Abolition Feminism and the Practice of Policing

Abstract In November of 2021, more than a year after the public execution of George Floyd by local police officers, Minneapolis voters rejected an amendment to its city charter (‘Question 2’) to abolish its police department. One of the most interesting points of contention between the ‘Yes’ (to police abolition) and the ‘No’ campaigns was whether, if the amendment passed, traditional police officers would still exist. White the ‘Yes’ campaign insisted that the abolition of the Minneapolis Police Department did not entail the elimination of all police officers, the ‘No’ campaign successfully stoked fears of a city completely unprotected from violent crime. One question that we can ask about Question 2 is whether, as a conceptual matter, the continual existence of police officers would be consistent with the demands of the movement to abolish the police. As the calls of abolitionists are often interpreted, the answer is an obvious ‘no’. After all, if police abolitionists don’t seek to transition to a world without police officers, then what exactly are they looking for? In this paper, I provide a framework, rooted in Black feminist thought, for answering this question. While this framework will not specify a unique set of policy prescriptions that all abolitionists will endorse, it makes clear the general contours of what must obtain in order for the abolitionist’s vision to be realized.