Becoming Abolitionists: Police, Protests, and the Pursuit of Freedom

Human rights lawyer Purnell debuts with an idealistic and impassioned call for dismantling the police in order to address the root causes of violence and inequality. She tracks her own evolving attitudes toward the police from her childhood in a St. Louis neighborhood in the 1990s and early 2000s “where we called 911 for almost everything”; to college activism galvanized by the 2011 execution of Troy Davis for murdering a police officer, despite the case against him being “obviously flawed”; and her work as a public defender in a Harvard University legal clinic, where she realized “most of the ‘criminals’ [in jail] were actually just poor people.” Purnell places abolition within a social justice framework that includes decolonization, environmental justice, and disability rights, and forcefully disputes the notion that more policing is necessary to stop “senseless violence,” arguing that drug decriminalization and programs to address health care, housing, and income disparities would “undermine the conditions that lead to violence and police contact.” Her vision of what abolition looks like features neighborhood councils, conflict mediation centers, and green teams to foster sustainability. Bold and utopian, yet grounded in Purnell’s experiences and copious evidence of how reform efforts have fallen short, this is an inspiring introduction to a hot-button topic. (Oct.)