Responding to Eric Levitz on Free Will and Punishment

Last week in New York magazine, Eric Levitz made a compelling case for a radical but grounded vision of criminal justice reform--but he tied it to skepticism about free will. That's a mistake.

Writing last week in New York magazine, my friend Eric Levitz intervened in the intra-left debate on whether police and prisons should be abolished or “just” radically transformed as part of a struggle for a vastly more humane and egalitarian society. I want to lodge a quibble with one very specific part of the article but before I do it’s worth emphasi…