Cop Cop: Breaking the Fixed System of American Policing - Mac Muir and Greg Finch

Published in 2025 by Zando, New York, NY

384 pages

ISBN: 9781638930082 

Over the past decade, increased scrutiny has been given to the institution of policing in America, and for good reason. In 2024, there were about 1,365 people killed by law enforcement, predominantly affecting Black and Latino communities. Policing in the U.S. has always been intertwined with race. Slave patrols, the enforcement of Black Codes, Jim Crow, the “war on drugs,” and broken windows policing have disproportionately targeted Black and brown communities throughout the past two centuries in America. These institutional legacies have continued through the overpolicing of marginalized communities and criminalization of poverty, as police serve to reinforce the social order rather than ensuring safety or justice.

       Major U.S. cities are spending enormous sums settling misconduct claims and wrongful conviction cases. Chicago, for example, paid out a record $107.5 million in 2024, while New York City spent nearly $206 million in settlements from misconduct claims. These large financial costs are borne largely by taxpayers, but money does not always translate into reform or prevention. The current model relies heavily on coercive responses rather than social supports such as mental health, housing, addiction services, and restorative justice. Many “calls for service” that police respond to would be better handled by non‐police actors (social workers, crisis teams, harm reduction specialists). Still, funding and institutional commitment toward those alternatives remain marginal.

       Reform policies to curb police violence, such as data collection, body cameras, and anti‐bias training, have also resulted in little change. Many law enforcement agencies are relatively insulated from community input, as budget decisions, internal policy, data collection, and use of force rules are often set with limited public participation. When complaints are leveled against officers, very few of these misconduct allegations become sustained, let alone lead to termination or criminal accountability. Police unions and internal norms often shield officers, even in well‐documented cases of misconduct, while internal investigations often lack transparency.

       Attempts to impose oversight on these institutions have also been met with significant challenges. Many oversight mechanisms, such as civilian review boards, often remain underpowered due to a lack of funding, inadequate staffing, a lack of independence, insufficient enforcement capabilities, and overt political interference. As such, what does the day-to-day life of a police misconduct investigator look like, and what can be done to overcome the institutional barriers that make their work so difficult? 

       In their 2025 book, Cop Cop: Breaking the Fixed System of American Policing, Mac Muir and Greg Finch offer an invaluable insider perspective on the challenges confronting civilian oversight in American policing. Drawing from nearly a decade at New York City’s Civilian Complaint Review Board (CCRB), the authors provide a rich empirical account of the institutional mechanisms that sustain police impunity as they recount real cases of police misconduct, including incidents of excessive force and racial profiling. By examining the challenges they faced as investigators, Muir and Finch offer six concrete reforms that could be implemented to reduce police misconduct and violence. 

Overview:

       Drawing from their experiences working at the NYC CCRB, Muir and Finch explore the systemic barriers that hinder police accountability in the United States, such as entrenched police unions, bureaucratic resistance, and a culture of silence within law enforcement. By examining a wide array of case studies and anecdotes from their work in the CCRB alongside quantitative data on police misconduct and violence, Muir and Finch make the argument that policing is designed to overpolice black and brown communities while simultaneously alienating and destroying the mental health of police officers themselves. Accordingly, in the first section of the book, Muir and Finch recount their frustrations while working at the CCRB, detailing specific cases of police misconduct and obfuscation. 

       In Part Two, the authors attempt to peek behind the “blue wall of silence,” detailing their experiences at the NYPD police academy and being stonewalled in their investigations of offenses such as chokeholds, shootings, and violence against protestors. Muir and Finch also trace the historical roots of policing not to slave patrols in the antebellum South, but rather to colonialism in Ireland and Haiti. By linking contemporary issues to colonial practices in Ireland and the Caribbean, Muir and Finch examine how these legacies persist in modern policing. They also examine the evolving rhetoric that has developed around policing, such as the embrace of “tough on crime” rhetoric that developed during the War on Drugs. 

       Accordingly, in light of this data, Muir and Finch argue that the current system is resistant to meaningful reform. In the Third and final Part, they offer six concrete solutions to address these challenges. They argue that since women commit less violence on the job (and male officers are less violent in the presence of women officers), police forces should commit to hiring more women to their ranks. Secondly, they advocate voting for politicians who promise to decriminalize and regulate drugs, thus ending the war on drugs and saving resources that can be funneled into more productive endeavors. Thirdly, there needs to be an investment in modes of community policing that can diffuse conflict and work in situations that police are not equipped to handle. These non-police responders would be rooted in the actual communities and reduce our dependence on police for any kind of disturbance. 

