Bound By Duty: Behind the Lines of Policing in Canada

Are police the advocates or adversaries of the people they supposedly protect? Is society placing more demands on the police than ever before? How are police dealing with public scrutiny as well as the changing nature of the job?

In Bound By Duty, social activist and acclaimed writer Pat Capponi explores the dynamic world of Canada's police as they experience it. Travelling across the country, from Vancouver's notorious East side to Ontario's Garden River First Nations reservation, Capponi speaks with police from all levels, from chiefs to the cop on the beat, both old and young, about the dangers and constraints that go hand in hand with life in uniform.

She discovers a surprisingly diversified police force, with more women and visible minorities than ever before. Yet, while the white male no longer exemplifies the force, he nonetheless still dominates it. The result is a tense schism in attitudes towards policing, between cops who view themselves as strict enforcers of the law and those who advocate for a less authoritarian, more community-based brand of policing.

This is a rare and current glimpse of the people behind the badge as only Pat Capponi can reveal. With an in-depth look at different approaches to the job and a variety of perceptions of policing, she exposes a system that is flawed, promising, and deeply human.

Pat Capponi is a weekly columnist for NOW magazine and the author of the critically acclaimed memoirs Upstairs at the Crazy House and Dispatches from the Poverty Line, as well as The War at Home: An Intimate Portrait of Canada's Poor. She is also one of Canada's leading mental health care advocates. In addition to attending numerous government hearings, task forces and inquests, Pat is a founding board member of the Gerstein Centre for mental health in Toronto.