‘Bad, sad and angry’ : Responses of the SAPS leadership to the dangers of policing

• Author: Gráinne Perkins
• DOI: 10.17159/2413-3108/2022/vn71a12857
• Published date: 01 November 2022
• Date: 01 November 2022
• Pages: 45-59

2 – 45

SA CRIME QUARTERLY NO. 71 • 2022

‘Bad, sad and angry’

Responses of the SAPS

leadership to the dangers

of policing

South African

Danger is an integral part of the fabric of South African society. Yearly statistics regularly underscore

the extent of danger experienced through reported acts of violence. As generally off‌ice bound

executives, senior police off‌icers rarely encounter this violence to the same extent as frontline

off‌icers.2 These police leaders are ultimately responsible for the strategies and operations employed

to prevent police exposure to such dangers. Little research, however, has examined how the

senior personnel react and respond to such danger. In this discussion, perceptions of senior South

African Police Service (SAPS) off‌icials to the dangers of police work are laid bare. How danger is

conceptualised at such senior levels has relevance in initial examinations of why the SAPS may police

in the manner in which they do.

CR I ME QUA RT E R LY

Gráinne Perkins1

perkinsgrain@seattleu.edu

https://doi.org/10.17159/2413-3108/2022/vn71a12857

No. 71 | 2022

Methodology

The murder rate in South Africa is consistently

amongst the highest in the world.3 Although

murder rates are high in South Africa, they

have been declining over the last decade4 and

so too has the number of police deaths.5 In

the Western Cape Province, however, on-duty

police deaths showed a slight upward trend

between 2002 and 2014. On a national scale

and in the Western Cape, off-duty murders

have actually accounted for more murders than

on-duty. Across South Africa, the SAPS identify