       Fourth, they argue that the Internal Affairs Bureau (IAB) must include professionally trained civilian staff who can simultaneously understand the challenges that police officers face while also ensuring that police officers are held accountable for their actions. Fifth, Muir and Finch propose the adoption of transparency methods that will tear down the blue wall of silence, such as making disciplinary records, data, and training materials public, creating professional associations for journalists to ensure accurate and transparent reporting, and creating a new court system that is tasked with keeping police accountable when the local departments fail to act. Finally, they propose a truth and reconciliation initiative modelled after the post-apartheid South African and post-Pinochet Chilean models that brings together victims and police to speak freely and openly about their experiences. As such, these approaches seek to transcend polarized debates like "Defund the Police" and "Blue Lives Matter," advocating for a balanced and pragmatic path forward that can break the anomie that both victims and perpetrators of police violence suffer through and break the fixed system of American policing. 

Commendations:

       Cop Cop possesses many notable strengths when it comes to addressing the lack of police accountability in the United States. First of all, one of the book’s biggest strengths is its unparalleled empirical depth. Muir and Finch’s position as senior investigators during their time working at the CCRB allows them to draw from a wide array of granular case studies from their direct investigations into police misconduct. This empirical richness is rare in policing literature, which often relies on secondhand accounts or theoretical abstraction. Their detailed and accessible narratives illuminate the day-to-day minutiae of the CCRB, revealing how bureaucratic inertia, union protections, and organizational culture systematically frustrate accountability efforts.

       This insider perspective is critical for scholars and activists alike, as it demystifies the “black box” of police oversight and lays bare the procedural and political roadblocks to reform. By situating their analysis within actual complaint investigations, the authors anchor their critique in lived experiences rather than abstract theorization. This empirical grounding is crucial for substantiating claims about how policing functions within capitalist state apparatuses.

       Additionally, Muir and Finch commendably historicize policing by tracing its origins to colonial policing practices in Ireland and the Caribbean, highlighting policing’s role in maintaining imperial domination and racial subjugation. This historical grounding situates contemporary American policing within a longer continuum of social control mechanisms that enforce racial capitalism. They explicitly connect present-day policing to colonial legacies, underscoring that police violence and systemic racism are not aberrations but inherent features of the institution of policing.

       Furthermore, Muir and Finch correctly highlight the structural and institutional barriers that shield the police from reform, including police unions, legal protections, and internal police culture. By confronting the entrenched resistance to oversight, Muir and Finch underscore the systemic character of policing, thereby transcending simplistic moralistic critiques centered solely on “just a few bad apples.” This effectively highlights the state’s role in reproducing capitalist class power and social hierarchies by protecting ruling-class interests through repressive apparatuses. By exposing how police unions wield political influence to shield officers and undermine reform efforts, the book contributes to a critical understanding of the political economy surrounding policing.

       Finally, the authors attempt to transcend polarized debates between “Defund the Police” and “Blue Lives Matter,” advocating a pragmatic, balanced approach that focuses on accountability and institutional reform. By examining how policing produces distrust, violence, and anomie in both the victims and perpetrators of police violence, Muir and Finch lend a sympathetic ear to both communities. They provide six clear recommendations for reforming the institution of policing and police accountability, which is refreshing since many critical analyses often lack positive policy proposals. While they might not be radical enough for my tastes, their positioning can be strategically useful in broadening dialogue and gaining traction for reforms within the limits of our current state of political consciousness and deep partisan divides. 

Critique:

       On the other hand, Cop Cop suffers from a few key weaknesses. First of all, while Muir and Finch adeptly diagnose systemic problems and highlight institutional dysfunction within contemporary policing, they ultimately embrace a reformist framework that presumes policing as a necessary and reformable institution. Thus, they ultimately endorse incremental reforms rather than a fundamental dismantling of policing. This stance inadvertently reifies policing as a necessary state function, obscuring its foundational role in maintaining capitalist class relations and racialized social hierarchies. 

