The murder of George Floyd by Minneapolis Police Department (MPD) officers in 2020 was a watershed moment, triggering protests across the country and unprecedented promises by city leaders to “end” the MPD. We use interviews and archival materials to understand the roots of this decision, tracing the emergent split between activists fighting for police reform and police abolition in the wake of the initial Black Lives Matter (BLM) protests in Minneapolis. We compare the frames used by these two sets of movement actors, arguing that abolitionists deployed more radical frames to disrupt hegemonic understandings of policing, while other activists fought to resonate with the existing discursive structure. After years of police reform, Floyd’s death and the rebellion that followed gave abolitionist discourses more resonance. In the discussion, we consider the future of public safety in Minneapolis and its implications for understanding frame resonance in Black movements.
Skip Nav Destination
Article navigation
December 2021
ARTICLES|
December 27 2021
FROM POLICE REFORM TO POLICE ABOLITION? HOW MINNEAPOLIS ACTIVISTS FOUGHT TO MAKE BLACK LIVES MATTER*
Mobilization: An International Quarterly (2021) 26 (4): 421–441.
Citation
Michelle S. Phelps, Anneliese Ward, Dwjuan Frazier; FROM POLICE REFORM TO POLICE ABOLITION? HOW MINNEAPOLIS ACTIVISTS FOUGHT TO MAKE BLACK LIVES MATTER. Mobilization: An International Quarterly 1 December 2021; 26 (4): 421–441. doi: https://doi.org/10.17813/1086-671X-26-4-421
Download citation file:
Sign in
Don't already have an account? Register
Client Account
You could not be signed in. Please check your email address / username and password and try again.
Could not validate captcha. Please try again.
Sign in via your Institution
Sign in via your InstitutionCiting articles via
ASSEMBLING GOD’S “LAST BEST HOPE”: THE EXPANDING REACH OF THE WORLD CONGRESS OF FAMILIES
Kristopher Velasco, Jeffrey Swindle
WHO’S THE REAL FEMINIST? FEMINIST DISCURSIVE BOUNDARY MAKING IN THE CONTEXT OF ANTI-GENDER CAMPAIGNS
Kerstin Jacobsson, Eva Karlberg, Elżbieta Korolczuk, Anna Meeuwisse