The problem is not overpolicing, it is policing itself Recent years have seen an explosion of protest and concern about police brutality and repression--especially after months of violent protest erupted in Ferguson, Missouri following the police killing of Mike Brown. Much of the conversation has focused on calls for enhancing police accountability, increasing police diversity, improving police training, and emphasizing community policing. Unfortunately, none of these is likely to produce results, because they fail to get at the core of the problem. The problem is policing itself--the dramatic expansion of the police role over the last 40 years. This book attempts to jog public discussion of policing by revealing the tainted origins of modern policing as a tool of social control and demonstrating how the expanded role of the police is inconsistent with community empowerment, social justice--even public safety. Drawing on first-hand research from across the globe, Alex Vitale shows how the implementation of alternatives to policing, like drug legalization, regulation, and harm reduction instead of the policing of drugs, has led to reductions in crime, spending, and injustice.
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"Offers a convincing argument that the traditional roles played by police forces have been largely counter-productive." - Morning Star "A welcome challenge to reformist thinking and a powerful argument against social and economic injustice, inequality and racism" - LSE Review of Books ""A compelling critique of modern policing." - Peter Stauber, Counterfire
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How the police endanger us and why we need to find an alternative
Now available in paperback

Produktdetaljer

ISBN
9781784782924
Publisert
2018-09-18
Utgiver
Vendor
Verso Books
Høyde
235 mm
Bredde
135 mm
Aldersnivå
G, 01
Språk
Product language
Engelsk
Format
Product format
Heftet
Antall sider
272

Forfatter

Biographical note

Alex S. Vitale is Associate Professor of Sociology at Brooklyn College. Before joining academia he was on the staff of the San Francisco Coalition on Homelessness. He is the author of City of Disorder: How the Quality of Life Campaign Transformed New York Politics. He consults with both police departments and human rights organizations internationally, is Senior Policy Advisor to the Police Reform Organizing Project in New York City, and is on the New York State Advisory Committee of the US Commission on Civil Rights. He has written recent pieces in the New York Daily News, The Nation, and The New Republic.