       As someone who leans more toward abolitionism, I found this to be a central disagreement that I have with Muir and Finch. Their reform agenda, although pragmatic, risks perpetuating illusions that transparency and accountability alone can resolve the structural violence endemic to the policing apparatus. By focusing on “fixing” the oversight system rather than challenging the existence or fundamental role of policing, the book risks reinforcing the legitimacy of policing as a neutral arbiter of social order. This tacit accommodation to the capitalist state’s repressive apparatus undercuts the possibility of abolitionist or revolutionary transformations.

      Relatedly, the book stops short of situating policing within the broader capitalist political economy. There is limited analysis of how policing functions to manage surplus populations, suppress labor unrest, and enforce property relations. Without embedding policing in capitalist social relations, Cop Cop treats police misconduct more as a dysfunction than a systemic feature aligned with ruling-class interests. 

       As such, their analysis remains confined mostly to the corruption of policing institutions without integrating the political economy of capitalism that allows such activity to flourish. This limits the explanatory power of the critique and further narrows potential strategies to mere institutional reform rather than systemic overhaul. Without addressing the cultural reproduction of policing’s legitimacy, reform efforts risk being undermined by hegemonic narratives that valorize law enforcement and criminalize dissent. This reformist approach tends to overlook that policing is inherently tied to class domination and cannot be neutralized or democratized under capitalism.

       More specifically, while I appreciated their attempts to propose tangible policy proposals, these reforms are woefully inadequate to address the full scope of police violence. While women are less apt to commit violence on the job, hiring more women cops won’t necessarily reduce the violent logic that policing upholds. While advocating for more democratic participation is undoubtedly good, placing more citizens on review boards won’t overcome the institutional barriers or corruption that is endemic to contemporary policing. 

       Additionally, history shows that even when reforms are adopted, they are often fragile, susceptible to various legal challenges, administrative reversal (as with EO 14074), defunding of oversight, or under‐resourcing. Following the ratchet effect, political discourse has shifted rightward over the past half-century. Rhetoric such as being “tough on crime” and maintaining “law and order” is embraced by Democrats and Republicans alike, which favors maintaining or increasing police powers rather than constraining them.

       Furthermore, their six concrete reforms do not engage sufficiently with grassroots movements that advocate for community self-defense, worker control, or abolitionist models of social safety. Although they implicitly draw from abolitionist ideas, Muir and Finch stop short of articulating or seriously engaging with explicit abolitionist strategies that emphasize collective care, restorative justice, and systemic redistribution. While it is most likely an attempt to circumvent the rhetoric of “Defund the Police” due to the idea that it is politically toxic, this absence circumscribes the book’s potential to inspire radical political change, which more often comes from bottom-up demands for change rather than top-down bureaucratic reforms.

       Finally, regarding the history and theory of policing, there is one aspect that I found particularly unconvincing. Muir and Finch rely heavily on contested social theory, particularly David Hackett Fischer’s Albion’s Seed, to explain why policing is practiced differently across the country (231). Essentially, they argue that policing arose as a result of a specifically Irish-American sentiment that arose from the colonization of Ireland (142), as Irish Americans employed the very tactics that were utilized against them by the British colonists. 

       Yet, this fails to explain the origins of modern policing. By relying heavily on the outdated and largely contested work of Fischer (which Wilber Zelinsky, whom the authors also cite, vehemently criticized), Muir and Fischer couch their theory in weak historical theory and narrow the scope of their critique unnecessarily. They also rely on the work of Colin Woodard, who echoes Fischer’s idea that distinct cultural differences in regions can be traced back to original settlers. Like Fischer, Woodard tends to describe these regions as discrete, enduring cultural entities with clear boundaries. This can gloss over the fluidity, hybridity, and internal contradictions within regions, as well as the role of social movements and cultural change over time. While Muir and Finch use this theory to explain the inertia of institutions, from a critical perspective, such essentialism risks naturalizing divisions that are in reality politically and economically constructed, and it may obscure possibilities for solidarity, cross-cultural alliances, and radical change. 

Continuing Context: Abolitionist Lineages Against Police Reform

       Any meaningful analysis of policing must integrate racial capitalism and intersectionality as core elements of the critique, recognizing how policing enforces social hierarchies beyond individual misconduct. While Cop Cop offers vital insights on police accountability, Marxist and abolitionist theories push beyond reforms to demand the dismantling of policing as a capitalist institution. In contrast to these modest reforms, we can find more systemic critiques of policing by examining the long lineage of anti-capitalist and abolitionist thought. 

