To dismantle the system of mass incarceration that founder Angela Davis describes as the inevitable result of “racial capitalism,” Critical Resistance National Network on Abolition hits where it hurts: the bank. Recent victories include cutting proposed police expansions in Portland (Care Not Cops campaign, 2018) and curbing California’s prison building boom (Stop Delano II campaign, 1998-2008). Now the organization is in coalition with several other nonprofits in California with a mission to close 10 prisons in the next 5 years.
With a surge of support for “Defund the Police” in 2020, CR can now engage in public discourse about where funds can be used to build a new and different infrastructure. In a June 2020 radio interview. Davis alluded to this forthcoming plan for community investment, saying, “Now we can think about funding agencies and individuals and organizations that will help address issues of health — physical health, mental health. This is the opportunity for us to begin to reimagine the meaning of these states.”
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