Curated by Building Beyond Policing and Democratizing Justice Initiative, this collection gathers fourteen essays from across the movement around a shared conviction: fascism will not be defeated without confronting the policing apparatus that enables it. Organized in three parts — Recognition, Refusal, and Rebuilding — the essays move from the historical and structural roots of the present moment, through the erosion of police oversight in progressive cities and the case against reforming ICE, to lessons from Puerto Rico, movement technology, and California’s youth justice organizing. The closing essay, by Rebecca Acevedo and CT-OG Director Abraham Medina, traces how carceral systems adapt when movements threaten them, and what organized people power must build in response.
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The archive
Reports and Publications
Reports and publications that advance or support transformative organizing and governance.
Why defending democracy must mean more than defending elections: this brief traces how an expansive social contract — in which residence, not citizenship, conferred democratic membership — was engineered into contraction across U.S. history, and how cities are rebuilding it today through sanctuary protections, universal representation, and local franchise expansion.
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