Civilian oversight model to improve the accountability and efficiency of the bazaar and neighborhood watchman

In the historical process, neighborhood watchmen have played an active role in ensuring the security of residential areas. The practice of guarding, which started from the first civilizations and carried to the present day, has fulfilled important functions, especially in terms of ensuring urban security. In the neighborhood, which was of great importance in the first years of the Republic, as it was in the Ottoman Empire, the neighborhood's getting to know each other, and the practices such as the guarantor applied during the settlement process show how important the functions of the guards are. Today, depending on the increasing population and the developments in technology, some security problems have begun to emerge in the neighborhoods. Even though neighborhood security is tried to be ensured with the bazaar and neighborhood guard system, a new debate has emerged to what extent the guards can continue their old functions. It is expected that the watchmen will be more effective with the new regulations, taking into account the discussions that have arisen, the deficiencies in the legislation and implementation. Although the control of law enforcement officers is usually provided by internal audits, today, a type of audit that is included in society is on the agenda. Although such inspections are carried out with different practices in Turkey, it cannot be said that law enforcement officers have such a pure inspection mechanism. Especially since the bazaar and neighborhood guard system does not have a separate organizational and control structure, it is among the issues that are frequently discussed that it acts under general law enforcement. Civilian oversight, as a control mechanism in which public participation is ensured and accountability and efficiency are kept at the forefront, has a quality that can eliminate such disruptions in the supervision of bazaar and neighborhood watchmen. In this context, in this study, the control problems of the bazaar and neighborhood watchmen will be discussed in detail, and suggestions will be given on the application of the civilian oversight model in order to increase the accountability and effectiveness of the bazaar and neighborhood watchmen system.