Bad Cop, Bad Cop: Corruption in the Buenos Aires Provincial Police. Contemporary Discourse and Suggestions for Future Research.

Abstract

This thesis comprehensively reviews literature pertaining to police corruption in the Buenos Aires Provincial Police. In doing so, it organizes and synthesizes contemporary discourse on this topic and suggests areas for future scholarly study in order to better understand corruption in this particular case. This thesis argues that the global police corruption literature provides an analytical framework for assessing the breadth of the police corruption literature specific to the Buenos Aires Provincial Police. In this way, this thesis reviews the global police corruption literature and finds that scholars have researched four principal areas of study: the definitions and typologies of police corruption, the causes of police corruption, the nature and organization of police corruption, and preventive strategies. These areas of research and their key findings are subsequently employed as an analytical framework for organizing discussion of the case-specific literature and suggesting areas in need of further scholarly study on this particular case. This review finds that each of these main areas of study present topics that have been widely researched in the context of the Buenos Aires Provincial Police, as well as others that have received little or no attention and therefore merit further study.