No More Police: A Case for Abolition
A persuasive primer on police abolition from two veteran organizers.
In this powerful call to action, New York Times bestselling author Mariame Kaba and attorney and organizer Andrea J. Ritchie detail why policing doesn’t stop violence, instead perpetuating widespread harm; outline the many failures of contemporary police reforms; and explore demands to defund police, divest from policing, and invest in community resources to create greater safety through a Black feminist lens.
Centering survivors of state, interpersonal, and community-based violence, and highlighting uprisings, campaigns, and community-based projects, No More Police makes a compelling case for a world where the tools required to prevent, interrupt, and transform violence in all its forms are abundant. Part handbook, part road map, No More Police calls on us to turn away from systems that perpetrate violence in the name of ending it toward a world where violence is the exception, and safe, well-resourced and thriving communities are the rule.
Read excerpts from the book:
Reclaiming Safety (Inquest)
How Abolition Feminism Fuels the Movement For Black Liberation (Literary Hub)
Why We Don’t Say “Reform the Police” (The Nation)
Reimagining the Commons Is One Step Toward a Future Without Police (Truthout)
Abolition Unfolds One Community At A Time (Next City)
Podcasts + Interviews
Deep Dive: Police Abolition (The Takeaway)
‘No More Police’ Is A Roadmap To A World Without Law Enforcement (Reset with Sasha-Ann Simons)
No More Police: A Case for Abolition (Rising Up With Sonali)
“We Can Do Something Different": Andrea Ritchie and Mariame Kaba on Their New Book "No More Police" (Harper’s Bazaar)
An Abolitionist Makes a Case for “No More Police” (Yes Magazine)
Andrea J. Ritchie Discusses ‘No More Police: A Case for Abolition’ (Windy City Times)
Copaganda Arrests Our Imaginations (Movement Memos, Truthout)
Abolition Is About Escaping the Death Trap of “Normalcy” (Movement Memos, Truthout)
In ‘No More Police,’ Mariame Kaba and Andrea Ritchie Argue for Abolition (Teen Vogue)
The Case for Abolition w/ Andrea J Ritchie (Law and Disorder, KPFA)
No More Police: A Case for Abolition (Inside Out Radio Show with Aishah Shahidah Simmons, WPFW)
Howard Prof. Justin Hansford & Abolitionist Andrea Ritchie on Tyre Nichols & Calls for No More Police. Democracy Now
Reviews + Lists
“A brilliantly articulated plan to abolish the police.” (Kirkus Starred Review)
“A passionate, eloquent condemnation of the carceral policies and mindsets that have long governed America.” (Booklist Starred Review)
“An impassioned and bold call to abolish police forces.” (Library Journal Starred Review)
Colin Kaepernick’s favorite recent reads (Amazon Book Review)
57 Books We Can’t Wait to Read This Fall (Vulture)
“The most compelling and practical arguments for abolition out there.” (August 2022 Reads for the Rest of Us, Ms. Magazine)
Three Steps Toward Police Abolition (The New Press)
“Equally perfect for the skeptics, the curious, and the committed abolitionists in your life.” (The Year in Books, Inquest)
Other 2022 Best of Book Lists or Gift Guides: The Stacks, Social Justice Books, NextCity, A Room of One’s Own, CounterPunch
“Colin Kaepernick: What I’m reading now” (Entertainment Weekly)
Kaba and Ritchie: No More Police: Pushing the Conversation, A Step Further (Study and Struggle)
Events
August 30: Publication Date (Purchase)
August 31: NYC Book Launch @ Bluestockings Cooperative (Tickets) — IG Video
September 1: Virtual Book Launch (Tickets)
September 16: Chicago Book Launch (Tickets)
September 20: Seattle Book Launch (Register)
October 6: Don’t Be A Copagandist: Covering Violence & “Crime” with an Abolitionist Lens — Video Recording
October 26: Virtual Book Event with Haymarket Books: The Role of the State in Abolitionist Futures: No More Police x Rehearsals for Living (Register) — Video Recording
November 7: Author Talk @ Source Booksellers in Detroit, MI (Tickets)
November 11: Author Talk @ Lake of the Isles Lutheran Church in Minneapolis, MN (Flyer)
November 14: Book Talk with the American Constitution Society (Register) — Video Recording
November 26: Author Talk @ Red Emma’s in Baltimore, MD (Tickets) — Video Recording
November 28: Author Talk @ Eaton DC in Washington, D.C. (Tickets) — IG Video
November 30: We Are Survivors: No More Police x Abolition Feminisms (Register) — Video Recording
February 13: No Soft Police — Video Recording
Spring 2023: Unitarian Universalist Office at the United Nations 2023 Spring Semester Keynote Presentation ft. Andrea J. Ritchie — Video Recording
Advance Praise
“Exploring movements to defund and abolish police through the lens of long legacies of Black feminist abolitionist organizing, No More Police offers an unflinching look at the traps that lie along the path to abolitionist futures, and critical guidance for readers who want to be part of bringing them into being. Add this timely and engaging book to the top of your must-read list.”
