A Systematic Review of Police Interventions against Serious Organised Crime

This research project is being undertaken as one of the work packages included in a series coordinated by the What Works Centre for Crime Reduction (WWCCR), hosted by the UK College of Policing. It focuses on the extent to which law enforcement disruption interventions effective in reducing the level of threat and harm posed by organised crime groups and networks. Specifically, this research contributes to the WWCCR Work Package 2 (WP2), as one of the five work packages commissioned to map the existing evidence base for crime reduction, label it for quality, cost and impact, and make it easily accessible for practitioners and decision makers.

This study will take the form of a systematic review of the available literature on interventions against serious organised crime. A research protocol has been devised that defines the key terms in the research question, provides an overview of the review process, a search strategy for the identification of relevant studies, and a set of inclusion and exclusion criteria. This research protocol also identifies the methods for the retrieval of relevant studies, including search terms and lists of relevant databases (including relevant grey literatures). This has been designed to ensure both rigour and replicability. Currently, having defined the problem to be tackled and the methods for doing so, the team is focussed upon collecting and analysing the available research evidence.