John Jay College's Future of Public Safety Initiative invites you to five events this fall, including an all-day convening of cities leading the way on public safety transformation, a lecture on public safety and police legitimacy in NYC, a webinar on cutting-edge research on gun violence and book talks on the politics of policing and the challenges of working on Rikers Island.
In America today, police enjoy unmatched power. On the streets, officers employ violence at their own discretion. Behind closed doors, they are even more powerful.
In city halls, police strong-arm local leaders and nullify attempts at public oversight. And in state legislatures and Washington, DC, police lobbyists and union leaders zealously uphold a bipartisan consensus against even mild reform. Yet as recently as fifty years ago, police still served at the pleasure of democratically elected politicians, not the other way around.
In Blue Power: How Police Organized to Protect and Serve Themselves (Basic Books, 2026), Dr. Stuart Schrader narrates the rise of a bottom-up movement of rank-and-file officers who lifted policing above the law.
Organizers launched their campaign in the 1960s, courting a public backlash to urban uprisings and civil rights. City by city, county by county, they formed unions and other organizations and won control over working conditions, impunity from oversight and insulation from lean budgets. By the 2000s, this movement had triumphed nationally, shoring up the power of the police to overrule the public interest in the name of law and order. Through deep archival detective work, Blue Power reveals how police forced American democracy to back the blue.
Register
Schrader is an associate professor of history at Johns Hopkins University and director of the Chloe Center for the Critical Study of Racism, Immigration, and Colonialism. His research examines policing, race, empire, and the global history of U.S. law enforcement. He is the author of Blue Power: How Police Organized to Protect and Serve Themselves, published by Basic Books in 2026, and Badges Without Borders: How Global Counterinsurgency Transformed American Policing (University of California Press, 2019).
At Johns Hopkins, Schrader teaches courses on policing and prisons, war and empire, Black social movements, and social theory. In 2023, he received the Johns Hopkins Alumni Association Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching Award from the Krieger School of Arts & Sciences. He is also affiliated with the Department of Sociology, Center for Africana Studies, and Arrighi Center for Global Studies.
Disscussant
Dr. David Brotherton is a professor of sociology at John Jay College. He has co-authored and co-edited eight books on gangs, immigration and deportation and is the co-editor of the Public Criminology book series with Columbia University Press. David was born in London's East End and was a long time labor activist before entering academia. Brotherton was named Critical Criminologist of the Year in 2011. He currently lives in Brooklyn, New York with his wife, two children and a beagle.
Sponsored by the Office for the Advancement of Research
Other events in this series
Wednesday, October 28 | 6-8 PM
Moot Court
Thin Line Between Justice & Vigilantism: Public Safety, Police Legitimacy & the Search for Trust
Elliot Williams delivers the keynote, drawing on his book Five Bullets: The Story of Bernie Goetz, New York's Explosive '80s and the Subway Vigilante Trial That Divided the Nation. A book signing follows the program.
Tuesday, November 3 | 4:30–5:45 PM
9th Floor Conference Room
Book Talk: Blue Power: How Police Organized to Protect & Serve Themselves
Historian Stuart Schrader discusses his new history of police unions and the rank-and-file movement that reshaped the politics of American law enforcement.
Tuesday, November 17 | Full Day
Gerald W. Lynch Theater
National Summit: All In: Leading the Community Safety Revolution
A full-day national summit showcasing cities driving innovation in community safety, featuring government leaders, advocates, and community organizers working to build comprehensive, coordinated models for safety.
ReimaginePublicSafety@jjay.cuny.edu
John Jay College educates fierce advocates for justice, a calling that demands robust debate, rigorous inquiry & respectful dissent. Consistent with this commitment, we support academic freedom & convene conversations reflecting multiple perspectives. The views expressed at events held at John Jay belong to the speaker(s) & do not represent the opinion of the college.
