The End of Policing summary

The book The End of Policing by Alex S. Vitale is a discussion about the fundamental issues
with police responsibilities that has led to social movements to end harsh police practices.
Chapter one is about the limits of policing reform. Vitale discusses that the major issue of
policing reform is the mindset of police and police departments that encourages the “warrior
mentality”. Vitale defines this mind set through this quote “Police often think of themselves
as soldiers in a battle with the public rather than guardians of public safety” (Vitale 2018).
Vitale discusses that this type of policing has led to the increase of militarized weapons.
Further, this type of policing has led to an increase of incarceration that has created the issue
of mass incarceration. Moreover, Vitale discusses Wilson’s broken window theory, the idea
that un-kept communities need to be policed more because more crimes are likely to occur
within these communities as a result has led to the increase of policing in low income areas,
often communities of color. Furthermore, Vitale highlights that police training is an issue as
to why police awareness of diversity and inclusion is lacking in departments. Vitale questions
police responsibilities in society through this quote “Is asking the police to be the lead agency
in dealing with homelessness, mental illness, school discipline, youth unemployment,
immigration, youth violence, sex work, and drugs really a way to achieve a better society”
(Vitale 2018). Therefore, Vitale argues that police departments are not well trained on the
issues they are asked to police, thereby the responsibilities of these issues should be placed on
other agencies better equipped to handle these issues that would not end in death or
incarceration.
In chapter two Vitale argues that police officers are not protecting their communities from
violence every day, rather much of their work is policing community members which has
become a source of revenue for their cities through fines and other fees. Vitale states that
“Felony arrests of any kind are a rarity for uniformed officers, with most making no more
than once a year” (Vitale 2018). This quote demonstrates that officers are not encountering
felony criminals every day to protect their communities. Further, Vitale discusses the history
of police departments that led to the need of policing workers from striking and rioting. These
officers were often hired by the factory owners, therefore having a biased police department
that led to policing community members that worked in these factories. Police officers were
used to disrupt and arrest the factory workers to ensure that labor unions were not formed to
demand higher pay and better working conditions. Vitale’s discussion of police departments'
history leads to ways in which people of color were policed throughout history. In Texas the
Texas rangers were used to police Mexican American using the “Juan Crow” type of
regulations. These regulations dealt with segregating, oppressing and deporting Mexican
Americans. Furthermore, Vitale discusses the regulation and policing of slaves by slave
patrols which has been correlated to policing practices. Vitale’s discussion of these policing
time frames demonstrates that Black and Brown people have a history of being policed by
police officers and that the development of police departments were not created to protect
these communities.
         In chapter three Vitale discusses the school to prison pipeline. Most schools in America
have a school resource officer. This has led to schools disciplining students through the
criminal justice system and not through school resources. Therefore, when a student is in
trouble at school instead of receiving counseling or other beneficial school resources, the
school officer handles the situation which leads to suspension, expulsion and in many cases
arrest. The offences that students commit are usually not criminal and can be corrected
through intervention instead of discipline actions through the criminal justice system. Further,
Vitale states that “The impacts of these policies have been especially harsh for students of
color and those with disabilities” (Vitale 2018).  This quote demonstrates that students of
color are more likely to be disciplined which creates a higher risk for them to be incarcerated.
Moreover, Vitale discusses that there is no research that suggests having a school resource
officer on campus protects students, rather school resource officers create risk of
incarceration by being on campus and using the criminal justice system to discipline
behavior.
         In chapter four Vitale discusses police officer’s response to people with mental illness.
Vitale analyzes police training when dealing with people with mental illness. Police officers
are “trained”, usually an hour class, about different ways to handle situations that involve
people with mental illness, but in practice are rarely followed due to police officers in depth
training in militarized tactics. Police officers responding to people with mental illness treat
them as a threat which leads to yelling commands. Many times, the use of deadly force is
used to deescalate the situation when these commands are not immediately followed. Vitale
discusses that police departments around the world have used other ways of responding to
people with mental illness such as, having trained professionals ride along with police
officers and police departments having officers that do not carry firearms thereby not having
an issue of deadly force when responding to people with mental illness. An example used is
London’s foot patrol officers that do not carry firearms and encounter people with mental
illness. The option of using deadly force is not there for the officer to use therefore making
the officers deescalate an armed person with a mental illness. Vitale does state that this
approach can take hours of convincing the person with a mental illness to stand down, but the
result does not kill this person. The sad reality of these situations is that they can still lead to
the use of deadly force when police backup arrives. Moreover, Vitale discusses that the lack
of training of police officers to people with mental illness needs to be addressed and
responsibilities of responses to these situations should shift from the police to more qualified
personnel.
         In chapter five Vitale discusses police’s response to the homeless population and the
criminalization of being homeless. Being homeless itself is not a crime, but regulations by
cities have made homeless people's actions criminal such as, loitering, criminalizing sleeping
in public places and so on. Vitale discusses that the issue of homelessness is thought to be a
problem by both liberal and conservative populations because of the drop in property values
and other financial deficits due to having a homeless population in their communities. Police
are the regulators of these policies that leads to arrest, fines, and the use of deadly force for
the homeless population. Police use tickets to fine the homeless population. These tickets
issued are for minor infractions such as littering and public urination. These tickets that are
unpaid leads to incarceration because these homeless people do not have money to pay these
fees. Furthermore, Vitale gives insight that criminalizing homeless people limits them from
getting social services that can help them out of their situation. People with criminal records
can not receive benefits such as housing, food and so on therefore, criminalizing homeless
populations does not solve or help the issue of homelessness rather it ensures that homeless
people will stay homeless. Moreover, Vitale discusses that incarcerating homeless people
costs more than having more homeless shelters that will house these populations that have
trouble getting into shelters due to not having enough beds to house people. Therefore, cities
would benefit from creating other resources to help the homeless population rather than
incarcerate them thereby, saving money and having less police enforcement. 
Chapter six discusses the criminalization of sex work and how the overall policing of
sex work has failed. Vitale acknowledges that sex workers and society are negatively
impacting by criminalizing sex work and its criminalization is widely observed as ineffective.
However, some believed that if sex work is criminalized and strictly enforced by the law, it
will deter prostitution and therefore there will be no market for sex work (Vitale 2018:109).
The author also argues that, “criminalization is ineffective. It also hurts sex workers, the
public, and the criminal justice system, contributing to the victimization of sex workers, the
spread of disease, and the corruption of the police and justice system” (Vitale 2018:113).
Another important factor that Vitale points out is the fact that there are no workplace
protections for sex workers and they cannot file complaints, sue their partners or report
violence. Policing and criminalization make way for exploitation by pimps, traffickers and
organized criminals (2018:113). Rather than eradicating the need for sex workers,
criminalization drives the practice underground where abuse and disease become prominent.
When targeting individuals, police often see the possession of condoms as evidence for
prostitution, therefore, workers risk disease to avoid arrest and persecution (Vitale 2018:116).
Cases of police corruption have revealed instances where officers have protected brothels,
demanded financial or sexual gains to avoid arrest, acted as pimps, as well as stole from and
assaulted sex workers (Vitale 2018: 117). Despite this, Vitale provides examples of areas
where sex work is legal such as in Nevada, New Zealand, parts of Germany, Belgium and the
Netherlands. These regions have found that regulating sex work has reduced crime and police
corruption, and has reduced harm to sex workers and their clients.
 

