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<p dir="ltr"><b><small><small><a
href="http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/32813-big-dreams-and-bold-steps-toward-a-police-free-future"
target="_blank"><a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/32813-big-dreams-and-bold-steps-toward-a-police-free-future">http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/32813-big-dreams-and-bold-steps-toward-a-police-free-future</a></a></small></small></b></p>
<h2 class="itemTitle">Big Dreams and Bold Steps Toward a Police-Free
Future </h2>
<p dir="ltr">Wednesday, 16 September 2015 00:00By <a
href="http://www.truth-out.org/author/itemlist/user/51424"
target="_blank">Rachel </a><a
href="http://www.truth-out.org/author/itemlist/user/51424"
target="_blank">Herzing</a>, Truthout | Op-Ed</p>
<p dir="ltr">Police scanners, Tasers, increased data collecting and
sharing, SWAT teams, gang injunctions, stop-and-frisk, "quality of
life" ticketing - all of these policing reforms have been taken up
to improve the quality of policing in the United States. The
dominant school of thought on police reform has suggested that
reforms like these make for safer communities and that improving
policing will allow us to escape its violence.</p>
<p dir="ltr"><b>The goal should not be to improve how policing
functions but to reduce its role in our lives.</b></p>
<p dir="ltr">This orientation toward police reform imagines that
documentation, training or oversight might protect us from the
harassment, intimidation, beatings, occupation and death that the
state employs to maintain social control under the guise of
safety. What is missing from this orientation, however, is the
recognition of the function of policing in US society: armed
protection of state interests. If one sees policing for what it is
- a set of practices empowered by the state to enforce law and
maintain social control and cultural hegemony through the use of
force - one may more easily recognize that perhaps the goal should
not be to improve how policing functions but to reduce its role in
our lives.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Today, calls for policing reform in the United States
are louder and more frequent than they have been for many years.
The protest movements fueled by bold, dynamic resistance in
Ferguson, Baltimore and other cities across the country have
raised awareness about police killings, especially of Black
people, and brought new voices and ideas to the fore. Those same
movements are also making recommendations about policing reforms.
Some recommendations have been broad and ideological such as<a
href="http://fergusonaction.com/demands/" target="_blank">Ferguson</a><a
href="http://fergusonaction.com/demands/" target="_blank">
Action's demand</a> for an "end to all forms of discrimination
and the full recognition of our human rights." Others have
involved collecting data and holding hearings, such as <a
href="http://fergusonaction.com/demands/" target="_blank">Ferguson
Action's demand</a> to call "a Congressional Hearing
investigating the criminalization of communities of color, racial
profiling, police abuses and torture by law enforcement." Others,
such as the<a
href="http://obs-stl.org/index.php/news/item/quality-policing-initiative-2"
target="_blank">Organization</a><a
href="http://obs-stl.org/index.php/news/item/quality-policing-initiative-2"
target="_blank"> for Black Struggle's recommendation</a> that
police should receive "enhanced personal unarmed combat training"
or <a
href="http://www.joincampaignzero.org/solutions/#solutionsoverview"
target="_blank">Campaign Zero's recommendation</a> that body and
dash cameras be required and funded, are more focused on the
day-to-day aspects of policing practice. And these examples are
merely representative of the range of recommendations currently
being circulated.</p>
<p dir="ltr">This wave of reform recommendations comes within the
context of an increased public focus on police killings, during a
presidential election cycle, and in the age of social media
dominance. Context matters in determining what will be understood
as viable or politically advantageous, what is perceived as
legitimate and who is accepted as having expertise. And, of
course, the media are serving as an amplifier, turning up the
volume on certain voices, recommendations and critiques, while
rendering others silent.</p>
<p dir="ltr">A reform is merely a change. When people experience
harms being done by the systems that govern their interactions,
movements and behaviors, some of them will undoubtedly be moved to
improve those systems in hopes of reducing that harm. Eager for
relief, they craft plans designed to bring that relief quickly and
in a way that generates as little resistance as possible.
Similarly, they may recommend reforms in reaction to a set of
incidents or a pattern of harm of which they are newly aware,
suggesting tools or vehicles they imagine are most expedient to
address that specific set of incidents or patterns. In the case of
law enforcement, if the primary goal is to eliminate deaths at the
hands of cops, the focus of reforms may be on the fastest way to
curb those deaths by targeting the practices that most frequently
lead to fatal incidents.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Making incremental changes to the systems, institutions
and practices that maintain systemic oppression and differentially
target marginalized communities is essential to shifting power.
