(tài)度和行為的固化。同樣，這種情況也有很多案例記錄為證。

警察文化中的“藍(lán)墻”加劇了這一點(diǎn)，這意味著警察的不當(dāng)行為通常不會被其他同事舉報(bào)，任何違反這一“潛規(guī)則”的人都會因此而擁有悲慘而短暫的職業(yè)生

涯。

行為不端的警察很少受到紀(jì)律處分。在本案中，該警官案發(fā)前曾遭到18起投訴，其中只有兩起受到輕微的紀(jì)律處分。一些警局有跟蹤紀(jì)律問題的計(jì)算機(jī)程序，這樣上級就可以提前處理，而不是等待這種事件發(fā)生，但顯然明尼阿波利斯的情況并非如此。

警察的上級主管通常都贊同警察的粗暴行為。即使上級主管不贊同，警察工會也總是會支持警察，并出資聘請優(yōu)秀的律師為被控使用非法暴力的警察辯護(hù)。在很多城市（如紐約、明尼阿波利斯和多倫多），警察工會擁有很大權(quán)力，以至于他們在實(shí)際上掌控警局。而在美國，許多警察工會領(lǐng)導(dǎo)人及成員都是特朗普的支持者，因?yàn)樗麄冎浪С炙麄兊呐按袨?。由于過度的暴力問題，一些警察部門一直迫于聯(lián)邦法律的壓力作出改變，但當(dāng)特朗普上任后，他至少取消了一些相關(guān)法律，也許全部都被他取

消了。

如果當(dāng)前的事件會帶來改變，那就太好了，但由于文化的力量，任何實(shí)際改變都要經(jīng)過很長時間。

原文：

For a simple answer as to why this happened， there is an old slogan： Culture beats strategy any day of the week. And for “strategy” you can substitute training， or selection， or almost any other activity. The U.S. has a long history of racism—a history that goes back to contact with indigenous people， and then to slavery. In both these cases， the result was ensuring that blacks and indigenous people stayed poor and uneducated. I can remember when the southern states had separate washrooms for blacks and whites， black professional baseball players had to stay in separate hotels and eat in separate restaurants. While these obvious barriers have now been lifted， many white Americans still hope those good old days will come back， and politicians like the current president and many in his party make sure the white supremacists know they are supported.

Police have always been used to keep blacks in their place， and because of poverty and discrimination they have also had higher crime rates than whites， so they have more contact with the police. There have been lots of studies documenting the fact that the entire justice system discriminates against blacks （one recent study in Halifax found that blacks were four times more likely to be stopped on the street than whites—this study resulted in the end of street checks in that city）. In the 1960s， rising crime rates （partly because of the baby boom） led U.S. politicians to declare war on crime， which encouraged the police and other parts of the justice system to crack down on offenders， many of whom were black. This helped to perpetuate racist attitudes and behaviours directed at blacks. Again， examples are well-documented.

This is compounded by the ‘blue wall of police culture， which means that police misconduct is often not reported by other officers， and anyone who violates the code will have a miserable and very short career.

Police who misbehave are rarely disciplined. The officer in this case had 18 complaints， of which only two led to minor discipline. Some departments have computer programs that track disciplinary issues so supervisors can deal with them early rather than waiting for this kind of episode， but obviously this wasnt the case in Minneapolis. Chiefs often agree with police abuses—and when they dont， unions will always support their officers， and usually have the money to hire very good lawyers to defend officers accused of illegal violence. In many cities （New York， Minneapolis and Toronto are examples）， the unions have so much power that they effectively run the department. And in the U.S.， many police union leaders and their members are big Trump supporters， because they know he supports their abusive behaviour. Some departments had been under federal orders to change because of excessive violence issues， but when Trump took over he cancelled at least some of these， and possibly all of them.

It would be nice if the current events led to change， but because of the strength of the culture it will be a long time before anything actually changes.

（本文譯者曾就職于武漢市公安局特警支隊(duì)，現(xiàn)為先豐服務(wù)集團(tuán)莫桑比克公司安全安保經(jīng)理。2009～2010年曾參加利比里亞維和任務(wù)，2010～2011年在公安部國際合作局禮賓處工作）

（責(zé)任編輯：古靜）