The idea that police should prioritize protecting life seems obvious. Many use-of-force policies already endorse the principle. But despite general support for this principle in and out of policing, figuring out what exactly it means in practice proves far more challenging.
In Protecting Life, Ben Jones takes up that challenge and provides strategies for navigating it. High-profile, controversial killings in recent years remind us that too often police fall short in their obligations to protect life. The problem goes deeper than a few bad apples. Law, policy, and training entrench practices that result in avoidable killings, which hit marginalized groups the hardest. Importantly, how police use deadly force is intertwined with questions of distributive justice. That insight differentiates Protecting Life in its approach to the ethics of police deadly force. It develops a framework to evaluate police deadly force at the individual and institutional level, with close attention to concerns voiced by Black Lives Matter on how policing contributes to structural injustices in society. The book's extensive engagement with social science research reveals ways to translate bedrock moral principles into policy. Ultimately, its conclusions push readers to rethink the state's obligations to those most vulnerable to police violence--particularly, disadvantaged racial groups and persons with mental illness.
Protecting Life is about the moral principles, at the individual and institutional level, that should guide and restrain police use of deadly force. Beyond simply identifying those principles, Ben Jones translates them into law and policy through extensive engagement with social science research. Protecting Life clarifies the obligations of police, explains how current police practices fall short of those obligations, and outlines concrete strategies to reduce policing killings without compromising public safety. Written in an accessible manner, the book will be of interest to scholars, practitioners, and the public alike.