Taking aim at specific aspects and demanding change helps build
power among repressed communities in ways that are more lasting
and sustainable. Without a strategic long-term vision for change,
however, today's reforms may be tomorrow's tools of repression.</p>
<p dir="ltr"><b>Without a strategic long-term vision for change,
today's reforms may be tomorrow's tools of repression.</b></p>
<p dir="ltr">In the 1990s, under the influence of Police
Commissioner William Bratton, the New York City Police Department
(NYPD) embraced CompStat, a data tracking and analysis system used
to monitor incidences of "crime and disorder" precinct by
precinct. This system is meant to track, in detail, crime
complaints, arrests and summonses, with corresponding locations
and times. The information from all the precincts in a
jurisdiction is combined and used to generate a weekly report used
in management meetings among departments' leadership.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Decreasing crime and increasing officer accountability
were just two of the benefits CompStat was purported to have, and
it represented a reform to the previous methods for documenting
daily policing practices. CompStat has spread widely among law
enforcement agencies across the county and the world and has
become one of the standard tools of modern police forces. And
while advocates like William Bratton maintain that CompStat is
crucial in decreasing crime rates, time has shown that these
decreases tend to initially be dramatic and then increase again.
Time has also led to more and more cops coming forward to describe
the coercion they felt to overreport or underreport certain types
of incidents to <a
href="http://www.villagevoice.com/news/eterno-and-silverman-criminologists-say-nypds-crime-stat-manipulation-a-factor-in-recent-corruption-scandals-6716168"
target="_blank">generate particular kinds of </a><a
href="http://www.villagevoice.com/news/eterno-and-silverman-criminologists-say-nypds-crime-stat-manipulation-a-factor-in-recent-corruption-scandals-6716168"
target="_blank">CompStat</a><a
href="http://www.villagevoice.com/news/eterno-and-silverman-criminologists-say-nypds-crime-stat-manipulation-a-factor-in-recent-corruption-scandals-6716168"
target="_blank"> results</a>. The accountability that CompStat
was supposed to encourage among individual cops was supplanted by
pressure to deliver the kinds of crime statistics desired by the
city's political leadership, including police chiefs and
commissioners. When crime rates continued to fall <a
href="http://home.uchicago.edu/%7Eludwigj/papers/Broken_windows_2006.pdf"
target="_blank">in fairly predictable patterns</a>, police had
to demonstrate their effectiveness and legitimate their role by
continuing to prove that they were making contact with people that
would do harm to residents if not for their intervention.</p>
<p dir="ltr">In New York City, stop-and-frisk was one way that cops
were able to demonstrate the power of these interventions. Before
CompStat, cops had usually stopped and questioned people of whom
they were suspicious and generally only searched them under
reasonable suspicion of danger (usually involving suspicion of
carrying a weapon). The broken windows orientation underlying
Bratton's mode of policing, which also extended to CompStat,
suggested that the very presence of suspicious persons was a
danger to the community. Through CompStat, the police could
demonstrate that they were neutralizing that danger.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Soon, "stop and question" transitioned to "stop and
question and frisk," and eventually to stop-and-frisk. By 2011,
the NYPD was doing over <a href="http://changethenypd.org/issue"
target="_blank">684,000 street stops per year</a>, nearly 90
percent of which resulted in no arrest or summons. These stops
disproportionately targeted people of color (especially Black
people), young people, homeless people, and queer and trans
people. The depth and breadth of the physical and psychological
harm done by the practice of stop-and-frisk ignited a citywide
campaign to eliminate the practice and resulted in a lawsuit
against the city based on the practice's racial bias. While
CompStat is still prized by departments across the country, the
longer it is used, the more clearly the problems inherent in its
use become evident.</p>
<p dir="ltr">The specialization of policing is another reform meant
to reflect responsiveness to the changing needs of police forces
and the residents they police. As modern policing has evolved,
many forces created units to focus on specific areas of crime such
as homicide, gangs or vice. One of the most notorious of these
units is special weapons and tactics (SWAT) teams.</p>
<p dir="ltr"><b>Why not take steps toward a future free of the
violence of policing?</b></p>
<p dir="ltr">First used in the mid-1960s as small, elite units
designed to respond to situations requiring paramilitary force and
precision, SWAT and other paramilitary policing units have ceased
to be the exception in policing and have become the rule. Roughly
90 percent of all police departments in cities with populations
over 50,000 have <a
href="http://www.economist.com/news/united-states/21599349-americas-police-have-become-too-militarised-cops-or-soldiers"
target="_blank">some type of SWAT team</a> as do federal
departments including the Department of Agriculture and the
Department of Education. Additionally, SWAT teams routinely run
training for new cops. They are used in a wide range of policing
activities from traffic stops to seeking informants, to more
high-impact policing. And although SWAT is a reform initiated from
within law enforcement, its overwhelming expansion and mission
creep are consistent with other forms of police specialization.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Keeping the function of policing in focus - armed
protection of state interests - increases clarity about what
policing is meant to protect and whom it serves. Further, that
clarity helps us reflect on what asking for police accountability
really means. Police forces tend to be very accountable to the
interests they were designed to serve, and those interests
frequently clash with the interests of the communities targeted
most aggressively by policing. Recognizing policing as a set of
practices used by the state to enforce law and maintain social
control and cultural hegemony through the use of force reveals the
