Book review: The End of Policing
| Author | Becky Shepherd |
| Published date | 01 September 2020 |
| Date | 01 September 2020 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/0264550520934332 |
Book reviews
Book reviews
The End of Policing
Alex S Vital
Verso; 2017, pp. 272; £16.99; hbk
ISBN: 9781784782894
Reviewed by: Becky Shepherd, Criminology Lecturer, London South
Bank University, UK
The End of Policing was published in 2017. However, given the protests against
repeated extrajudicial executions of Black citizens in America at the time of writing
(June 2020), this feels an appropriate time to discuss Vitale’s comprehensive dis-
section of US policing.
Vitale analyses key aspects of policing, with chapters on police reform attempts;
the historical development of policing; and the policing of sex work, mental health,
immigration, schools, political protests, homelessness, drugs and gangs. Although
Vitale is a distinguished academic, this is not a densely written obscure tome: it is
highly readable and richly packed with evidence to support his central thesis. The
thrust of the book is that reforming policing is not sufficient: substantially less poli-
cing is needed overall, with a concomitant diversion of funding into community
initiatives which would impact more effectively on crime rates and quality of life,
such as housing, employment, education and meaningful funding for social change.
He takes the positionthat the racist and oppressive nature of policing is a structural
and political choice, in which case it is misguided to expect Black officers, who face
endemic discrimination and disadvantage within the force themselves, and who are
also not immuneto racist narratives, to somehowinstigate meaningful reform.He cites
clear evidence to demonstrate that more racially diverse police workforces do not
reduce rates ofviolence or killings. Similarly,diversity and equality trainingwill never
eliminate injustice within theexisting model of policing as itis insufficient to overcome
ingrained cop culture which perceives Black citizens as an immediate threat. Vitale
argues that oppression and repressionof minorities and of the powerless is effectively
a social superstructure, within which policing is a key building block, and that the
entire edifice needs to be dismantled, reduced and redesigned.
For those in any doubt of the troubling omnipresence of racism within poli-
cing, his chapter on the historical development of policing in the United States is
Probation Journal
2020, Vol. 67(3) 297–304
ªThe Author(s) 2020
Article reuse guidelines:
sagepub.com/journals-permissions
DOI: 10.1177/0264550520934332
journals.sagepub.com/home/prb
The Journal of Community and Criminal Justice
To continue reading
Request your trial