Transformative justice is an alternative to punitive justice that focuses on solving the causes for crime rather than punishing the person who did the crime. It recognizes systemic issues are typically at fault rather than individual failings.
Police abolitionists still want to ensure public safety, just not through policing and incarceration. They believe, since most crime is not born of malice, that improving society by ensuring everyone's needs are met would evaporate the majority of crimes as well - at least as many as are prevented by the current system. This is an idea fundamentally aligned with materialism. Police are incredibly over funded, enough to buy things like surplus tanks from the US military. That money can instead go to social programs that would solve the root causes that lead to crimes.
Societies can and will find alternative ways of preventing any specific crime. An often used example is if you have a drunk friend who is about to drive home, you typically will help get them a ride (driving yourself if you're sober, or calling them a cab or uber otherwise) rather than calling the police on them. Abolitionism finds policing as only required by those who lack the political imagination to find other solutions - basically, cure the diseases rather than treat the symptoms. At a systemic level, drunk driving can be reduced or eliminated by improving public transit.
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