This course explores a wide range of critical scholarship on policing. We begin by developing a sociological conceptualization of “policing” before proceeding to examine the emergence of police in the modern period. Focusing on the case of the United States, we trace the historical development of policing from the colonial era through the contemporary period.

The course traces the historical development of policing in the U.S. from the colonial era through the contemporary period. How are we to understand the power, means, and function of police? If the mandate of police is to enforce and guarantee “order”, what is the relationship between policing and the maintenance of the class order of capitalism, the racial order of white supremacy, and the gendered and heteronormative order of patriarchy? And how are deviations and resistances to these orders criminalized as forms of “disorder” that then become targets of policing? The second part of the course examines major current developments that are transforming contemporary policing. How can we understand the phenomenon referred to as the “militarization of policing”? What new forms of policing have emerged alongside neoliberalization, and what becomes the role of police in the maintenance of a neoliberal order? How have contemporary technologies ushered in a new era of “predictive policing”? Finally, we focus on resistance, particularly the increasing centrality of criticisms of policing within contemporary social movements, and we conclude the course by imagining the possibilities for abolition…

Credit Restrictions

Students will receive no credit for SOCIOL 149P after completing SOCIOL 149. A deficient grade in SOCIOL 149P may be removed by taking SOCIOL 149.

Repeat Rules

Course is not repeatable for credit.