Controlling control: toward a reflexive concept of officer safety

Police responses to psychosocial crises frequently unfold in ambiguous, emotionally charged situations. While many encounters are handled professionally, others escalate, sometimes fatally. This paper observes such outcomes through a systemic lens rather than isolated individual decisions. Drawing on systems theory, we argue that the dominant model of officer safety, what we term Officer Safety 1.0, relies on three core assumptions: that safety is a producible condition, that violence is an external threat, and that thinking is guided by a linear, input-output logic concerning police-citizen interaction. These assumptions shape how officers perceive and act in complex situations, often reinforcing rigid and reactive forms of engagement that may inadvertently escalate risk. Officer Safety 1.0, in this sense, is grounded in a logic of linear control. We introduce an alternative model-Officer Safety 2.0-which retains the functional goal of control but reconfigures its foundation through reflexivity. In this model, safety is understood as a socially constructed fiction, violence as an interactive risk, and thinking is guided by a nonlinear understanding of social interactions. Within this model, control emerges from insight: the reflexive capacity to observe one's own assumptions and their effects on the unfolding situation. Officers are encouraged not only to observe events, but also to reflect on the interpretive frameworks guiding their perceptions and actions. This reflexive approach aims to expand the behavioral repertoire available to officers, enabling more adaptive and situationally attuned responses that reduce the likelihood of escalation. Officer Safety 2.0 is not a replacement for existing tactics, but an educational framework that reframes them within a broader understanding of system logic and human interaction. It shifts the foundation of safety thinking from the pursuit of linear control to the cultivation of insight as a form of reflexive control.