You've probably heard the phrase "racial capitalism" thrown around in activist circles, academic papers, or maybe a particularly intense Twitter thread. It sounds like jargon. Another buzzword to nod along to.
But here's the thing — it's not a metaphor. It's a diagnosis Not complicated — just consistent..
And once you see it, you can't unsee it.
What Is Racial Capitalism
The term comes from Cedric Robinson's 1983 book Black Marxism, though the reality it describes is centuries older. In practice, robinson argued that capitalism didn't emerge despite racism — it emerged through it. The two aren't separate systems that occasionally intersect. They're braided together at the root Took long enough..
Think about it. Stolen lives. That's not "primitive accumulation" in some abstract Marxist sense — that's the actual foundation. Which means it was the engine. The transatlantic slave trade wasn't a bug in early capitalism. Now, stolen land. Even so, stolen labor. The plantations, the sugar colonies, the cotton mills in Manchester fed by enslaved hands in Mississippi — this is capitalism's origin story And it works..
It's Not Just History
Racial capitalism didn't end with emancipation. It shape-shifted Not complicated — just consistent..
Convict leasing. On top of that, sharecropping. Here's the thing — redlining. Also, the war on drugs. Mass incarceration. The subprime mortgage crisis that wiped out Black wealth in 2008. The gig economy that treats delivery drivers and warehouse workers — disproportionately Black and Brown — as independent contractors with no safety net.
Every iteration extracts value from racialized populations while protecting white wealth. That's the pattern. Not prejudice. Not bias. *Structure.
Ruth Wilson Gilmore, in Change Everything: Racial Capitalism and the Case for Abolition, puts it plainly: "Capitalism requires inequality and racism enshrines it."
Why It Matters — And Why Most Analyses Fall Short
Liberal anti-racism tends to focus on representation, diversity training, implicit bias workshops. Corporate DEI initiatives. Practically speaking, more Black CEOs. More Brown faces in high places That's the whole idea..
And look — representation matters. It's not nothing. But it doesn't touch the structure.
You can diversify the board of a private prison company. In practice, you can elect a Brown mayor. The institution still traces its lineage to slave patrols. Also, the business model still depends on caging people. You can hire a Black police chief. The municipal budget still prioritizes policing over housing, schools, healthcare.
And yeah — that's actually more nuanced than it sounds.
Racial capitalism explains why these reforms keep failing. Because the problem isn't who sits at the table. It's the table itself.
The Cost of Misdiagnosis
When we treat racial inequality as a matter of individual prejudice or cultural misunderstanding, we get solutions that don't scale. Mentorship programs. Scholarship funds. "Community policing" initiatives that still put cops in schools Turns out it matters..
Meanwhile, the wealth gap widens. The carceral state expands. Climate disaster hits Black and Indigenous communities first and hardest — because racial capitalism sacrifices zones are where the toxic waste goes, where the pipelines get built, where the flood protection never arrives.
Understanding racial capitalism means asking different questions. Not "how do we make this institution more diverse?" but "why does this institution exist, and who does it serve?
How Abolition Fits In
Abolition isn't just about closing prisons. It's a theory of change. So a practice. A world-building project.
Angela Davis, Ruth Wilson Gilmore, Mariame Kaba, and generations of organizers argue that you can't reform a system designed for capture and control. You have to shrink its power while building the things that actually keep people safe: housing, healthcare, education, food, community care networks, transformative justice processes That's the part that actually makes a difference..
The Three Moves
Gilmore describes abolition as three simultaneous moves:
1. Dismantle. Stop building cages. Stop funding police. Stop expanding surveillance. Divest from the carceral state at every level — local, state, federal Simple, but easy to overlook..
2. Change. Transform the conditions that produce harm. Poverty. Instability. Trauma. Lack of mental health care. Underfunded schools. This isn't "social services" as charity. It's infrastructure Nothing fancy..
3. Build. Create new systems of accountability and care. Community mediation. Restorative justice circles. Mutual aid networks. Tenant unions. Worker cooperatives. The list goes on.
These aren't sequential steps. Even so, messily. Day to day, they happen together. In practice The details matter here..
It's Already Happening
People think abolition is a fantasy. But organizers have been doing it for decades It's one of those things that adds up..
The Chicago Torture Justice Memorials project won reparations for survivors of police torture — the first such ordinance in U.So s. history. Plus, critical Resistance chapters have stopped jail expansions in New Orleans, Oakland, Los Angeles. Survived & Punished campaigns have freed criminalized survivors of domestic violence. The Movement for Black Lives' BREATHE Act is a federal legislative framework written by abolitionists It's one of those things that adds up..
In Minneapolis after George Floyd's murder, the city council voted to dismantle the police department — a move blocked by charter rules, but the vote happened. That wasn't inevitable. Organizers made it possible The details matter here..
Abolition isn't a destination. Think about it: it's a direction. And people are walking it.
