This article discusses tides and currents in modern policing from a perspective of changes in the exercise of social control and in the balance between formal and informal social control in particular. The primary focus will be on the case of Belgium which has, like other Western countries, a considerable tradition in developing (a discourse on) community policing and other community oriented security policies within and outside police agencies. This analysis will also elaborate in brief the impact of late modernity on policing and on the evolution of criminal policy in general.