The books by Lea and Young and by Scraton are part of an important political debate about what should be done about crime and policy development. The collection edited by Roach and Thomaneck evaluates the experience of other countries in terms of the British problem. An essential tenet of the Lea and Young argument is that there is a growing problem of crime both in terms of increasing crime rates and articulated fear of crime and that the appropriate strategy for countering the drift to military policing is to argue for accountability. An examination then is presented of Scraton's argument that the police have always been against the working class and that police actions require external monitoring. The discussion shows that the implicit roles assigned by these authors to the police are not totally believable: a uniformed police force cannot control crime, as Lea and Young suppose; and a State police force is not only and solely on the side of capital and against the Labour party, as Scraton would have it. Both texts, however, agree that the police are moving back to an explicit public order role. 2 notes and 21 references. (Author abstract modified)