The formal approach to selecting chief constables has not changed much in Great Britain since the early 19th Century. The police authority still advertises the vacancy, develops a list of candidates, votes on the candidates, and obtains appointment approval. Career patterns of chief constables between 1835 and 1985 demonstrate certain changes, however, in chief constable selection policies that focus on internal versus external police manager recruitment. These career patterns also show how different policing traditions have merged. The development of an ideology of internal recruitment has turned chief constables into a special, internally accountable, professional elite with direct links to the central government. The author contends that the shift in control over the police toward the Home Office and chief constables has occurred at the expense of weakened police powers. He traces the social origins of chief constables and discusses the ideological implications of internal recruitment. 32 references