State-sanctioned violence has been a prominent subject of critical discussion in the writings of many, if not the majority, of Black philosophers. Likewise, for philosophical accounts of protest, which—among not only Black philosophers but moral and political philosophers in general—often take the history of African-American protest as a central empirical flashpoint. In what follows, I offer an empirical account of the relationship between these topics. While not strictly philosophical, I put forth an analytic framework and empirical substantiation that are important for those thinking philosophically about state-sanctioned violence and the protests it inspires.
In the contemporary United States, the enduring repercussions of the War on Drugs and Crime—manifested in police militarization and the violence inflicted on Black Americans by law enforcement—are a focal point in the examination of state-sanctioned violence. Although national attention to the disproportionate violence Black Americans face from police has notably declined since 2020, the rates of police violence against Black Americans remain alarmingly high. The 2024 Police Violence Report found that Black Americans alone accounted for a quarter of all police-related fatalities that year and comprised 30 percent of fatalities involving individuals who were unarmed and not alleged to pose a threat, despite making up only 12 percent of the total U.S. population. These percentages are slightly lower compared to 2020, but the continuing disproportionalities necessitate both scholarly and political attention.
Entwined to the former is the continuing and ever-growing militarization of local police departments. Victoria Valenzuela writes that plans to build multi-million dollar “Cop Cities,” mirroring the highly controversial police training complex in Atlanta, have spread to nearly every U.S. State. Per Valenzuela’s reporting, many of these facilities are intended to host international police training programs, including collaboration with the Israeli Occupation Forces, and aim to “train” officers in urban military tactics and riot suppression.
These trends, while not fully encompassing the issue of police militarization, ultimately indicate that despite the initial overwhelming public pressure to reform domestic law enforcement funding and operational policies, local, state, and national policymakers have largely failed (or chosen not) to substantively address the entrenchment of militarism within police departments. Such conditions compel us to consider the apparent inevitability of future protests against police brutality and/or abuse of power and, consequently, the potential of future unrest comparable to or worse than that observed in 2020.
What follows is a synopsis of my findings and insights from a much longer project titled “How the Militarization of Police Sows Community Distrust and Political Unrest: A Case Study of the Minneapolis Police Department,” which examines the influence of police militarization in creating the conditions for unrest during the Minneapolis arm of the 2020 BLM protests. I contextualize the initial police-protester violence following the murder of George Floyd as a product of the Minneapolis Police Department’s (MPD) militarization efforts over the past half century, and the consequent violence imposed on its communities of color, particularly Black Minneapolitans. This history, I contend, empirically supports many critiques of state-sanctioned violence and the use of law enforcement as a mechanism of social control. Although the MPD is a singular case, the department’s militarization efforts, both materially and operationally, are representative of national militarization trends beginning in the mid- to late-1960s as a response to concerns over rising crime rates, widespread civil unrest over racial injustice, the antiwar movement, and militant Black resistance groups.
Analytical Framework
I posit three central and interconnected arguments drawn from a vast review of police militarization scholarship to build the analytical framework.
The first is that police militarization emboldens aggressive police behaviors and misconduct by exacerbating preexisting power differentials in police-citizen interactions. Independent of their militarization, police are granted the unique right to exert coercive authority over civilian populations and, if necessary, lethal force. Militarization, as Peter Kraska notes, stresses the “use of force and threat of violence as the most appropriate and efficacious means to solve problems” over other possible de-escalatory measures (3). Criminology and policing scholars have largely agreed that the process of police receiving military equipment, training, and embodying militaristic operational procedures disciplines officers to view the citizenry as potential enemy combatants rather than civilian populations, thus incentivizing the use of force (Kraska & Kappeler, 1997; Lieblich & Shinar, 2017; McMichael 2017). Further studies from Delehanty et al. (2017), Lawson (2019), and Masera (2021) quantitatively explore this consideration, with varying parameters, finding that as local law enforcement departments obtained surplus military equipment from the DOJ’s 1033 program, their propensity to utilize lethal force increased.
