Excellent, comprehensive, and accessible. This book covers a lot of information, it's dense, yet accessibly written and rather short for how much it covers. The first few chapters give a background and address many of the critiques abolitionists hear. The last few chapters cover how people are currently doing the work and envisioning a better future. Highly recommend for anyone wanting to learn about working towards a world without police.

This book should be required reading. Whether you’re deep in the police abolition movement or just looking to learn more, the information included in this book is a useful guide to understanding the principles and moving toward action.

Thank you for the advanced copy and apologies for my delayed review. This book is fantastic and the authors were able to articulate their arguments in ways that have helped me to articulate the same argument when in discussion with others. Kaba and Ritchie make a great case for abolishing the police. Even if you disagree with their stance, it is clear that a complete overhaul of policing is needed.

Like many people who grew up in the US, I was inundated with sold story of Police being in the "God"-tier of pious professions. And despite having a few really negative experiences with the police in my area as a kid, it was ingrained in me that police ALWAYS do only what is in the best interest of the infamous "protect & serve" slogan they live by. Police were touted as "safe" and that you should never hesitate to call them if you need help. It wasn't until about 10 years ago that I learned how "protect & serve" is applied to themselves, not necessarily to the communities they are employed with.

While there has always been knowledge of crooked cops, I think it's safe to say that the last few years have really brought about a VERY public awareness and call for restructuring, awareness, accountability, and change. I think this book is very important, no matter where you land among the multitudes of opinions on police accountability. Mariame Kaba and Andrea Ritchie are vital voices who bring personal experience, deft knowledge of the multiple communities and the system in general, as well as plain facts. Inarguable facts.

I think this book would be a fantastic fit for anyone who is already dipping their toes into abolitionism and wants to increase their knowledge, but also for anyone who has just been hearing buzzwords thrown around on social media and wants to know what they really mean. What they stand for, how they affect people, and what to do next. You may not agree with everything in the book, the authors know this and expect this, but if you are willing to sit with discomfort or disagreement in the journey of learning more in general - this is a great piece of work to do that with. People often want to immediately shove aside non-fiction books that they aren't already familiar with or know they would agree with -- but I would implore you to give this one a try. If for no other reason than to help you be sure you have a fuller understanding of the bigger picture.

Kaba and Ritchie use a deep breadth of their knowledge and experience of activism to give this well thought out book. It reads like a call to action and a manual. The chapter are divided up well to answer specific questions and abolition, the prison industrial complex, and community work. I particularly loved their use of examples to show mistakes they have seen, such as more cameras in neighborhoods, as well as good work like inviting loud teenagers to have a conversation with a community member rather than calling the police. I do wish they discussed frameworks for helping survivors of violence after the fact. They do briefly discuss restorative justice, but a whole chapter would have been great. They do state they do not have all the answers and call in the reader to imagine what a world with police or the prison industrial complex.

This is much-needed work, I recommend this book to anyone wanting to find something to do, and willing to learn more about these struggles.

If you want to learn more about abolition, Mariame Kaba and Andrea Ritchie are the perfect two to learn from. This book is rich and informative, and I'd recommend it to anyone interested in learning more about it.

I haven’t finished this, but thank goodness it’s an ebook because if it was in print, I would have already dissolved it in highlighter ink. I appreciated Kaba’s previous book, We Do This ‘Til We Free Us, but wanted something from her on abolition that went deeper than those essays and was a cohesive whole. This book is that, with co-author Andrea Ritchie. Can’t wait to finish and probably revisit over and over.

Whilst US-based, this book is an important read for everyone, especially those who struggle to understand what abolition means, how it could work, and why it's important.

"No More Police" perfectly and succinctly shows us why the current system is both ineffective and actively harmful.

The arguments in this book are well thought out and supported by both strong anecdotal data and peer-reviewed research. There is an extensive section near the back of the book that cites all of the author's sources which makes "doing your own research" easy.