       First and foremost, Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels laid the foundation for understanding the state as a mechanism that exists primarily to uphold the interests of the ruling class (aka the bourgeoisie) through coercion and ideological control. Policing, in this view, is part of what Louis Althusser later called the"repressive state apparatus," which also includes the military and judicial system. While Muir and Finch document police misconduct, Marx’s framework would push us to see the police not just as flawed or corrupt actors but as structural enforcers of capitalist social order, designed to repress working-class resistance and protect private property.

       Furthermore, Antonio Gramsci expanded on Marx by emphasizing the role of cultural hegemony, which is how ruling classes maintain power not only through overt repression but through ideological consent. Gramsci’s insights explain why policing can sometimes gain popular consent despite its violence, and why reformist strategies like those in Cop Cop may have limited impact without challenging hegemonic ideas about law, order, and race. His work encourages engaging with civil society and creating counter-hegemonic narratives that challenge the dominant views of policing in American society, which, to their credit, Muir and Finch do well in this work. Integrating Gramsci’s insights on cultural hegemony further challenges reformists to reckon with the ideological consent policing garners in civil society. 

       I would also be remiss if I did not mention one of the most prolific leftist figures when it comes to discipline in contemporary society. Though not strictly Marxist, Michel Foucault’s analysis of disciplinary power is essential for understanding modern policing and surveillance as technologies of social control. Foucault’s concept of the panopticon illustrates how policing extends beyond direct violence into normalization and surveillance, a dimension Cop Cop could incorporate more fully. Foucault’s analyses of surveillance and disciplinary power complement Marxist critiques by revealing the multifaceted modalities through which policing normalizes control beyond direct, overt violence.

       More recently, scholars and activists like Angela Davis and Ruth Wilson-Gilmore have forcefully articulated the need for abolitionist paradigms, emphasizing that policing and prisons are inseparable from capitalist exploitation and racial oppression. Davis’s abolitionism advocates for the dismantling of carceral systems coupled with reinvestment in transformative justice and community self-determination. Similarly, contemporary movements such as Black Lives Matter and Critical Resistance foreground grassroots empowerment, participatory budgeting, and mutual aid as alternatives to state violence, which are strategies that Cop Cop engages with only tangentially.

Counter Offer: Towards a Radical Policy and Abolitionist Framework

       Utilizing these various strands of theory, how can we implement tangible, actionable abolitionist policies to address the violence of policing? Building on Cop Cop’s foundation, an expanded framework must center abolitionist policies and grassroots empowerment to dismantle the foundations of policing. Following the model of Muir and Finch, I propose six abolitionist approaches to addressing the root causes of police misconduct and violence:

1. Phased defunding and dismantling of police institutions alongside reinvestment in social infrastructure (housing, healthcare, education)

2. Intersectional restorative and transformative justice programs addressing harm without recourse to punitive state apparatuses

3. Democratic community control over public safety while incorporating marginalized groups in decision-making and budgetary authority

4. Bans on surveillance technologies that extend carceral power, coupled with digital privacy education

5. Coalition-building across labor, racial justice, feminist, and abolitionist movements to challenge capitalist hegemony holistically

6. Cultural interventions to build counter-hegemonic narratives that delegitimize policing’s claim to social order

Conversation: A Radical Policy Platform & Activist Framework for Policing Abolition and Community Empowerment

1. Abolish Policing as a Repressive State Apparatus:

       An abolitionist approach must begin with a clear vision of the abolition of the police as a state apparatus that enforces capitalist property relations and suppresses working-class movements. By demanding a phased defunding and dismantling of police forces, this policy would reallocate budgets to redistribute resources from policing to social services and other community-oriented programs that address the root causes of social unrest (ie, housing, healthcare, education, jobs, etc). It must also work to create independent community-led commissions with authority over public safety funds and policy decisions. 

        Furthermore, it must call for the abolition of laws criminalizing poverty, homelessness, and minor infractions (e.g., loitering, jaywalking), a point with which Muir and Finch also agree. Following their example, an abolitionist praxis will push for repealing laws that protect police unions and officers from accountability while simultaneously building working-class solidarity and class consciousness to challenge capitalist control over social institutions, including policing. As such, we could promote legislation that limits police powers, restricts militarization, and bans practices like stop-and-frisk, racial profiling, and use of excessive force while also building the necessary infrastructure to rely on community-led initiatives.

