Verification of Difference in Empowerment of POLICE Officers in Security Department in Republic of Korea by Their Academic Background and Employment Route

Purpose: Police officers in security department play important role in securing the safety of nation and the people from very broad security threat and have no choice but to have stricter vertical organi-zational structure compared to other police organizations. However, in order to change to more positive and active organization, police officers in security department must change to horizontal one where the members can make active communications and interactions. Thus, in this study, we make an empirical verification which differences will be caused by the educational background and employment route in members’ empowerment of police officers in security department which secure national preservation from various threat to the safety and seek for protecting the life and personal safety of the people. Method: Frequency Analysis, t-test, One Way ANOVA. In this study, a survey has been conducted in Self-Administration Method for 100 police officers in the security departments experienced in the duties for the residents escaping from North Korea out of the police officers in the security department with the population of the police officers of the Republic of Korea in 2020 in order to verify how difference will be caused in follower ship of leaders based on the number and work region of staffs in the depart-ment of security police officers. Results: As a result of analysis, in terms of difference in empowerment from educational background, it is discovered from all the questionnaires that the police officers in security department having higher educational background including graduates of universities and graduate schools have higher empow-erment than the ones having comparatively lower educational background including graduates from college and high school. Moreover, in terms of difference in empowerment from employment route, it is discovered from most of the questionnaires that the public officers of police officers in security department graduated from the Korea National Police University or military cadet have higher empowerment level than the police officers employed from open recruitment or other special recruitment. Conclusion: In order to form positive empowerment of public officers of police officers in security de-partment: first, in the National Police Agency and each local police agencies in cities and Do provinces, educational opportunity must be extended for formation of positive empowerment, improvement of work performance and other self development of police officers in lower position including police offic-ers in security department; second, it is necessary for extending the window and route of decision mak-ing in internal organization of police so that various opinions and suggestions of lower level police of-ficers in security department, who have lower educational background, been employed at comparative-ly lower ranking positions and have not promoted to a management position, are openly collected and actively reflected in the policies of police; third, fair and strict physical and emotional compensation system for empowerment of police officers including police officers in security department must be ex-tended; and, forth, it is necessary to ensure that the chief of the National Police Agency and other offic-ers from high ranking management from local police agencies develop transformative leadership.