Using Citizen Surveys to Produce Information on the Police: The Present and Potential Uses of the National Crime Victimization Survey

The National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) is a major source of nationally representative data on crime and the response to crime in the United States. The survey's potential to add to our understanding of crime and criminal justice issues has not been fully exploited, however. One of the areas where more effective use could be made of the information gathered by the survey is policing. This paper suggests how the NCVS can more fully realize its potential for informing issues pertaining to the police.