Not Giving Up on People - by Barrett Emerick & Audrey Yap Hardcover

About the Book

Book Synopsis

This book argues for prison abolition within the framework of feminist philosophy. Based in the Anglo-American, analytic tradition, the authors also draw on non-analytic sources, historical sources, and activist writing. The authors argue for a multi-generational collective action to build resilient communities that support the wellbeing of all.

Review Quotes

Barrett Emerick and Audrey Yap have written a humanistic book, in the best sense of that term. Their work is rigorous, carefully argued, empirically informed, original, and focused on making life better. They take both responsibility and forgiveness seriously, asking how to heal after harm in a way that respects both the perpetrator and the victim of that harm. This book connects prison abolition, conflict resolution, feminism, and much more into an important new vision of individual and societal transformation.

Barrett Emerick and Audrey Yap make an intellectually and emotionally powerful case for moving from retribution to repair in our response to those who have caused harm. Recognizing our entanglement in each other's pasts and possibilities, they help us see incarceration as abandonment--the antithesis of holding each other responsible.

Emerick and Yap are doing the very best kind of philosophy in this book--accessible, gripping, caring, and grounded in real world concerns. Not Giving Up on People presents a passionate case for empathy, forgiveness and solidarity and encourages readers to imagine how to become their best selves while working together toward more just futures.

In this elegant and energetic work, philosophers Barrett Emerick and Audrey Yap explore the reach and significance of moral abandonment in human relations. Carefully expanding upon ideas developed by a variety of authors and activists, they gently but firmly urge us to reflect on how often and in what circumstances we ignore or give up on people who, fairly or unfairly, have been accused of wrongdoing.

About the Author

Barrett Emerick is an associate professor at St. Mary's College of Maryland. He works in social and feminist philosophy, moral psychology, and normative ethics. His work is focused primarily on the ways that our inner lives are affected by and contribute to oppressive or liberatory ideologies.

Audrey Yap is a professor at the University of Victoria. Her research and teaching interests are very broad, but most of them fall under the heading of social and feminist philosophy. She has written on gendered violence, research ethics, martial arts, and norms of argumentation, though most of her current work is centred on issues of prison justice. She has taught in local correctional facilities since 2019.