Here's an important @washingtonpost piece on a key structural challenge to police reform in America: the decentralized nature of policing itself. Read on. https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2021/05/08/most-police-departments-america-are-small-thats-partly-why-changing-policing-is-difficult-experts-say/

There are 12k+ local police departments nationwide. Nearly half have fewer than 10 officers. 3 in 4 have 2 dozen or less. 9 in 10 employ fewer than 50. This level of decentralization is a huge obstacle to systemic reform.

Many small departments simply don't have the resources to adequately reform themselves. Not surprisingly, many (though certainly not all) of the worst police abuses we hear about today happen in these smaller jurisdictions.

"In places like the UK, you have a Home Office, you have standards. In Germany or Israel … they have a national police. Our policing is completely fragmented, decentralized, with no national standards," says @CWexlerPERF.

Consolidation is a possible solution, notes the article. But the resistance from voters and politicians, both of whom like local control, could be huge. Another option would be for small jurisdictions to share services and resources.

Driving change through one bureaucracy is hard. Driving change through 12k bureaucracies at the same time is much, much harder. We will need strong, thoughtful leadership at the federal level to get this done.

Finally, kudos to @markberman for a quite sophisticated and thoughtful piece of reporting. You rarely see reporters appreciate the complexities of institutional and systemic change in this way.