—Angela Y. Davis, Distinguished Professor Emerita, University of California, Santa Cruz
“More than a synthesis and summation of the conditions of our movements’ work over the last two years, and more than just an abolitionist movement timeline going back decades, Kaba and Ritchie weave together our collective stories, contradictions, tensions, and all, and gift us with a road map to a future free of cops and cages. This is a must-read in the abolitionist lexicon.”
—Ash-Lee Woodard Henderson, Movement for Black Lives and co-director of the Highlander Center
“Kaba and Ritchie provide a much-needed primer on the demand to defund the police and how that demand can be leveraged toward an even more fundamental transformation of the violence of policing. The authors root their analysis in the reality of today’s movements and offer practical, concrete recommendations that activists and organizers can put to work right now.”
—Rachel Herzing, co-author of How to Abolish Prisons
“With No More Police, Mariame Kaba and Andrea Ritchie have written the definitive text on police abolition. The magic of this book is its ability to address the practical concerns of the present while strengthening our ability to craft ambitious and transformative freedom dreams for the future. Carefully researched, passionately written, and persuasively argued, No More Police is a must-read text for policymakers, activists, educators, and anyone else committed to imagining and building beyond the carceral world.”
—Marc Lamont Hill, author of We Still Here: Pandemic, Policing, Protest, and Possibility
“An absolutely brilliant contribution. Black feminist abolitionists Kaba and Ritchie’s passionate mandate is that we never give up on the vision of a world where justice and safety live alongside each other.”
—Beth Richie, author of Arrested Justice
“This book pushes those of us who have been fighting police and sexual violence for decades to think past prosecutions and prisons toward a future where we stop violence before it starts and transform harm when it happens.”
—dream hampton, filmmaker and writer
“In the powerful and generative tradition of Black feminist freedom-making, No More Police not only presents a compelling case for the abolition of police, but points us in the direction of building a safer and more just future. Ritchie and Kaba have worked for decades in transformative justice and abolitionist movements. The richness of that experience, the love that fuels it, and the brilliant insights that flow from it, shine brightly in this book.”
—Barbara Ransby, activist, author, and historian
“Kaba and Ritchie are such trusted souls in Black Liberation movements, and No More Police passionately synthesizes the experiences and expertise necessary for building a new world with less violence on all fronts.”
—Raquel Willis, author and activist
“No More Police makes a sharp and compelling Black feminist case for a world without police, and without policing. Kaba and Ritchie are movement veterans, and their writing is as meticulously researched as it is grounded in practical knowledge gleaned over decades of abolitionist movement work. At once theoretically nuanced, analytically insightful and highly accessible, No More Police is an essential, must-read book for this moment.”
—Robyn Maynard, author of Policing Black Lives and co-author of Rehearsals for Living
About the Authors
Mariame Kaba is a leading prison and police abolitionist. She is the founder and director of Project NIA and the co-founder of Interrupting Criminalization. She is the author of the New York Times bestselling We Do This ’Til We Free Us, Missing Daddy, See You Soon (Haymarket Books); and co-author (with Andrea J. Ritchie) of No More Police (The New Press) and lives in New York City.
Andrea J. Ritchie is a nationally recognized expert on policing and criminalization, and supports organizers across the country working to build safer communities. She is co-founder of Interrupting Criminalization, the author of Invisible No More: Police Violence Against Black Women and Women of Color, the co-author (with Joey Mogul & Kay Whitlock) of QUEER (IN)JUSTICE: The Criminalization of LGBT People in the United States (Beacon), and the co-author (with Mariame Kaba) of No More Police (The New Press). She lives in Detroit.