The War on Drugs is the focus of chapter seven in, The End of Policing. As discussed
in Balko’s The Rise of the Warrior Cop, the War on Drugs first came to light during the
Nixon Administration. The goal was to win over the southern states in the election and
interject the federal government into local law enforcement (Vitale 2018:133). The author
explains that historically, drug use was criminalized and blamed on racial groups. In the
Harrison Act of 1819, opium, cocaine and heroin use was restricted as a way to justify the
policing of Chinese laborers. Furthermore, cocaine once was given to enslaved plantation
workers to increase production and as a result of the Harrison Act, it gave law enforcement a
reason to vilify black people for cocaine use. Similarly, marijuana was used by Mexican
migrants and it was not a problem until large populations came into the United States. Anti-
marijuana laws allowed police to search migrants as a result (Vitale 2018: 134). The War on
Drugs transformed policing, increasing the presence of SWAT teams across the nation, and
tactics such as racial profiling, unlawfully searching people’s homes and properties, and large
drug sweeps (2018:135) This resulted in corruption among police departments, botched
police raids, and scandals. The author explains that illegal and legal drugs will always have a
part in our society. Decriminalizing and legalizing some drugs and amounts would have a
positive impact on society and would reduce police presence. Additionally, the author
suggests that decriminalization would have positive implications on harm reduction with
programs such as supervised injections to stop the spread of HIV and drug treatment would
help those incarcerated from withdrawal relapses. 
 

