This chapter considers the development of, and growing interest in, cold case reviews, distinguishing between the instrumental and symbolic politics which surround their development. What becomes clear in this chapter is that the rise in interest can be attributed to a number of individual and interlocking events, including changes in police legitimacy, the introduction of a number of police reforms, and initiatives resulting in changes to police practices, pressure from victims’ rights groups for more attention from the criminal justice system, and advances in scientific techniques and technologies with increasing uses found for them. The chapter briefly considers the political background to cold case reviews, and how this connects with the broader politics of policing along with the instrumental politics of maintaining major crime review teams and the symbolic politics which helps to justify expenditure in cold case reviews.
