This article examines the development of community-based policing in the United States and the Netherlands. These two countries were selected because the United States has been the forerunner of research into the police and one of the first countries to attempt to introduce on a wide-scale, and conduct research into community policing. In the Netherlands, the Major Cities Policy, a governmental approach to addressing the cities' problems provided an interesting basis for comparison. Policy or operational changes in the police organization are generally influenced by the political climate and or scientific research. Both of these factors played a major role in the US. This section begins with a brief historical view of the factors which brought about changes within American policing, ultimately resulting in a new concept of community policing. This is followed by developments which led to community policing or the concept of the 'neighbourhood teams' (wijkbureaus) in the Netherlands.