Vitale observes the effects of gang suppression in chapter eight. In the 1980’s the first police
gang units emerged in the United States and are still used in intelligence gathering and street
suppression (Vitale 2018: 157). Crime conducted by youth in urban areas is often perceived
as gang related but the majority of crime committed by gang members involves drug dealing
and property crime. The author argues that violence is more related to gang identities and
territory protection from rival gangs.  Officers target individuals and have the authority to
criminalize gang membership or simply association. In California, they also have a database
of names that lists what gang a person is associated with (Vitale 2018:164). Another tactic
used by the police to identify gang associations is creating fake social media profiles to
monitor online gang presence and involvement in crime such as in Operation Crew Cut
through the NYPD. Some models created to discourage youth from participating in gangs and
crime have included the “targeted deterrence” model by David Kennedy and the Spergel
model. Both encourage collaboration between communities, schools, and law enforcement to
stop violence (Vitale 2018:167). Vitalte acknowledges that no one single model or method
can stop gang violence and association. He argues that collaboration with local police and
early intervention programs can be effective in discouraging youth involvement in gangs.
Professor Elliot Currie argues that the solution to reducing juvenile crime is offering them
jobs. He believes that individuals would be more willing to work a stable and legitimate job
than participation in sex work, selling drugs etc. (Vitale 2018: 171). 
 

Chapter nine examines the evolution of border policing. The author explains that the borders
in the United States were largely unregulated until the late 19  century. Throughout the
th

decades, greater restrictions have been imposed on immigration and migrants along the
borders. The US Border Patrol was created in 1924 and today it is a part of the Department of
Homeland Security. Vitale highlights that border patrolling has always been racially
motivated. During the Clinton Administration, many policies were implemented in the first
attempt to close the southern border of the United States with Mexico. This resulted in more
fencing, the deportation of immigrants with criminal records and capturing and persecuting
those crossing the border illegally (Vitale 2018:180). The chapter states that, “Police,
prosecutors and judges all see the futility of criminalizing a population driven by extreme
hardship to seek out a better life across the border, (Vitale 2018:182), yet thousands of
immigrants are being held in for profit prisons by ICE. The purpose of this chapter is to
express how expensive and largely ineffective border policing actually is. It causes mass
criminalization, unnecessary deaths, human rights violations, causes families to be broken up
as well as perpetuates racism and xenophobia. Vitale points out that when the EU reduced
border policing created greater economic and social stability, despite widespread initial
opposition. 
 

