The End of Policing

1. Traditional police reforms fail because policing's core function is managing inequality.

A kinder, gentler, and more diverse war on the poor is still a war on the poor.

Reform limitations. Efforts like enhanced training, diversity hiring, community policing, and accountability measures are insufficient because they don't address the fundamental purpose of policing. Policing is historically and currently designed to manage social and economic inequality, not primarily to ensure public safety for all. Reforms focused on procedure rather than substance are doomed to reproduce existing injustices.

Broken windows critique. Theories like "broken windows" policing, which target low-level disorder, are deeply conservative attempts to blame the poor for urban decline and justify aggressive enforcement. This approach, driven by political leaders and embraced by police, disproportionately targets communities of color and the poor, leading to invasive interactions, tickets, and arrests for minor infractions. No amount of training can fix this fundamental flaw in public policy.

Systemic issues persist. Even with diverse police forces or improved communication, systemic problems like racial profiling and excessive force persist because departmental priorities are set by political leaders who favor aggressive crime control policies. These policies, such as the War on Drugs and broken windows, inherently target marginalized communities. Focusing on cosmetic changes like body cameras or diversity training distracts from the need to critically evaluate what police are asked to do and its impact.

2. Modern policing originated to control marginalized populations and suppress dissent.

The reality is that the police exist primarily as a system for managing and even producing inequality by suppressing social movements and tightly managing the behaviors of poor and nonwhite people: those on the losing end of economic and political arrangements.

Historical roots. Modern policing emerged in the 18th and 19th centuries tied to managing inequality through:

• Slavery (slave patrols in the South)
• Colonialism (British policing in Ireland, US policing in the Philippines)
• Control of the industrial working class (London Metropolitan Police, early US urban police).
  These forces were created to protect property, quell riots, break strikes, and enforce social order on behalf of elites.

US adaptation. In the US, this model adapted to massive immigration and rapid industrialization, leading to forces like the Boston and New York police departments. They managed social chaos, enforced morality laws targeting immigrants, and were used by political parties to suppress opposition and labor organizing. Early police were often corrupt, profiting from vice and working with criminals.

Racial control. Southern policing evolved directly from slave patrols, becoming a tool to force newly freed blacks into subservient economic roles through vagrancy laws and voter suppression. In the North, police enforced segregation and used excessive force to control growing black populations in urban ghettos. This history demonstrates that policing's core function has always been about managing the poor, foreign, and nonwhite.

3. Putting police in schools criminalizes youth and fuels the school-to-prison pipeline.

Over the last twenty years there has been an explosion in the number of police officers stationed in schools—one of the most dramatic and clearly counterproductive expansions of police scope and power.

Increased presence. Driven by the "superpredator" myth, the Columbine massacre, and neoliberal school reforms focused on high-stakes testing, the number of school-based police officers (SROs) has dramatically increased. Over 40% of schools now have SROs, many of whom handle discipline rather than just security. This turns schools into extensions of the carceral state.

Criminalizing behavior. Despite declining juvenile crime rates, SRO presence leads to a massive increase in student arrests, often for minor infractions like using phones or disrespecting teachers. Schools with SROs have significantly higher arrest rates. This disproportionately affects students of color and those with disabilities, pushing them out of school and into the criminal justice system.

• Black students are far more likely to be referred to law enforcement and arrested.
• Special-needs children are overrepresented in referrals to police.
• LGBTQ students are also at higher risk.

Militarization and harm. Schools are increasingly militarized with SROs acquiring military-grade equipment, creating a climate of fear and control instead of a supportive learning environment. This mindset leads to excessive force, including pepper spray, tasers, and beatings, even for minor misbehavior. There is no evidence that SROs make schools safer or reduce crime; they primarily increase arrests and undermine the educational mission.

4. Police are ill-equipped to handle mental health crises, often leading to tragic outcomes.

What we are witnessing is, in essence, the criminalization of mental illness, with police on the front lines of this process.

Inadequate system. The US has severely inadequate mental health care services, leaving police as the default first responders for people experiencing crises. While officers receive some training, they are not clinicians and their standard procedures (command, control, threat neutralization) often escalate situations with individuals who may be unable to understand or comply with orders.

