Toward a better understanding of the hierarchical nature of police organizations: Conception and measurement

The present article proposes a reconceptualization of police organizational hierarchy as a multidimensional construct. This notion of a multidimensional police hierarchy was derived from the sociological literature of stratification and the prior management literature of organizational hierarchy. It is proposed here that police employees are stratified based upon the differential allocation of various resources (such as rewards and formal power) and attributes (such as skills). This differential allocation stratifies employees into five different hierarchies. This article describes these five hierarchies and suggests how they might be measured, at both the individual and comparative/organizational levels. Finally, the possible interrelations among these hierarchies is discussed as well as three management issues concerning this multidimensional conception of police hierarchy.