For every American who is victimized by crime, several experience crime vicariously each evening on their television sets. But while cops and robbers are a staple of TV entertainment, we know very little about how TV portrays crime and the law.
In this study we examined the nature of crime and law enforcement portrayed in 263 prime-time programs from the 1980-81 television season. We employed a content analysis system to analyze the types of illegal behavior shown, the characteristics of criminals, and the portrayal of law enforcement officials on these programs.
Prime-time television creates a fantasy world that is frequently dangerous and violent. Our study identified 417 illegal acts, an average of about 1.7 crimes per series episode. Moreover, lawbreakers on television tended to engage m the most serious and violent crimes to an extent that bears little relation to reality. Every fourth crime shown was a murder; one crime in six was a violent theft. Overall, a majority of all illegal acts portrayed were crimes of violence.
Television introduces the viewer to two types of criminals the professional deviant who lives a life of crime, and the apparent pillar of the community who turns to crime to maintain or better his standard of living. Criminals on prime time are usually middle- or upper-class white males over age 30. As "mature" adults, they rarely act on impulse. Instead their lawbreaking is carefully calculated to advance their own interest.
The vast majority of television crime is predicated on pure greed. Wealthy characters are over twice as likely to commit crimes as those identified as poor or middle class. Along these lines, a stock criminal type is the businessman whose selfish pursuit of profit leads him into illegal activity. TV businessmen and their underlings account for almost one in four lawbreakers with identifiable occupations they constitute the largest criminal group aside from professional gangsters. But substantial numbers of criminals are other pillars of the community, including educated professionals and the police themselves. In fact, one television criminal in eight is drawn from the ranks of those sworn to uphold the law.
Of course, all this is only half the story. Criminals on television are vigorously pursued and usually thwarted by a variety of crime stoppers. We identified 373 characters as law enforcers. Over two-thirds were police, with the remainder divided among private eyes, lawyers, judges and government agents. An additional 37 private citizens performed law enforcement functions, such as capturing the criminal.
Law enforcers appeared frequently on comedies and dramas alike, on all three networks, in both continuing and single-appearance roles. Most were white males; 15 percent were nonwhites; and 11 percent were women.
In general, law enforcers were portrayed in a positive light although "supercops" were rarely seen. Fifty-four percent functioned as good guys, 28 percent as villains, and the rest played neutral roles. The largest number, about one in three, was portrayed as doing their job in a competent manner. However, very few were cast in a heroic light only 4 percent went beyond the call of duty rather than just performing competently. Moreover, significant percentages were portrayed as either inept or positively criminal; about one law enforcer in 12 fell into these categories. Thus, law enforcers fared rather well in general, but they were tainted somewhat by incompetence and even illegal behavior.
A major finding was the privileged position of private investigators relative to all other groups of law enforcers. Ninety-three percent of private eyes functioned as good guys, compared to 53 percent of police and fewer than half the lawyers and government agents. In all the programs we viewed not a single private eye played the heavy. By contrast, the crooked cop and the greedy lawyer provided recurring negative images of law enforcers.
Private eyes proved almost godlike in their crime-solving abilities, while other law enforcers were often portrayed as mere mortals. Sixty-two percent of the private eyes were the primary agents in solving crimes, compared to only 19 percent of policemen. In fact, every group other than private eyes failed to solve crimes more often than they succeeded, though they sometimes assisted others in making the collar. By contrast, private eyes succeeded almost nine times as often as they failed.
The phenomenal success of private eyes was part of a broader trend involving the need for outside help or unorthodox means to enforce the law. In addition to that quintessential outsider, the private eye, the police often required the help of private citizens to foil the bad guys. Their assistance did not take the form of providing evidence or identifying suspects, but of actually solving the crime themselves. Private citizens actually edged out private eyes as the most effective group of crime solvers. Finally, law enforcers who bent the rules were over twice as likely to solve crimes as those who went by the book.
This portrait of crime and law enforcement is perhaps most notable for what it fails to show about the crime problem that today preoccupies the American public. Television entertainment largely ignores most aspects of real crime in America, focusing instead on the most serious, violent and life-threatening offenses. By sensationalizing crime in this way, TV misses its opportunity to educate the audience about the true dimensions of America's crime problem. Television's nightly stream of murder, mugging and may- hem obscures the less dramatic but much more common threats to law-abiding citizens from such unspectacular sources as drunkenness, drug abuse and larceny.
If prime-time crime bears little relation to the genuine article, television's criminals are equally far removed from their real-life counterparts. The main focus is on the avarice of the middle and upper classes. We rarely see the juvenile delinquent or the youth gang. Nor are we exposed to the culture of poverty that is directly or indirectly responsible for so much crime. Similarly, the black community's increasing public concern with street crime is rarely in evidence.
For all the criminal activity, in one respect there is no crime "problem" on television. In the fantasy world of TV entertainment (unlike the real world) most lawyers are thwarted and crime is punished yet ordinary law enforcement officials are presented as highly fallible. More often than not, they either fail to catch the crook or they play supporting roles for the heroic private eyes who are television's real crime stoppers.
Neither Dick Tracy nor Joe Friday serves as the model law enforcer for today's cops-and-robbers shows. We found few square jawed Blue Knights who capture the villains and comfort the victims. Nor does television favor the rnethodical and mundane investigative style of Dragnet's dedicated cops. Instead, the glamor boy of TV's legal system is the private eye, whose Holmesian abilities often consign the law enforcement professionals to the role of Doctor Watson.
More broadly, effective law enforcement is often the province of the outsider who bypasses the law enforcement establishment. On television, the police, the government, and the legal profession are often shown as competent if uninspired upholders of the law. But these law enforcement professionals often need the help of the lone outsider the private eye or the citizen-detective to bring evildoers to justice.
In sum, the artificial world of prime time is a dangerous and crime-ridden place. Evildoers are drawn from the ranks of both professional criminals and apparent pillars of the community. Most are thwarted before the final credits, but policemen are rarely the heroes. Television manages to enforce the law without glorifying the law enforcement establishment. Surprisingly often on prime time. The insiders break the law and the outsiders enforce it.