Deadly encounters. US police kill hundreds of people with mental illness (PMI) every year; PMI are sixteen times more likely to be killed by police. Encounters involving perceived weapons often result in deadly force, even when less lethal options or de-escalation training are present. This contrasts sharply with countries like the UK where unarmed police or specialized teams use different tactics.

Jails as institutions. The number of incarcerated PMI has grown dramatically, with jails and prisons becoming the largest psychiatric facilities. This is expensive, inefficient, and does little to improve mental health outcomes. People cycle through arrest, jail, and release without adequate treatment, perpetuating the problem. Relying on police and jails to manage mental health issues is a failure of public health policy.

5. Criminalizing homelessness is an ineffective and harmful way to manage public disorder.

Ultimately, the criminalization of homeless people should be understood as a way of managing growing inequality through increasingly punitive mechanisms of state control.

Increased criminalization. Cities across the US are enacting new laws that criminalize behaviors associated with homelessness, such as camping, sleeping, begging, and loitering in public spaces. These laws are often driven by "quality of life" complaints from residents and businesses and are enforced through tickets and arrests that do nothing to solve homelessness.

Ineffective and costly. This approach is ineffective; it merely displaces people and disrupts their access to services, making it harder to escape homelessness. It is also incredibly expensive, costing far more to cycle people through jails and emergency rooms than to provide housing and support services. Studies consistently show that "Housing First" models are significantly cheaper and more effective.

Human rights violations. Criminalizing homelessness violates human rights, including the right to housing and freedom of movement. It also raises concerns about cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment, especially when people have no alternative but to sleep in public. This punitive approach is an unethical way to manage the consequences of economic inequality and the failure of government to provide affordable housing and social services.

6. Policing sex work drives it underground, increasing danger, exploitation, and corruption.

Criminalizing sex work is notoriously ineffective and hurts sex workers and society at large.

Ineffective prohibition. Despite decades of intensive policing, commercial sexual services remain widely available. Prohibitionist approaches, whether targeting workers or clients, fail to deter the trade and merely drive it into more hidden and dangerous environments. This makes sex workers vulnerable to violence, exploitation, and abuse with little recourse to the law.

Increased harm. Criminalization empowers pimps, organized criminals, and traffickers because they control access to the illegal market and provide protection. It also contributes to unsafe sex practices, as sex workers may avoid carrying condoms (seen as evidence by police) or be pressured by clients/pimps to engage in unprotected sex. Access to health care is also hindered by fear of stigma and criminalization.

Police corruption. Vice crimes like prostitution are ripe for police corruption due to their profitability and the discretionary nature of enforcement. Police are regularly implicated in demanding bribes, sexual favors, or providing protection for illegal operations. This undermines public trust and further marginalizes sex workers, who are often victimized by the very officers meant to enforce the law.

7. The War on Drugs is a disastrous failure that fuels mass incarceration and racial injustice.

The use of police to wage a war on drugs has been a total nightmare.

Failure to reduce use. Despite billions spent and millions incarcerated, the War on Drugs has failed to reduce drug use or availability. Drugs are cheaper, purer, and more accessible than ever. Prohibition creates dangerous black markets, unregulated products leading to overdoses, and hinders access to effective treatment and harm reduction.

Racial injustice. The drug war is deeply rooted in racial prejudice, historically targeting Chinese opium users, black cocaine users, and Mexican marijuana users. Today, enforcement disproportionately targets communities of color, despite similar drug use rates across racial lines. This fuels mass incarceration, particularly of black and brown individuals for low-level possession offenses.

Erosion of rights and corruption. The drug war has led to the militarization of police (SWAT teams), abuse of asset forfeiture laws, and the erosion of Fourth Amendment protections against unreasonable searches and seizures (e.g., no-knock warrants, racial profiling). The vast profits of the black market also create strong incentives for police corruption, leading to widespread instances of theft, bribery, and even drug dealing by officers.

8. Gang suppression tactics are counterproductive and intensify the cycle of violence and criminalization.

The dynamic between street gangs and the police looks a lot like a war between competing gangs, with each side using constantly increasing terror to try to show who is toughest.