The current system is broken and does not prevent crime or keep people safe, especially people from marginalised communities.

The current system needs to be abolished and a new system focused on rehabilitation, not punitive measures, needs to be implemented.

I especially recommend this book to people who support the Blue Lives Matter movement, are members of a policing force, or know someone who is a police officer as it does a brilliant job of showing how individual "good cops" still uphold, support, and enforce harmful systems. I say this as someone who used to work for their state's police service.

Thank you to NetGalley, The New Press, and Mariame Kaba and Andrea Ritchie for giving me a free digital copy of this book to read in exchange for an honest review.

Mariame Kaba is without a doubt one of the most important voices in the movement for criminal justice reform and prison abolition. No More Police makes the case by using evidence and statistics on how police intervention is harmful and leads to violence in already marginalized communities. The call to Defund The Police has been met with nothing but negativity from a majority of politicians ranging from conservatives to liberals. Before explaining the goals of defund the police, I think it is important to highlight some stats that I found while reading.

"Research confirms that police are up to 4 times more likely to shoot Black people than white people, even when both groups are engaged int eh same levels of criminalized activity, even when they are unarmed."

"Longitudinal studies indicate that markers of resource deprivation - lack of sufficient income, health care, etc are critical factors in heightened violent crime rates." HOWEVER

"Less than 5% of the 10 million arrests made annually are for "violent crime" and "1%-4% of police calls are for "serious violent crime" like homicide, rape, or robbery. When cops do respond to such calls, they find the person responsible for violence 1/4 of the time." and finally,

"Crime was down overall in 2020, by about 6%, one of the largest decreases in decades." (These same 2020 crime rates were the exact reason why Biden enacted ARPA, giving $350 billion to police in 2022.

Kaba artfully explains the goal of defunding the police, which involves a divestment of resources that are then redistributed to communities ravaged by poverty and a lack of resources. Kaba further proves her point by citing statistics that show no correlation between crime rates and police budgets. Meaning, crime does not go up if police lose money and vise versa. The current state of policing is poisoned, there is no doubt about it. If the goal is abolition, then defunding the police is the starting point. Regardless of political view, anyone can resonate with this story as it is written with facts as well as emotions.

This literature is excellent for anyone who wants to read more about abolition, criminal justice reform, and transformative justice. It is relevant no matter what level your at, or whether you think the country as it currently stands needs to change. This book is likely to convince even status quo-ers that change is needed and that supporting our communities, especially communities of color, is how we actually tackle crime rates, violence, and recidivism.

No More Police discusses what the future could look like if policing was abolished from the country. Each chapter focuses on an aspect of policing and talks about it currently and alternatives. While I enjoyed the contents of this book if felt very choppy and didn’t flow well which lead to an overall poor reading experience.

Mariame Kaba is one of the most important voices and activists going today. This book is a thorough argument for one of the defining issues of our time.

No More Police is a book that clearly lays out dense material in an accessible way. Something I really admire about this book is that the authors lay out multiple approaches but don’t treat situations with a one size fits all solution. I highly recommend this book for people trying to understand the police abolition movement.
Thank you to the authors and The New Press for the e-ARC in exchange for an honest review.

The art and title of this book caught my eye. I wanted to read it because while I know some about calls to defund the police and change the way we support our communities and provide "safety" in the United States, I have not done in-depth research on the topic.

Whether you want to learn more about the police abolition movement or simply learn more about the state of policing in the United States, this book is excellent. It is extremely well-researched and all sources are cited. This would be a great title to use to find statistics, stories, and sources to share with people you're discussing policing, safety, and justice with. It is compelling and laid out very well so you can also jump to specific chapters if you need to.

If you are hesitant about the idea of police abolition or have an image of the police force as a solid, public good with a few "bad apples" - I encourage you to read this book. It also engages with "soft policing" by people not employed directly by police which I found very interesting. Take note of reflexive or high-emotion reactions as you read, and question them. Specifically, if you are white (like I am, for context), you must block the reflexive white supremacist narratives of "crime," "bad guys," and "friendly cops" that we are raised with.

