"As new and more virulent articulations of imprisonment, policing, and surveillance have grown over the past decade, one thing remains clear: the prison industrial complex must be abolished. Critical Resistance is a leading voice in the movement for abolition and the pieces in this collection are powerful tools for both long-time activists and those brand new to the movement for abolition now!"--Angela Y. Davis, author of Are Prisons Obsolete?
The number of people in prison in the United States has risen 400 percent in the last twenty years--the world's highest incarceration rate. Over seven million people currently live under the control of US jail, prison, probation, or parole systems--the vast majority of them people of color and young people. Policing at all levels is increasingly militarized and demands more and more resources.
For a decade, Critical Resistance has organized to abolish the reliance on imprisonment, policing, and surveillance, seeing the prison industrial complex (PIC) not as a broken system to be fixed, but a well-oiled machine that must be eliminated entirely.
Published in honor of Critical Resistance's tenth anniversary, Abolition Now! reflects the organization's themes: Dismantle, Change, and Build. It presents bold strategies to create a stronger movement of people committed to PIC abolition and building stronger, safer, healthier communities, not more elaborate forms of repression.
The CR10 Publications Collective is a national grassroots organization with thousands of members and supporters working toward reducing the current prison population, stopping construction of new prisons, and developing alternative public safety models.