Ineffective suppression. Police gang units, which proliferated in the 1980s, focus on intelligence gathering and aggressive street suppression tactics like constant harassment, searches, and arrests. This approach is based on misunderstandings about gang structure and membership, which is often fluid and short-lived. Intensive enforcement fails to eradicate gangs and simply removes individuals who are quickly replaced.

Fueling the cycle. Arrest and incarceration do not deter youth who often have short time horizons and prioritize street respect. Instead, it burdens them with criminal records, exposes them to more violent prison gangs, and hardens criminal identities. This "youth control complex" undermines their life chances and contributes to long-term failure.

Problematic tools. New tools like gang databases, sentencing enhancements, and injunctions disproportionately target youth of color based on loose definitions of gang affiliation. These tools expand police power, erode privacy, and criminalize association, often without evidence of specific criminal behavior. Social-media monitoring further exacerbates guilt by association.

9. Border policing is a costly, ineffective system rooted in racial exclusion and economic control.

US border enforcement has been primarily about the production of whiteness and economic inequality.

Historical exclusion. US border enforcement began in the late 19th century to exclude Chinese laborers and later expanded with nationality-based quotas, enforced by the newly created Border Patrol. This policing was often explicitly racist and violent, aimed at controlling the flow of labor to ensure a cheap, exploitable workforce while maintaining racial hierarchies.

Massive expansion. Border policing has expanded dramatically, especially since the 1990s and 9/11. The Border Patrol has grown exponentially, supported by other federal and local agencies. Billions are spent annually on enforcement, including fencing, technology, and the criminalization of migrants through policies like "Operation Streamline."

Ineffective and harmful. Despite massive investment and the prosecution of hundreds of thousands, border enforcement has failed to deter migration, which is driven by poverty and family reunification. It has made the border more dangerous, pushing migrants into remote areas where thousands have died. It also fuels human smuggling and organized crime, separates families, and relies on racial profiling and abuses of authority by agents.

10. Political policing has a long history of suppressing dissent and targeting activists.

The continued existence of these practices poses a major threat to any effort to change the basic role of the police and, more broadly, to achieve the goals of racial and economic justice.

Historical surveillance. US police, including the FBI and local "Red Squads," have a long history of monitoring and disrupting political movements perceived as threats to the status quo, particularly labor, civil rights, and anti-war groups. This involved surveillance, infiltration, harassment, and the use of agents provocateurs, often in collusion with private business interests and right-wing politics.

Post-9/11 resurgence. Under the guise of counterterrorism, political policing has been rehabilitated and expanded. Joint Terrorism Task Forces (JTTFs) and Fusion Centers, operating with little oversight, have monitored lawful political activity, conflated activism with terrorism, and shared intelligence with private entities. This erodes civil liberties and undermines public trust, hindering community cooperation needed to address real threats.

Crowd control. Protest policing has shifted from negotiated management to more restrictive "command and control" or "Miami model" approaches. These involve micromanaging demonstrations, creating no-protest zones, using preemptive arrests, and deploying militarized force ("less lethal" weapons, armored vehicles). This restricts the right to protest and can escalate tensions, as seen in Ferguson.

11. True safety requires divesting from policing and investing in communities and social services.

We should demand safety and security—but not at the hands of the police.

Police cannot solve social problems. Police are tasked with managing the consequences of deep social and economic inequalities, but they cannot solve the root problems of poverty, lack of opportunity, mental illness, addiction, or homelessness. Relying on police and prisons is expensive, ineffective, and perpetuates injustice.

Invest in communities. Real safety and justice require shifting resources away from policing, courts, and jails towards community-based solutions. This means investing in:

• Affordable housing and addressing homelessness
• Robust mental health and addiction treatment on demand
• Quality education, youth programs, and job opportunities
• Community-based violence prevention and restorative justice initiatives.

Address root causes. Ultimately, reducing crime and enhancing wellbeing requires confronting systemic issues like racial segregation, income inequality, and lack of economic opportunity. This involves raising wages, strengthening worker rights, and ensuring equitable access to resources. Empowering communities and building political will for transformative change is necessary to create a society where people's needs are met without relying on punitive control.

Last updated: May 13, 2025