Modern Policing, a critical assessment of contemporary police agencies, is the fifteenth volume in the Crime and Justice series. Modern Policing is a comprehensive review for students and scholars of criminal justice and public policy, as well as specialists in sociology and history.

Norval Morris and Gordon Hawkins's first premise is that our criminal justice system is a moral busybody, unwisely extended beyond its proper role of protecting persons and property. But they go further and systematically cover the amount, costs, causes, and victims of crime: the reduction of violence; the police; corrections; juvenile delinquency; the function of psychiatry in crime control; organized crime; and the uses of criminological research. On each topic precise recommendations are made and carefully defended.