From a systems perspective, the quality of police operations is largely determined by social and political traditions in a given area. Police-public isolation is premised on several factors including perceptions of unjust police practices, inward police orientation, and police organization. Ways to achieve the police ideal focus on the concept of police professionalism, preventive versus reactive policing, role perceptions, and police reorganization. An improved organizational climate should encompass police roles and functions, police-community relations, police lifestyle and subculture, and organizational approaches (militarization versus civilianization and centralization versus decentralization). The time may have come in some countries for a change in the concept of the police role, from an instrument of the power elite to service for all citizens. The police must strike a delicate balance between the rights of citizens to protection and the rights of the accused to due process. Success in policing is predicated on police effectiveness which, in turn, is premised on public acceptance. 100 notes