Enabling Policing to Be Better: Lessons from Two Case Studies in Police Collaboration

In the UK, the introduction of austerity measures for public services has intensified the thinking around inter-organizational collaboration between emergency services and other public and/or private sector organizations. Theoretically, while collaborative benefits are held up as beacons that drive organizations to participate in inter-organizational arrangements, a high number of such arrangements fail. In this paper, we explored the factors that influenced the collaboration process in the context of developing ‘collaborative information infrastructures’, from an organizational and collaboration level perspective, via a multiple case study approach. Our findings offer insights into how policymakers and public managers could improve their practices by considering their approach towards, and impact of, these factors when implementing collaborative projects in information technology and information systems.