Black Agenda Report
Black Agenda Report
News, commentary and analysis from the black left.

  • Home
  • Africa
  • African America
  • Education
  • Environment
  • International
  • Media and Culture
  • Political Economy
  • Radio
  • US Politics
  • War and Empire

When Movements Embrace Police Abolition, the Rich Resurrect “Reform”
Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley and Glen Ford
09 Mar 2021
🖨️ Print Article

Margaret Kimberley · When Movements Embrace Police Abolition, the Rich Resurrect “Reform”

“As soon as movements emerge that identify the normal operations of the police” and other capitalist institutions as the problem, the regime directs the language of the debate towards reform, said Dylan Rodriguez, professor of medica culture at the University of California at Riverside. “People are no longer tolerating anti-Black police terror,” said Rodriguez. To change the subject from police and prison abolition, the system’s defenders pretend the debate is centered on preservation of these institutions, through reform.

Police Repression

Related Podcasts

Ilyasah Shabazz
Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
Shabazz Family Lawsuit Against the FBI and NYPD
03 October 2025
The investigation of the 1965 assassination of El Hajj Malik El Shabazz, Malcolm X, was compromised by the NYPD and the FBI from the very beginning
 R.E.A.L. Youth Initiative Works for Prison Abolition
Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
R.E.A.L. Youth Initiative Works for Prison Abolition
10 February 2023
Denzel Burke is Co-Founder and Co-Director of R.E.A.L.
 Anti-Police Activists are Doing Post-Slavery “Wake Work”
Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley and Glen Ford
Anti-Police Activists are Doing Post-Slavery “Wake Work”
15 February 2021
Today’s Black Americans are living in “the wake” of centuries of slavery, said Dr Corey Miles, a professor of sociology and anthro

More Stories


  • Gaza
    Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
    Gaza and the West Bank Under Attack After the Ceasefire
    28 Feb 2025
    The ceasefire in Gaza has not ended the suffering of the people there or in the West Bank. The violent occupation against Palestinians continues.
  • Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist
    Ukraine, War Propaganda, and the Return of Russiagate
    26 Feb 2025
    We must be able to acknowledge that Donald Trump has created a serious constitutional crisis while also recognizing that changing the U.S. relationship with Russia is groundbreaking and a necessity.
  • ​​​​​​​ Ajamu Baraka, BAR editor and columnist
    Who Protects the People from the Human Rights Protectors?
    26 Feb 2025
    Can Palestinians get a little Humanitarian Intervention?
  • Editors, The Black Agenda Review
    LETTER: An Open Letter to My Sister, Miss Angela Y. Davis, James Baldwin, 1970
    26 Feb 2025
    James Baldwin on white madness–and Black resistance.
  • Clau O'Brien Moscoso , Austin Cole
    The Struggle for a Zone of Peace Continues!: A Conversation with Austin Cole
    26 Feb 2025
    The newly launched U.S./NATO Out of the Americas Network activates local grassroots organizations across the region in an effort to make this hemisphere a Zone of Peace.
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us