The final chapter of The End of Policing  analyzes political policing. The author introduces
the principle that police forces are perceived as “protectors of public safety” (2018:196)
however, in reality, the police monitor political activity as well, through the use of
infiltration, criminal entrapment, surveillance and by repressing protest (2018:196).  He gives
examples of semi democratic nations that use the police force for mostly political reasons,
such as in Nigeria and India. In the United States, many groups such as the FBI, as well as the
Joint Terrorism Task Forces were created to combine federal and local law enforcement
agents to identify threats. Vitale argue that there are other ways that local governments can
reduce threats without excessive policing. For example, he notes that police departments
should share their concerns about serious risks, such as during protests, but the authority to
act should lie with elected leaders. Furthermore, he states that police officers should be
forbidden to surveillance, gather intelligence and use paid informants unless there is evidence
of criminal activity (Vitale 2018: 219). As a final note, Vitale claims that, “the best way to
avoid political violence is to enhance justice abroad and at home.” (2018:220). 
 
Overall, Vitale aims to express how desperately policing needs to be reformed, within
training, enhanced accountability, and greater local and public involvement in law
enforcement policies. He argues that despite the increasing rates of policing, communities
feel less safe and more vulnerable to police brutality. Through the reduction of policing, and
a focus on the reduction of poverty and social isolation, Vitale claims that crime would
significantly reduce. 
The book The End of Policing can be related to the rest of the class readings by the idea of
controlling people of color disproportionately to White people. The book The White Racial
Frame: Centuries of Racial Framing and Counter-Framing discusses how America has
systematic racist values that oppress people of color and grants opportunities for White
people. Further, the ideas from Hadden’s book Slave Patrols: Law and Violence in Virginia
and the Carolinas relate to this book by demonstrating the control of Black people during
slavery through slave patrols as discussed in chapter two. Moreover, the book Policing the
Black Man: Arrest, Prosecution, and Imprisonment can be related to this book due to the
mass incarceration of Black bodies as well as the unsettling death of young Black men being
murdered by white police officers. Furthermore, the book Policing Black Bodies relates to
this book through the ideas of the school to prison pipeline that has created risk factors for
children of color to be more likely criminalized for minor behavior problems. Last, the
book Rise of The Warrior Cop relates to this book by demonstrating the militarization of
police departments that have made them unhelpful to their communities and incarcerate more
community members rather than protect them. 

Current Events – 
During the COVID-19 quarantine lockdown, there have been a multitude of reports of
increased policing around the world. In some areas of the world, government officials have
places strict restrictions on who can leave their house during lockdown and some places have
criminalized unnecessary outing. In one news article, it was revealed that in Kenya, people
have been beaten by the police for leaving their homes in search of food and water.
Additionally, the same article stated that police shot a boy for standing on his balcony despite
the country’s restrictions. In other places around the world, the police have given tickets and
fined individuals breaking the lockdown policies. When reading these articles, I immediately
thought of Vitale’s book. Can the extreme policing of these regions be justified in terms of
the global pandemic? Or should nation’s and local governments prioritize the safety and
wellbeing of their citizens (i.e. leaving to find food and water) over the enforcement of laws? 
Articles - https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2020/4/18/21212688/coronavirus-lockdowns-
developing-world
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/19/world/asia/india-coronavirus-lockdown.html
References
Davis, Angela J. 2018. Policing the Black Man: Arrest, Prosecution, and Imprisonment. New
York: Vintage Books, a division of Penguin Random House LLC.
Hadden, Sally E. 2003. Slave Patrols: Law and Violence in Virginia and the Carolinas.
Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Hattery, Angela and Earl Smith. 2017. Policing Black Bodies How Black Lives Are
Surveilled and How to Work for Change. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield.
Vitale, Alex S. 2018. The End of Policing. London: Verso.
 

Discussion Questions: 
 
1) Do you think that decriminalization and legalization of the above things discussed by
Vitale (gangs, drugs, sex work, homelessness etc.) would be effective in reducing policing?
Or would new problems arise that would give way to new reasons to target specific groups of
people and communities? 
2) Vitale discusses ways in which police officers are not well trained to deal with certain
populations they are meant to protect. Can you highlight a way police officers can be trained
differently to protect communities and/or can you discuss a new topic in which police officers
are not well trained?