2. Invest in Social Infrastructure and Community Well-Being to Divest from the Prison Industrial Complex

       Closely linked with the first point, a path toward an abolitionist future must fund universal healthcare, housing, education, and job programs as fundamental tools to reduce crime and diminish social unrest. Because policing is closely tied to poverty, housing insecurity, lack of opportunity, racial segregation, etc., reforms must pair with investments in economic justice, health, education, and housing. As such, we must invest in the creation of free public childcare, food security programs, and transportation access to tackle these root causes of marginalization. Without addressing these root factors that contribute to criminal behavior, policing will remain a band‐aid on deeper wounds.

       Ultimately, this proposal seeks to restructure the functions of public safety, diverting as many interactions as possible away from armed police. As such, it would work to expand non‐police responders such as social workers, harm reduction teams in overdose cases, and community mediators to address moments of crisis within a community. Additionally, it would work to decriminalize many non‐violent behaviors, thus reducing our reliance on incarceration as an immediate response to deviancy.

3. Using Grassroots Organizing and Direct Action to Build Community Control and Democratic Self-Determination

       Building on the previous proposal, we could also establish democratically elected safety councils that include marginalized groups, especially Black, Indigenous, LGBTQ+, and working-class people. These teams could democratically develop and implement participatory budgeting guides, engaging communities on the local level in decision-making about public safety funds. In the short term, this could also be combined with the establishment of community oversight boards with real power, including budgetary authority and the ability to discipline or remove officers. These boards could address the obstacles to police accountability, such as qualified immunity, decertification laws, and prosecutorial discretion that make it difficult to hold officers criminally responsible.

       Furthermore, these investments must be rooted in community-led safety initiatives that prioritize healing and accountability over punishment. While advocating for divestment from police and prisons, we must simultaneously invest in transformative justice programs, such as mental health crisis teams, youth programs, and victim support groups. These could be led by mental health crisis response teams staffed by trained social workers and community members, thus reducing our need to call on the police. These initiatives should also support the community ownership of land, housing, and local co-op businesses to challenge capitalist exploitation and encourage mutual aid networks and solidarity economies as alternatives to relying on state repression. It also allows communities to directly control the allocation of resources tailored to their own unique needs, thus addressing the complexity and variation across jurisdictions and minimizing unintended consequences of “one‐size‐fits‐all” reforms. 

4. Combat Surveillance and Disciplinary Technologies

       Fourth, if we are to have a livable and dignified future, we must institute strict regulations on surveillance technologies such as facial recognition, predictive policing, and mass data collection. In short, we must demand transparency and community oversight of all police-related technologies while gradually working to dismantle the foundations of state surveillance. This will include promoting privacy rights and digital security education in marginalized communities as a defense against disciplinary mechanisms, as well as encouraging the decentralization of social control, replacing punitive institutions with participatory, restorative processes. By implementing strict regulations on police surveillance and data collection and ensuring community oversight of technologies that are utilized to extend carceral power, we can reduce harm in the short term while also working toward longer-term solutions. 

5. Uplift Intersectional Approaches to Safety and Justice

       Next, we must create policy frameworks that address policing’s impact on intersecting identities (i.e., race, gender, sexuality, class), ensuring marginalized voices lead reform or abolition efforts. This could include funding community centers and services tailored for Black women, LGBTQ+, the indigent, and other vulnerable groups who experience state violence disproportionately. These teams would have leadership from Black women, queer, trans, disabled, and immigrant communities as they democratically contribute to safety and justice initiatives. By developing targeted programs addressing violence and harm in marginalized communities, including domestic violence, police violence, and harassment, these teams could be rapidly responsive to the immediate needs of their particular community while also receiving support from above. By investing in intersectional restorative justice models of conflict resolution, we can reduce violence within a community and allow crime to be addressed without resorting to carceral logics.

6. Cultural and Ideological Transformation

       Ultimately, if we are to implement these ideas, we must generate the necessary popular political will to do so. As such, we need to launch media campaigns and community education programs to dismantle popular myths about policing and criminality. We must create alternative narratives of justice, safety, and community care through art, storytelling, and public forums to challenge dominant narratives that legitimize policing and criminalization while promoting radical ideas of justice and equality. We must quell public fears that are fueled by misleading narratives emphasizing law and order, sensational crime, which empower tougher policing rather than nuanced reforms. This would overcome one of the most significant obstacles to abolitionism, which is the public demand in some places for increased policing when crime spikes or in response to crises. 

