LIVING IN MINNEAPOLIS-SAINT PAUL, I LISTEN TO THE STORIES OF OTHER ABOLITIONISTS TO LEARN HOW THEY CAME TO THIS RADICAL APPROACH ~ Camille Tinnin ~ We are living in a time of increased authoritarianism around the globe, propped up by police and other forms of law enforcement. In the United States we see the deployment of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the National Guard, with police cooperation on various levels. Masked agents, refusing to provide names or identification, appear in workplaces, homes, roads, and businesses, snatching up neighbours. Fear abounds, as does resistance. As we fight this new onslaught and rollback of personal civil liberties, it is important to not only focus on what we are fighting against, but what we are fighting for. Police abolitionist organisers provide wisdom for this moment. Abolitionists are not only fighting against the police state, we are building alternative practices and institutions that push against assumptions about conflict, power, and interpersonal and community relationships. We are questioning our collective conception of power, considering accountability for harm over discipline and punishment, developing skills to better resolve conflicts in our neighbourhoods, families, organising spaces, and society. We are engaging in mutual aid and the creation of community spaces. We are building skills that generations of capitalist individualism have attempted to train out of us. Living in Minneapolis-Saint Paul (Twin Cities), Minnesota, I listen to the stories of other abolitionists to learn how they came to this radical approach, and about what people are doing to model and build the world we want to see. The Twin Cities have an array of organisations working toward abolition (and related movements) creatively. I see three main ways that abolitionists are engaging which go beyond obstructing injustice to creating prefigurative alternatives. The modelling of imagined future in the now, while fighting against present oppression. These works of what Sarah Lamble calls “everyday abolition” include: 1. the development of conflict skills and education around conflict transformation, 2. mutual aid, and 3. claimed and created spaces. CONFLICT SKILLS During my interviews, many abolitionists mentioned how we, as a society, need to build conflict skills. Collectively, we often outsource responsibility for managing conflict to the State, rather than addressing it ourselves. One way this occurs is through calling the police (or State institutions that do similar work). Abolitionists avoid doing so. One said, “if I have a problem with my neighbour and can talk to my neighbour about it, or if I can talk to another person who knows my neighbour, and get that solved, why would I ever have to go over here [to the police]?” Abolitionists talked about how, to not rely on the police, people need to be willing to step in and help neighbours-in-crisis, or diffuse disagreements. To respond, people need to have the skills to do so. By conflict skills, I mean approaches or tools to use in conflict that equip parties to respond to acute or ongoing situations with de-escalation, communication of disagreement, and collective problem solving. This can include listening skills, conflict mapping, understanding underlying needs and feelings, nonviolent communication, and collective problem-solving skills. These skills are relevant beyond avoiding the police. Abolitionists focus on the need to holistically respond to conflict, including in movement spaces. Conflict is neither good nor bad. Rather, it is something that can be positively or negatively engaged with, arising from disagreements, communication challenges, opposing interests, and so on. It can be interpersonal, or exist within a broader group. We must use conflict, and its transformation, as a way to identify harm, take accountability, repair relationships, grapple with complexity and differences of opinion or strategy, and ultimately determine how we can work together toward transformation. Often, people can be quick to sever ties during conflict. adrienne maree brown, in their book We Will Not Cancel Us, discusses how the disposability projected onto others uses similar carceral logic to the systems we are working to dismantle. Of course, when harm has occurred, people must be willing to acknowledge it and take accountability, and the safety needs for individuals and groups must be considered when navigating repair and transformative justice work. Abolitionists also discussed examples of groups helping people develop these skills, and the importance of education and training. REP, in South Minneapolis, is a local organisation with a crisis hotline that operates several nights a week, and offers ‘studios’ to build conflict skills and knowledge around abolitionist principles. REP’s studios have included ‘consent and abolition’, ‘self-de-escalation and regulation’, ‘community trauma and care’, and ‘solving problems ourselves’. One abolitionist involved in the project said: “We’re striving towards a deep cultural shift in how people assess a crisis and address the crisis, instead of having that knee-jerk response to call someone else.” This is key to the work of unlearning our existing social structures and learning how to face accountability without isolating ourselves, or choosing self-pity or self-flagellation rather than action and repair. There are other community education projects, reading circles, and so on, around the Twin Cities offering different ways for people to learn together. People are creating participatory education programs, sometimes in a certain career or sector, sometimes in certain identity groups, and often for people looking to develop certain skills. MUTUAL AID Several abolitionists interviewed mentioned how they engage in mutual aid work, particularly supporting unhoused neighbours, because many of the biggest challenges our communities face are connected to lack of resources. Mutual aid is when people work together to meet basic human needs because they recognise the capitalist system is not designed to do so. Multiple people discussed working with programs that support our unhoused neighbours. One said of unhoused encampment sweeps, which often result in people losing everything they have, that a lot of our ‘public safety’ interventions are more about preventing people from seeing the realities of capitalism than safety. Community members organise free distributions of clothing and food through Little Free Pantries in people’s front yards, the People’s Closet in George Floyd Square, neighbourhood-based “Buy Nothing” groups on Facebook, and cooked-meal distributions. Abolitionists discussed how people come together to meet collective and individual needs, often stepping in to fill gaps that could be filled by reallocation of government funds. George Floyd Square, the memorial and community space located in the intersection where he was murdered by the police, was a mutual aid hub during the 2020 uprisings, and continues to be where free clothing, books, and other supplies are distributed. An abolitionist explained: “In press conferences, [Governor] Tim Walz, Mayor Frey, [city council member] Andrea Jenkins and the crew, were all saying, ‘oh, that’s the best part of Minneapolis.’ You see it. You see it. You see the people coming together. You see the people forming groups to protect each other and their neighbourhoods. That’s the best Minneapolis, to which I respond, if that’s the best of Minneapolis, why aren’t you doing it?” While city officials continue to destroy encampments, state officials cut public health insurance for undocumented immigrants, and federal officials cut food, housing, and health programs, the needs of our communities will continue to grow. Mutual aid will become even more important. SPACE/ TAKING UP SPACE/ INTENTIONAL SPACES Abolitionists discussed the importance of taking up space and having intentional spaces. John Gaventa, in his piece Finding Spaces For Change: A Power Analysis, calls these spaces “claimed by less powerful actors from or against the power holders, or created more autonomously by them.” One such space is George Floyd Square, which one abolitionist described as “community-built systems of networking and safety doing a lot more to provide feelings of safety than policing does.” Others discussed student anti-war encampments pushing for their demands to be heard through getting in the way of business-as-usual, and providing space to try out alternatives. Abolitionists discussed the need for community spaces that foster imagination, like ‘third spaces’, where people can gather, without needing to spend money, to exchange ideas, host events, and build community. Several interview participants are working on creating such spaces. In this period of amplifying and expanding inhumanity by the State, people are working locally to meet our collective needs. We have the opportunity, amidst the intentional chaos created by those with formal power, to build ways-of-being in community that model a future worth fighting for. The abolition movement in the Twin Cities provides just one example of the prefigurative work happening around the globe. We may not live to see the future we prefigure, but as links in a chain, we continue this work, as Mariane Kaba says “until we free us.” -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- This article was first published in the Winter 2025-6 issue of Freedom anarchist journal The post Everyday abolition in the Twin Cities appeared first on Freedom News.