So … why was television in the 1970s dominated by police and detective shows?
For the same reason tv shows aren’t centered accountants and insurance agents. drama. In a crime drama, anything can happen. The writers have unlimited opportunities to create the dramatic situations which drive the show and keep you coming back for more. There always seem to be a lot of crime dramas on television, do you have any numbers that show there were more in the 1970’s?
Because of the ‘Law and Order’ theme of the decade, a full-out backlash of the free-wheeling 60’s. Nixon and all that, you know.
Archie Bunker was another reactionary jerk of the times.
The 70s weren’t dominated by those shows any more than today. But to answer the general question, these shows are common because they are cheap to produce.
Police and private detective shows have always been popular in television. So are medical shows.
1970s TV is more noted for more titillating stuff like “Charlie’s Angels” (a detective show in a weird sense) and “Love Boat” and “Fantasy Island” (very lame ensemble shows).
The sitcoms were either stuff like “All in the Family” and “Maude” or treacle like “The Brady Bunch.”
The Quinn Martin shows from the 70s included “Cannon”, “Barnaby Jones”, “The Streets of San Francisco”, and a lot of stuff that didn’t last long like “Banyon” (Robert Forster), “Caribe” (Stacy Keach), and “Bert D’Angelo/Superstar” (Paul Sorvino).
If it weren’t for Quinn Martin, how would small kids have learned the meaning of the word “Epilog”?
Quinn Martin shows of the 1960s included the classic The Fugitive and the proto-X-Files The Invaders.
It’s not just that crime dramas are cheap to produce (so would a show about accountants), but crime drama is interesting and gives you an excuse to get into important dramatic moments of other people’s lives. You can do an anthology without it seeming like one. The combination of inherently dramatic situations with the ability to go to a lot of different stories makes crimes shows a natural. Doctor/Hospital shows let you do the same thing.
Another factor was probably the decreasing popularity of WWII action adventures such as Combat, 12 O’clock High and The Rat Patrol. They had to replace these shows with something, and the Vietnam war probably caused people to prefer a slightly softer, gentler form of violent entertainment.