Abstract
This chapter reviews substantive issues related to racially biased policing, and discusses how those issues complicate the definition and measurement of the phenomena. In particular, it points to the notion of the “symbolic assailant” and drug courier profiles associated with the “war on drugs” as early predecessors of the racial profiling problem. It also notes that rulings by the U.S. Supreme Court—particularly in Terry v. Ohio and Whren v. United States—provided the legislative foundations of police profiling. The chapter ends by suggesting the scrapping of the term “racial profiling” in favor of the term “differential stops,” as the latter allows researchers to begin from a neutral and objective position.