Second, I contend that police militarization deteriorates police-community relations on account of militarized officers’ propensity to use coercive force. In other words, a community experiencing aggressive police hostility, misconduct, and perceived procedural injustice over repeated instances loses respect and trust for law enforcement officers, potentially even developing disdain toward them (See Maguire et al, 2018; Dai et al., 2011, Mummolo, 2018; Italiano et al., 2021). This issue is further magnified if citizens do not have proper avenues to address complaints against the police or receive justice for legitimate cases of misconduct or brutality. Consider that a core premise of BLM is to address the historical lack of justice African Americans have had in the presence and aftermath of police brutality. The 2020 BLM protests were the compounded response to decades of violence from the police and a lack of recourse thereof, following previously failed efforts to enact reform.
Based on the above circumstances, I ultimately posit militarization as the phenomenon that exacerbates antagonistic police-community relationships and which generates the conditions that can lead to unrest in the short-term on account of officers’ propensity to exert undue force in immediate interactions and chronically, as a sociopolitical contagion. The following synopsis of my Minneapolis case study captures the crystallization of national and local militarization trends and reflects upon their compounding impact on police-community relations. I focus on how these developments exacerbate BIPOC Minneapolitans’ disdain toward the MPD over nearly 100 years, leading to various watershed moments across Minneapolis’s history.
Minneapolis Policing: Historical Context
As in many early American cities, Minneapolis was far from a haven for its Black residents. According to David Vassar Taylor (2006), city planners utilized discriminatory housing covenants to concentrate Black Minneapolitans in the southern and northern wards of the city where they suffered from the highest levels of deteriorating housing, poverty, illiteracy, vice, and crime. Their marginalized status and lack of any real political power rendered them highly susceptible to police discrimination and abuse of power. Journalistic accounts of police brutality and the subsequent backlash can be traced back to June 1922, when, in two separate incidents occurring just days apart, MPD officers aggressively arrested several young black men, charging them with disorderly conduct for the alleged offense of conversing with white women (Delegard, 2015). In response to community outrage over the officers’ actions, local NAACP leaders met with then Minneapolis mayor George Leach to demand reform and the addition of African Americans into the police force to improve race relations and mitigate escalation during police interactions. Local historian Kristen Delegard ultimately notes that the meeting yielded little substantive reform to the MPD.
This early instance is emblematic of a cyclical trend that persists throughout this historical analysis. The pattern in question involves the MPD committing procedural injustices against the African American population in Minneapolis, which leads to calls for reform but ultimately produces no real change, thus contributing to sowing seeds of division. Both the antagonistic dichotomies inherent in this cycle and the frequency of these watershed moments become intensified as the MPD militarizes and increases hostility toward the African American community.
By the 1960s, decades of impoverished economic conditions, social marginalization, and police discrimination fueled increasing sociopolitical unrest in Minneapolis. On July 19, 1967, mounting discontent with police mistreatment erupted into a riot after an officer struck a pregnant black woman during a peaceful protest in response to a separate instance of police brutality that same day. Mayor Arthur Naftalin quickly deployed riot-equipped officers, and Minnesota Governor Harold LeVander sent approximately 600 National Guard troops. Notably, journalists reported that Naftalin and LeVander ordered restraint from both the MPD and the National Guard to avoid escalation. This directive played a crucial role in gradually de-escalating the riots over the next three days. Police restraint prevented further escalation and injury as the rioters primarily targeted businesses and property as symbols of white authority rather than any individuals. When compared to the more infamous cases of racial unrest during the “Long Hot Summer of 1967”, the Minneapolis riots quelled relatively quickly and non-violently. Still, like the others, it set the foundation for the militarization of the MPD.