This was a thought-provoking book that challenged some assumptions I still held about police and backed it up with a wealth of information and lived experiences. The authors also state that not everyone will be dedicated on the road to abolition but that similar goals will follow the same road. You may come out not agreeing with everything, but the author's arguments are excellent, and I think anyone who wants a better world without the violence inflicted by police and/or prison industrial complex will find something in this book.

This is not a casual read and is not intended to be one. The facts are stark and thoroughly backed up. A specific note I found resonant, and that challenged a lot of my thinking, is the refrain that living in a society that actually supports its people requires commitment. It has made me consider my own dedication, willingness and ability to help my neighbors. No More Police makes it clear that making things better is not a quick fix. There is no one answer. It will require many actions and people. This is a book I will think about for a very long time.

Reviewed via digital ARC from NetGalley.

I usually put content notes at the end of my reviews. The nature of this book means that it confronts many stories of racism, violence, abuse, sexual violence, transphobia, and more.

In “no more police“ there’s a lot that I agree with in the book like for example people educated in mental health and drug addiction should respond to calls about those situations, but to have unarmed police respond to calls for police is in my opinion risky. Anyone who knows about police in the world they do know that things can turn ugly in the moment and to have these men unarmed is dangerous for the most part foolish. I did find this book quite interesting and in some parts of the book it sounded as if they want a utopian society… Which who doesn’t, although Unachvable it’s always good to dream. When I initially got this book I wanted real answers to how we could replace a system already in place no matter how flawed with the new system and then the book they want neighborhoods to police their self an unarmed policeman to go how to calls about loud noises in abandon cars. I get the abandon cars but loud noises could be loud music and drunk people and I get it it’s a work in progress or a movement in progress but I didn’t hear anything in the book that would cause me to say yes let’s abolish the police. I really think things are getting too carried away with this abolishing the police. I mean they have hundreds of years of investigatory research and they arrest the really bad guys that we want nowhere near us. I know they have some really terrible police and putting a new system in order is not going to stop bad apples from getting into the bunch and wobble we do then make a whole new system. Some of these ideas I see as achievable what song to me I just dreams that will never come to fruition. In any system that could be rapists and abusers and calling it by a different name isn’t going to make it better it’s just going to make it called something else. I mean there will always be people wanting these jobs so they could be in power over others we just have to find a better way of weeding those people out and then we can have a doable system. I received this book from NetGalley for free and I am leaving this review voluntarily please forgive any mistakes as I am blind and dictate my review but all opinions are definitely my own.

This was a fantastic read, although the ARC copy was marked in a way that made it difficult to comprehend at times. Brought together the important issues of why policing in America is inherently corrupt, the institutional harm that's being done and the individual groups that are affected. It proposes an end to the current system and is very in-depth. I really felt drawn to what was being said and will do another re-read upon publication. Fantastic!

“No More Police” is a fantastic community resource for engaging in abolitionist dialogue. This book masterfully answers basically every question and concern people who are just learning about abolition tend to have. I found this book highly accessible, as I typically have a hard time getting through nonfiction just by its sometimes dense nature. “We Do This ‘Til We Free Us” has been one of my go-to accessible reads, and I can confidently say that “No More Police” is just as accessible if not more.

Informative without being too dense, knowledgeable on a very nuanced topic, and perfectly structured for people like myself who want to read more abolition literature but have a hard time focusing on nonfiction.

I also thought the introduction was wonderful – again, accessible and particularly helpful in navigating specific chapters if you are looking for answers for one question in particular, allowing the reader to jump around chapters without feeling overwhelmed or as though we’re missing something by not reading chronologically.

5 stars, definitely adding to my collection and to my list of recs for police abolition.