need for incremental changes that lead toward the erosion of
policing power rather than reinforcing it. This recognition may
also move us toward ways to reduce the impacts of the violence of
policing without ignoring the serious issues that lead to violence
within our communities.</p>
<p dir="ltr">For anyone with experience dealing with the grinding
harassment, psychological or physical harm, or death meted out by
policing, it's clear that the best way to reduce the violence of
policing is to reduce contact with cops. Plans for change must
include taking incremental steps with an eye toward making the
cops obsolete, even if not in our own lifetimes. Taking
incremental steps toward the abolition of policing is even more
about what must be built than what must be eliminated. Further, it
requires steps that build on each other and continue to clear the
path for larger future steps while being mindful not to build
something today that will need to be torn down later on the path
toward the long-term goal.</p>
<p dir="ltr">The context created by the powerful protest movements
referenced above has created an opportunity to make bigger, bolder
changes than we have seen in a very long time. Now should be the
time to draw from the organizations that have been hard at work
making that change on the ground and to test out creative new
approaches rather than attempting to develop brand new platforms
or repackaging reforms already in the Department of Justice
pipeline, or reintroducing old reforms such as civilian review
boards that have a demonstrated track record of being more theater
than substance.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Here are just a few examples of ideas that have
received less attention than body cameras or special prosecutors,
but are promising incremental steps toward eroding the place and
power of policing in US communities: Youth Justice Coalition's <a
href="http://www.laforyouth.org/" target="_blank">1% Campaign</a> advocates
for just 1 percent (roughly $100 million) to be diverted from the
Los Angeles Police Department budget and directed toward programs
and services for young people that are alternatives to youth
suppression. Similarly, Los Angeles Community Action Network's (LA
CAN)<a href="http://cangress.org/our-work/share-the-wealth/"
target="_blank">Share the Wealth Campaign</a> advocates for more
equitable distribution of investments in Los Angeles' Downtown
neighborhood such that they benefit all residents without
displacement or fear from police violence. Given adequate
resources and an opportunity to develop, imagine what incremental
shifts of funding priorities of this sort could create.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Projects such as the <a
href="http://www.spirithouse-nc.org/collective-sun-ii"
target="_blank">Harm Free </a><a
href="http://www.spirithouse-nc.org/collective-sun-ii"
target="_blank">Zone</a>project in Durham, North Carolina, and
Audre Lorde Project's Safe OUTside the System <a
href="http://alp.org/community/sos" target="_blank">Safe
Neighborhood Campaign</a> are testing grounds for community
responses to harm that do not rely on law enforcement
interventions. The Harm Free Zone is building community knowledge
and power to enable community members rather than the police to be
called upon as first responders. The project educates and trains
interested Durham residents to intervene in situations of harm
without police intervention. Based in Brooklyn, New York, the Safe
Neighborhood Campaign focuses on reducing harm to lesbian, gay,
bisexual, two spirit, trans and gender-nonconforming people of
color by working with local businesses and community spaces to
provide safe haven for people in need without contacting the
police. The campaign also trains campaign partners on combating
homophobia and transphobia and developing strategies for
addressing violence without calling the police.</p>
<p dir="ltr">These projects have been replicated in cities across
the country and could serve as models in scaling up these kinds of
community-based interventions. Meanwhile the <a
href="http://www.stopviolenceeveryday.org/" target="_blank">StoryTelling</a><a
href="http://www.stopviolenceeveryday.org/" target="_blank">
& Organizing Project</a> reminds us that people are already
using creative means to address interpersonal harms everyday
without police intervention. These projects take seriously harms
that generate fear, violence and even death, but also understand
that police intervention is not the right remedy.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Broader reaching ideas such as<a
href="http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/32782-community-groups-work-to-provide-emergency-medical-alternatives-separate-from-police"
target="_blank">eliminating</a><a
href="http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/32782-community-groups-work-to-provide-emergency-medical-alternatives-separate-from-police"
target="_blank"> the use of police forces in addressing mental
health crises</a> instead of creating special teams of mental
health cops, <a
href="http://www.joincampaignzero.org/brokenwindows"
target="_blank">ending the use of broken windows policing</a> or
banning cops that use excessive force from any employment in any
type of law enforcement (public or private) are just some of the
bolder recommendations currently being circulated.</p>
<p dir="ltr">This is the era for bold ideas and big dreams. While
the whole world is watching and monitoring how the United States
will address its policing crisis, why not take steps forward
toward a future free of the violence of policing rather than one
that has improved the functioning of a killing machine? The surest
path toward a future free of the violence of policing is one that
aims to eliminate contact between those violent forces and the
people it targets. Why not start taking steps down that path
today?<br>
</p>
<p dir="ltr"><b><small><small><a
href="http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/32813-big-dreams-and-bold-steps-toward-a-police-free-future"
target="_blank"><a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/32813-big-dreams-and-bold-steps-toward-a-police-free-future">http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/32813-big-dreams-and-bold-steps-toward-a-police-free-future</a></a></small></small></b></p>
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