In 1969, Charles Stenvig, president of the Minneapolis Police Officer Federation, won the mayoral race on a platform emphasizing law and order. Stenvig, mirroring the political rhetoric of President Nixon, capitalized on the city’s racial tensions and promised to empower the MPD to combat “racial militants.” As mayor, he adopted policies that broadened officers’ discretion to employ force, rejected calls for civilian oversight of the police, and reinforced the idea that criminal behavior was an individual choice, not a result of a person’s socioeconomic conditions. The impact of these initiatives came to the forefront in the 1972 anti-Vietnam War student protests at the University of Minnesota (UoM). UoM administrators requested MPD’s presence to ensure campus safety but pleaded that officers remain passive. Stenvig ultimately disregarded the administration’s appeals for restraint and directed the riot-equipped officers to confront the peaceful demonstrators (Manuel & Urban, 2008). Per first-hand accounts, officers indiscriminately and brutally attacked the students, sparking several days of skirmishes and arson. Afterward, no officers were held accountable for agitating the demonstrators. The MPD’s conduct represented the dangerous outcomes of equipping officers with tactical gear against the backdrop of policies and rhetoric that incentivized aggression in police interactions.
In the years following, lack of oversight and loosened operational standards led to worsened treatment of Indigenous, Black, and LGBTQ+ Minneapolitans, as reflected through increasing discrimination and excessive force complaints against the MPD (Minnesota Advisory Committee, 1981). Stenvig served until 1973, and then again from 1975–1977. Still, his focus on militarizing the MPD and emphasis on aggressive policing ultimately entrenched an abusive internal culture, leading to increasingly desperate calls for reform as fears of unrest circulated.
The appointment of the reform-minded Anthony Bouza as Chief of Police by newly elected Mayor Donald M. Fraser in 1981 marked a significant shift. Bouza, with 24 years of experience in the NYPD, was known for his intolerance of police brutality and corruption. He argued that the police’s primary role had systematically evolved into managing crime as a nuisance to be hidden from the upper class, thus promoting a standard that incentivized excessive use of force and the normalization of corruption in the form of the “blue code of silence” (Bouza, 1990). Bouza emphasized the crucial role of police leadership in shaping the organizational culture of law enforcement agencies, positing that if police leadership condoned brutality or corruption, it would quickly permeate the entire department. Over the course of 8 years, Bouza avoided major MPD scandals and improved the MPD’s response to political demonstrations. However, against the backdrop of the national War on Drugs and Reagan’s initiatives to militarize urban police departments, the MPD would, by the end of the decade, secure federal funds from several omnibus crime bills to engage in widespread drug busts using sophisticated military gear. Bouza’s successes were notably overshadowed in the wake of Minneapolis’ local War on Drugs.
The MPD’s SWAT team, the Emergency Response Unit (ERU), utilized Heckler and Koch MP5 submachine guns, flash-bang grenades, shotguns with special rounds to blow out reinforced doors, and body-length bulletproof Kevlar shields during drug raids (Diaz, 1988). Moreover, in line with the scholarship positing that militarization disciplines officers to view citizens as enemies, the team’s training emphasized their operations’ “dangerousness.” Per the Star Tribune, Sgt. Doug Smith of the ERU claimed, “If you don’t move in quickly, you could end up dead…We can’t underestimate the adversary” (Diaz, 1988). Almost immediately, Black Minneapolitans felt the impact of the drug war escalation. In 1989, a botched ERU raid, conducted on faulty evidence, led to the deaths of an innocent elderly Black couple (Wilkes, 2003, 9). Despite community protests, no officers were held accountable. A year later, Officer Dan May killed 17-year-old Tycel Nelson while chasing him, claiming that, at one point, Nelson turned around and pointed a gun at him. Afterward, the MPD claimed Nelson had gang ties. The medical autopsy, however, revealed Nelson was shot from behind, and Sgt. Thomas McKenzie later testified that upon arriving at the scene, no weapon had been found yet. Moreover, Nelson’s family adamantly rejected the gang allegations. May never faced charges despite the substantial evidence alleging misconduct. Although Nelson’s killing was not a direct result of a militarized unit or a drug raid, the circumstances of his murder were a product of the MPD’s increased hostility toward Black residents in the Drug War. For some, Nelson’s murder was a point of radicalization. Ryan Dillard, activist, and friend of Nelson, reflected that “His death was the breaking point for our era, the young adults and the children of our era that were forced into manhood and womanhood early” (Pruni, 2000).