       In our current media environment, reforms (let alone abolitionist ideas) are perceived as weakening law enforcement and placing marginalized communities in more danger, which makes them politically vulnerable to conservatives. To combat this, we need to build solidarity networks across labor, racial justice, and feminist movements to challenge capitalist hegemony and illustrate that these fears are unfounded. Supporting these grassroots organizing and coalition-building initiatives would help to create broad-based movements that shift public opinion away from the logic of militant policing and towards abolition and community control. Such a strategy hinges on fostering alternative institutions such as cooperatives and mutual aid networks to reduce dependence on capitalist structures enforced by police. While there would inevitably be resistance to these ideas and attempts to obfuscate and sabotage them, it is only by changing people’s material conditions that we can begin to change their minds about the necessity of investing in community over investing in increasingly militarized and privatized police forces.

Consolidation: Embracing Long- and Short-Term Horizons

       Taken together, these approaches emphasize transforming social relations, not just policing institutions. They work to empower communities through self-determination and collective care, addressing capitalism and racial oppression as root causes of police violence. By building cultural and ideological change alongside political and economic shifts, we can reduce our dependence on policing as a moderating institution. The ideas that I’ve proposed here do not necessarily conflict with Muir and Finch’s reforms, but rather complement them as we jointly work to reduce police violence. 

       As such, there are many ways in which these ideas complement Muir and Finch’s proposals. For example, a legal advocacy network could be developed to connect communities with lawyers and rights organizations specializing in police accountability to address short-term concerns while also investing in longer-term solutions. In the short term, national‐level misconduct tracking (or something like NLEAD) that is transparent and enforceable could be reinstated. Additionally, the decertification processes could be strengthened so that officers with serious misconduct can’t move jurisdictions to escape accountability. 

      Following the examples that Muir and Finch offer in Cop Cop, civilian oversight boards could be empowered with enforcement power, not just advisory or fact‐finding roles. These top-down legal reforms could work to revisit qualified immunity doctrines, ensure prosecutorial independence in cases of police misconduct, and change legislation that allows the reversal of oversight orders or revocation of citizen complaint protections while mutual aid networks are established from the bottom up. As such, these proposals should work hand-in-hand with those offered by Muir and Finch, as we all work together to build a more just society that provides dignity for all.  

Conclusion:

       Overall, Cop Cop is an eye-opening, well-researched, and deeply empathetic contribution to the field and discussion around police oversight. While its reformist orientation, limited examination of political economy, and insufficient engagement with abolitionist praxis limit its explanatory power, the book remains a necessary and insightful exposé of the monumental challenges faced by police oversight bodies. Muir and Finch have made a significant contribution to the contemporary discourse on policing and accountability, offering a nuanced perspective from those who have worked within the system and are now advocating for its transformation. Their systemic critique of institutional barriers is particularly instructive for understanding the durability of police impunity, and their proposed reforms, while perhaps not radical enough, offer viable avenues for substantive and meaningful change. 

       As such, for scholars, activists, and policymakers committed to emancipatory justice, Cop Cop should be read alongside Marxist and abolitionist critiques that push beyond oversight reforms and work toward dismantling policing as a capitalist and racialized state function. By situating Muir and Finch’s work within this broader radical framework, scholars and activists can better understand the challenges of policing reform and the necessity of transformative, community-led alternatives based on collective care and liberation. 

       In 2025, policing in America is at a tense inflection point. Awareness of police violence, especially racial violence, is high. Activism and scholarly critique are slowly but inevitably influencing public debate. In this regard, some progress is evident, as evidenced in greater calls for transparency and oversight, as well as pilot programs that have been initiated for alternative responses to policing. 

       Yet, much still needs changing, as structural, legal, cultural, and financial barriers persist. In many places, the system remains largely intact in its coercive, racialized, punitive form. If real reform is to occur, it must be systemic rather than piecemeal. It must include shifting power, not just processes. It must tie security to justice, not just the maintenance of an unjust order. The stakes are high not just for those most targeted by the violent arm of the state, but for democratic norms, the legitimacy of the state, and societal well-being as a whole. As such, Muir and Finch invite the reader to consider how we can work toward a society that holds police accountable in the short term, while offering harm reduction tactics that aid us in building a more sustainable and dignified future for us all.