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In this international interdisciplinary conference, law professors and sociologists will assess the policing initiatives that the United States and Europe have used to combat terrorism and other transnational forms of crime in the last decade. In particular, the conference will explore the difficulties of democratic oversight of these more aggressive policing techniques; the implications of these new powers for transnational collaboration in fighting crime; and the feedback effect that international cooperation has upon domestic law enforcement.
In the wake of the 9/11 attacks, the United States and Europe expanded police powers and applied to the fight against international terrorism techniques previously developed to pursue domestic terrorists, drug traffickers, and organized crime. Some of these initiatives made it easier for police and intelligence agencies to share information. Others promoted efforts to collect personal information, including fingerprints, religious and political affiliations, and records of finances and travel. Revisions of investigative rules expanded surveillance of oral and electronic communications and legitimated a wide array of undercover operations against suspected targets. The most controversial innovations allowed law enforcement agencies to arrest suspected terrorists and detain them indefinitely without providing access to counsel or opportunities to seek judicial review. New criminal statutes broadened the definition of terrorism greatly enough to potentially reclassify drug trafficking and organized crime as threats to national security. Expansions of criminal liability also made it possible to pursue fringe members of terrorist organizations without requiring individualized information about whether and how particular defendants promoted the aims of the organization with which they associated.
These expansions of law enforcement powers were not simply a reaction to the 9/11 attacks. They built upon initiatives under way well before 9/11 that targeted organized crime. Starting in the late 1980's and accelerating through the 1990's, many European nations established laws that, for the first time, tried to codify (and thus better control) law enforcement powers that had long existed in a twilight of legality. These controversial powers included covert policing methods, such as wiretaps, electronic bugs, and the strategic deployment of informants and undercover agents. Like the post-9/11 initiatives against terrorism, these developments arose from a perception that the targeted problem-organized crime-transcended national borders; threatened the survival of the democratic state; and resisted more conventional modes of police inquiry. And like the post 9/11 anti-terrorism campaign, Europe 's revamping of its covert policing apparatus was designed to facilitate international cooperation, particularly with U.S. law enforcement agencies.
The new law enforcement initiatives begun in the 1980s and significantly expanded after 9/11 raise important questions about how the U.S. and Europe can respond to threats while retaining their democratic character and preserving civil liberties. The ways in which different national legal systems have absorbed and adapted to earlier law enforcement initiatives can provide clues about how the more recent anti-terrorism campaign can be expected to change these societies.
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