Bridging divides to build connections: A scoping review of police practices, behaviours and actions with Roma and Traveller communities

Across Europe, police are expected to maintain productive human rights-based relationships with the public. This scoping review focuses on how police achieve this aim with Roma and Traveller communities. Review questions consider the way that policing practices, behaviours and actions with Roma and Traveller communities are described in the existing literature. Additionally, they identify gaps in knowledge within this area of study. Applying qualitative content analysis, this review advances a comprehensive illustration of racism and discrimination. It shows how current relationships, determined by experiences of police brutality and abuse, can limit the ability of Roma and Traveller people to request and accept help from the police when they are victims of crime. Drawing on current scholarship, implications for a human rights-based approach to policing are considered and a four-step framework for community policing is introduced. The study concludes that co-produced and participatory research initiatives are urgently needed to cultivate innovative community engagement strategies that can begin to develop productive relationships between police and Roma and Traveller communities.