Overview
I study how the way state power is legitimized shapes inequalities within communities. My book “The Policing Machine: Enforcement, Endorsements, & the Illusion of Public Input” (2024, University of Chicago Press) is about how police resist institutional reforms by cultivating political capital from the community constituents they empower.
My research has appeared in journals like the American Journal of Sociology, Criminology, Law & Society Review, and Social Problems. It has won awards from the American Sociological Association, American Society of Criminology, and Law & Society Association, and has been supported by the Russell Sage Foundation and an NSF CAREER Award. I have a Sociology PhD from Yale University and a J.D. from NYU Law School.
Personal website: http://www.tonykcheng.com
Current Duke Appointments & Affiliations
Recent Scholarly Works
Strategies of Police Legitimation
Journal article Sociology Compass · July 1, 2026 The concept of police legitimacy has become central to the study of policing, yet scholarly attention has concentrated on legitimacy as an attitude measured among publics, rather than on the activities that produce legitimacy. This article reframes the pro ... Full text CiteWhen trust building looks like surveillance: Public polarization toward Chicago policing.
Journal article Science advances · July 2026 Public debate about policing highlights competing views about whether community initiatives build trust or reinforce surveillance. We argue that perceptions depend on prior state orientations, which can polarize opinions across groups. Using a preregistere ... Full text CiteState Actors as Hard-to-Reach Populations
Journal article Qualitative Sociology · September 1, 2025 Vulnerable populations may be hard-to-reach, but so too are state actors. Classic strategies of accessing the hard-to-reach, devised in reference to the vulnerable, do not translate well to state actors because their inaccessibility lies in their instituti ... Full text Open Access CiteRecent Grants
CAREER: Elite Wealth in Big City Policing
ResearchPrincipal Investigator · Awarded by National Science Foundation · 2024 - 2029Pseudo-State Entities and the Infusion of Elite Wealth into American Policing
ResearchPrincipal Investigator · Awarded by Russell Sage Foundation · 2026 - 2027The Effect of Police Alternatives on Public Safety Outcomes in Durham, NC
ResearchCo-Principal Investigator · Awarded by Arnold Ventures · 2025 - 2027View All Grants