We write from our diverse backgrounds and roles – having shared a long involvement in research, education and change regarding policing – with considerable concern about the future of public policing. The context in which we write is the reorganisation in 2013 of the Dutch police from a decentralised system with 25 regional forces and a national unit – the National Police Services Agency (Korps Landelijke Politiediensten, KLPD) – into a single National Police (Nationale Politie) with 10 regional ‘units’ and one national unit based on the former KLPD. In the wake of that system change, two of us, Auke van Dijk and Frank Hoogewoning, were involved in implementing an assignment from the Chief of the National Police, Gerard Bouman, initially to Bernard Welten, then Head of the School for Police Leadership (SPL), to shape a leadership programme for senior officers to replace the existing courses given at the Dutch Police Academy. Bernard Welten was previously Police Chief of the Regional Police of Amsterdam-Amstelland – now the Amsterdam Police Unit in the new national structure – and chaired the Working Group on Police Leadership (WGPL) that was implementing the assignment from the Chief of the National Police. The WGPL produced a final report (Final Report TOLNP, 2013) to complete the research phase into, as well as the design of, a new leadership programme. This SPL leadership project involved a range of people, from within and without the police, who functioned in the WGPL and, along with van Dijk and Hoogewoning, the members included Professor Bob Hoogenboom (LSE and Nyenrode Business University); Astrid van Gerwen, Jan Nap and Marjanne Rauh of the Dutch Police Academy; Caroline Geradts (National Police, Amsterdam Unit); and Jaco van Hoorn (National Police, Zeeland-West Brabant Unit).

Auke van Dijk and Frank Hoogewoning are policy advisers for strategy and development within the Amsterdam Police Unit of the National Police. Maurice Punch is an academic with a background in police research and education in the UK, US, the Netherlands and other countries and has an advisory role in their specific project. The three of us were involved in helping to deliver a new leadership programme for senior officers. As a part of this process, we examined in some detail developments in the UK, primarily in England and Wales but also Scotland, concerning police leadership and training and also the professionalisation of policing.