Defund Fear, Zach Norris
Defund Fear, Zach Norris
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Defund Fear
Safety Without Policing, Prisons, and Punishment

Author: Zach Norris, Van Jones

Narrator: Adam Lazarre-White

Unabridged: 8 hr 9 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 02/02/2021


Synopsis

A groundbreaking new vision for public safety that overturns more than 200 years of fear-based discrimination, othering, and punishment

As the effects of aggressive policing and mass incarceration harm historically marginalized communities and tear families apart, how do we define safety? In a time when the most powerful institutions in the United States are embracing the repressive and racist systems that keep many communities struggling and in fear, we need to reimagine what safety means. Community leader and lawyer Zach Norris lays out a radical way to shift the conversation about public safety away from fear and punishment and toward growth and support systems for our families and communities. In order to truly be safe, we are going to have to dismantle our mentality of Us vs. Them. By bridging the divides and building relationships with one another, we can dedicate ourselves to strategic, smart investments—meaning resources directed toward our stability and well-being, like healthcare and housing, education and living-wage jobs. This is where real safety begins.

Originally published in hardcover as We Keep Us Safe: Building Secure, Just, and Inclusive Communities, Defund Fear is a blueprint of how to hold people accountable while still holding them in community. The result reinstates full humanity and agency for everyone who has been dehumanized and traumatized, so they can participate fully in life, in society, and in the fabric of our democracy.

About The Author

Zach Norris is the executive director of the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights, which creates campaigns related to civic engagement, violence prevention, juvenile justice, and police brutality, with a goal of shifting economic resources away from prisons and punishment and towards economic opportunity. He is also the cofounder of Restore Oakland and Justice for Families, both of which focus on the power of community action. He graduated from Harvard and took his law degree from New York University. Connect with him @ZachWNorris.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Victoria on July 04, 2020

Really appreciated Norris weaving stories in with historical context as well as facts and figures. I also appreciated how he expanded beyond violence and crime to include other types of safety, such as stable housing as safety, and ways that the state sabotages DIY efforts of those most affected (su......more

Goodreads review by Rod on April 27, 2022

"Defund the Police" has quickly become a polarizing phrase that can mean different things to different people, even people ostensibly on the same side of the issue. I find Zach Norris' vision of community networks and social programs that decrease the need for such a large prison industrial complex......more

Goodreads review by Esta on April 18, 2021

This book is a MUST READ for everyone! Through his framework of fear, Norris demonstrates how we have been conditioned by what he refers to as the "Architects of Anxiety," "the fear mongers and the fear-profiters, people who manipulate our anxieties so that we buy what they want us to buy and vote th......more

Goodreads review by Beth on December 26, 2021

A lot of abolitionist and antiracist literature leaves me with the question "but what can we DO?". Through a series of vignettes this book answers exactly that question.......more

Goodreads review by Jan on October 29, 2020

Another book that tries to help us understand how excessively expensive our failed systems are. Mr. Norris offers feasible suggestions and concrete solutions. I think this is a must read no matter where you are on the political spectrum. I listened to the e-book, which was narrated so well that I fe......more