The rapid escalation of these events reflects yet another watershed moment in the escalation of the MPD’s militarization. As Ta-Nehisi Coates (2016) writes, “[A] community consistently subjected to violent discrimination under the law will lose respect for it, and act beyond it.” Since 1967, Black community leaders had been warning that the MPD’s aggressive and discriminatory behaviors would create irrevocable harm in police-citizen relations and lead to violence. For over twenty years after, the community had endured growing abuse with little to no recourse, and now the circumstances were far more drastic. Increased ERU raids and street-level police who conflate blackness with criminality fostered the conditions for a cycle of violence that would worsen as the MPD escalated the War on Drugs. Tensions between MPD and the Black community steadily rose in the following years, reaching a breaking point in 1992 when Metro Transit officers aggressively removed a blind and disabled black man, Leory Gray, from a bus for failing to pay the full fare. Later that night, gang members indiscriminately shot and killed Officer Jerry Haaf in retaliation while he was on break at a well-known cop-friendly pizza shop. A brutal crackdown involving stop-and-frisks and militarized home raids soon followed as the MPD searched for the perpetrators, leading to further concerns amongst the community of racially motivated persecution (Kelly, 1992).
The circumstances surrounding Haaf’s murder are unequivocally complicated, but understanding those circumstances nonetheless calls for acknowledging that the controversial deaths of the Black elderly couple and Tycel Nelson had all occurred in the three years prior to Officer Haaf’s murder. These developments represent a considerable escalation in the hostilities between MPD and Black residents that had been boiling over the span of those three years. These previous occurrences, directly resulting from the MPD’s misconduct and, more broadly, from the MPD embodying a militarized approach to combatting criminality, sowed distrust and resentment toward the department. Furthermore, none of the officers directly involved in those incidents faced legal repercussions. As a result, residents’ sense of procedural justice continued to deteriorate, and the city’s social disorganization worsened. Rather than addressing Black Minneapolitans’ grievances toward law enforcement, the MPD and city officials continued to intensify their crackdown on drugs and crime throughout the 1990s.
2020 and Beyond
These inflection points demonstrate the increasing deterioration of police-community relations with the onset of material and operational militarization. Temporally, they exemplify how, in the immediate moment, officers often relied on excessive, even lethal, force and how—without redress over time—militarization detrimentally damaged police-community relations. Following officers indiscriminately firing rubber bullets, using tear gas, and intimidating protesters during the 2020 BLM protests in Minneapolis, the Minnesota Department of Human Rights (MDHR) and the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) conducted extensive investigations of the MPD. The MHDR report revealed that trainers emphasize to recruits that “instant and unquestioned compliance [with higher ranking officers] is in order” and regularly conditioned recruits to view community members of color as oppositional to police efforts and authority (MDHR, 2022, 40). Similarly, the DOJ investigation conclusively determined that MPD officers prioritized using “unreasonable force, including deadly force, to obtain immediate compliance with orders…forgoing meaningful de-escalation tactics and instead using force to subdue people” (DOJ, 2023, 12). After reviewing hours of MPD body camera footage, both reports found that the MPD regularly used force against peaceful protesters during the protests, thus escalating the preexisting tensions.
The unrest seen in 2020 was the culmination of decades of militancy from MPD and repeated injustices subsequently faced by persons of color. The history of MPD and the communities of color it serves is just one of many nationwide. Nonetheless, it is representative of how police militarization exacerbated preexisting trends of police corruption, minimal accountability for procedural misconduct, and hostility toward citizens of color. Interwoven into this account is the history of the marginalized communities of Minneapolis. As this synopsis briefly exemplifies, these communities suffered immensely from blatant police brutality, worsened through the inaction or negligence of city and police leaders to enact substantial reform. This historical analysis serves to provide the context to fully understand the significance of the violence seen during the 2020 BLM protests and how, for over a century, the MPD embarked on an escalating war against the underclass.
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