Maroon Geographies and the Paradox of Abolition Policy

This chapter draws lessons from maroon geographies for abolition policy: plans and actions undertaken to produce a world without police. In an ongoing context of anti-Black state violence, the chapter discusses how Black justice organizing can hold the state accountable outside of investments in existing state formations. Maroon geographies demonstrate how to move toward police abolition through both radical spatial transformations and strategic entanglements with the state. This chapter also explores how the commitments and goals of marronage are echoed in Black struggles against police violence in the United States and across the globe. Just as police have inherited a violent system of control and surveillance, the people who are policed have a geographic blueprint for fleeing and producing place beyond policing.