Common Mistakes — What Most People Get Wrong
"Abolition Means No Consequences"
This is the most common straw man. Abolitionists don't argue that harm shouldn't be addressed. They argue that punishment isn't the same as accountability.
Prison doesn't make victims whole. It doesn't transform the person who caused harm. Think about it: it doesn't address root causes. It warehouses people — mostly poor, mostly Black and Brown — in conditions that generate more trauma, more violence, more instability.
Transformative justice asks: what does this person need to understand the harm they caused? In real terms, what does the person harmed need to heal? What conditions allowed this harm, and how do we change them?
It's harder than locking someone up. It requires community. It takes time. But it actually works — where it's been tried, recidivism drops, survivor satisfaction rises Simple, but easy to overlook..
"Racial Capitalism Is Just Class Plus Race"
No. It's not additive. It's constitutive Simple, but easy to overlook..
Race isn't a variable you add to class analysis. Race makes class possible in its current form. The global division of labor — who does the dangerous work, who gets the profits, who lives in the sacrifice zones — is organized through racial hierarchy Not complicated — just consistent..
This is why "class-first" politics that sideline race keep failing. You can't build multiracial working-class solidarity without confronting how racial capitalism divides that class. The white worker's relative privilege (however fragile) is structurally produced. Ignoring it doesn't make it go away — it lets it fester And that's really what it comes down to..
"Abolition Is Only About Police and Prisons"
The carceral state is bigger than police and prisons. It's probation and parole. It's electronic monitoring. It's school resource officers. It's the encourage system. Still, it's ICE. And it's the psych ward where you're held against your will. It's the welfare office that surveils poor mothers And that's really what it comes down to..
Abolition means all of it. The logic is the same: control, containment, punishment as the default response to social need Small thing, real impact..
Practical Tips — What Actually Works
Start Where You Are
You don't need to quit your job and join a collective tomorrow. But you can:
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Follow abolitionist organizers. Mariame Kaba (@prisonculture), Ruth Wilson Gilmore, Derecka Purnell, Andrea Ritchie, the folks at Critical Resistance, Survived & Punished, Project NIA
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Fund bail funds and commissary funds. Cash bail keeps legally innocent people caged because they're poor. A few hundred dollars changes a life. Commissary funds let people inside buy soap, phone time, decent food. It's not charity — it's solidarity.
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Show up for court watch. Sit in the gallery. Take notes. Your presence changes how judges and prosecutors behave. Programs like Court Watch NYC and Philly Court Watch have forced dismissals, exposed patterns, shifted outcomes The details matter here..
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Join a mutual aid project. Not a nonprofit. Not a service provider. Mutual aid — horizontal, reciprocal, no strings. Food distro. Eviction defense. Childcare collectives. Transit fare evasion support. These build the infrastructure that makes police obsolete.
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Organize your workplace. Unions are the only scalable vehicle for working-class power. If you're not unionized, start talking to coworkers. If you are, push your local to take abolitionist positions — divest from police contracts, defend undocumented members, bargain for community control.
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Learn the budget. City and county budgets are moral documents. Find the line items: police overtime, jail expansion, surveillance tech, school resource officers. Show up at hearings. Demand divest/invest. The money exists. It's a choice where it goes.
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Write to people inside. Not as a pen pal project. As a lifeline. Incarcerated people are organizers, theorists, artists, strategists. They're not "voices to amplify" — they're comrades. Correspondence breaks isolation. It builds political clarity on both sides.
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Study. Together. Reading groups aren't prep work. They are the work. Abolition. Feminism. Now. by Davis, Dent, Meiners, Richie. We Do This 'Til We Free Us by Kaba. Change Everything by Purnell. Golden Gulag by Gilmore. Read slow. Argue. Apply.
The Long Haul
You will burn out if you treat this like a sprint. Consider this: the carceral state took centuries to build. It won't fall in an election cycle.
But look at what's already fallen.
Solitary confinement — once considered humane reform — is now recognized as torture. Worth adding: twenty states have restricted or banned it for vulnerable populations. The movement did that Surprisingly effective..
Cash bail — the engine of mass incarceration — has been eliminated in Illinois, restricted in New York, challenged in dozens of jurisdictions. The movement did that The details matter here. Worth knowing..
Police free schools. Practically speaking, youth prisons closed. Day to day, parole reform. Now, prosecutors elected on decarceration platforms. Even so, iCE contracts terminated. On the flip side, surveillance ordinances passed. Mutual aid networks feeding thousands.
None of it was gifted. All of it was won — by people who showed up, stayed, built, failed, adjusted, built again.
Abolition isn't a fantasy. It's a practice. Every time someone gets bailed out, every time a school kicks out cops, every time a community resolves harm without calling 911, every time a budget line moves from cages to care — abolition happens Worth keeping that in mind..
The vote happened. Day to day, the next one's coming. And the one after that.
You don't need permission. You need comrades Which is the point..
Find them. Start building.
