No More Police: A Case for Abolition

by Mariame Kaba

The third and final element of our case is that we can create safety beyond policing. As explored throughout No More Police, a growing number of people and communities are already reimagining safety, experimenting and building on existing skills, relationships, and infrastructure to create it through mutual aid, violence prevention and intervention, transformative justice projects and practices. Yet, by consuming a majority of our collective resources and colonizing our imaginations with the narrative that policing is the only path to safety, police stand in the way of these efforts to create greater safety. Ultimately, we don’t need to have all the answers before we move forward. We know enough to know that what exists now is not working, and to shape our visions of a society that doesn’t require policing and punishment, and instead is organized around cultures of care, mutual responsibility, and accountability. And we know enough to take the first steps forward, and to collectively generate the answers to the questions that arise along the way.