books
Freeing the Mind
An incarcerated researcher explores how childhood trauma often shapes the lives of those in prison.
criminal legal system
69 posts in ‘criminal legal system’
interventions
Becoming Decarceral Jurors
Serving in the jury system, and preserving it, should be a goal for anyone committed to ending the scope and scale of mass incarceration.
system actors
Decarceral Counseling
Defense lawyers should be open to advising their clients about systemic oppression, laying bare the ways that mass incarceration ensnares.
Beyond Reform
No More Pretrial Punishment
In my many years as a public defender, I accepted the legal rationales for pretrial detention. But I can’t anymore.
Essay
A Lethal Upbringing
A decade of victimization landed a Harlem kid in prison. More than three decades later, he has not allowed prison to define his life story.
recommendations
The Year in Books
A curated list of 2024 publications that moved us to continue working toward a world without mass incarceration.
Politics
The Terrain of Struggle
Leaving no one behind, abolitionists plan for a transformed future—even as we attempt to address pain points in the here and now.
interventions
Uprooting Violence
Restorative justice seeks to address the root causes of violence—while also doing the work of healing the grief caused by it.
in conversation
Decarceral Judges
Most judges in Los Angeles are former prosecutors. But a leadership academy there is helping a pair of public defenders to challenge that status quo.
law & policy
Don’t Talk to the Cops
Your right against self-incrimination is not safe in a criminal system that cares more about coercing convictions than about finding the truth.
conclusion
All of the Above
Prosecutors alone won’t end mass incarceration. But their interventions can mean the world to people staring down the many harms of criminalization.
advocacy
Not a Fix-All
Electing progressive prosecutors is but one tool in a multifaceted, collaborative approach to ending mass incarceration.
system actors
The Best Prospect
Not all so-called progressive prosecutors are doing enough to dismantle mass incarceration. But they’re better than the alternative.
Politics
Power to the Voters
Progressive prosecutors have delivered tangible and rapid wins to a grassroots movement seeking to end mass incarceration.
Beyond Reform
Maybe, If . . .
Believing that prosecutors can play a role in ending mass incarceration requires imagining a prosecutor whose goal is non-reformist reforms.
interventions
The Problem Solvers
Prosecution can be redefined to focus on effective problem-solving through policies and initiatives that make us a safer, healthier community.
lead essay
The Prosecutor Paradox
Can a prosecutor, even a progressive or reform-minded one, really help dismantle mass incarceration?
recommendations
The Year in Books
As 2023 draws to a close, a look back at the books that informed, inspired, and empowered us to work for a world without mass incarceration.
In Depth
When ‘Community’ Isn’t Actually the Community
The crisis of youth incarceration won’t be solved by cynical attempts to co-opt the language of grassroots organizing.
Essay
On Resilience
In the criminal system, having your life constrained and restricted, even after your sentence is over, has become a fact of life.
Crimmigration
Deconstructing Immigrant Binaries
To truly provide justice for those with criminal records, we must question harmful binaries that separate “good” from “bad” immigrants.
book review
The Gun of Incarceration
Probation and parole in the United States don’t work. A longtime reformer and advocate has drawn a blueprint to end them.
advocacy
Chained by Debt
Erasing court costs and fines is a relatively small change that would have an outsize impact on those harmed by mass incarceration.
recommendations
Our End-of-Summer Reading List
Decarceral ideas and essays that have moved our readers in the past year.
roundtable
Keeping Each Other Safe
Acting within the criminal legal system cannot be the solution, on its own, to the existence of the carceral state.
roundtable
Radicalized in Service of Others
Organizing and collective acts of resistance allow us to not only imagine new understandings of justice and safety, but to live them out.
Film review
Reframing Our Outrage
A new film reminds us that caring about survivors means working to prevent and respond to all violence—including carceral violence.
Essay
The Power of Fiction
More people impacted by the criminal legal system can and should share their stories through fiction—and through those stories change minds and public policy.
Essay
The Recall: Reframed
A short film asks how we can offer justice for survivors of sexual violence without perpetuating the harms of mass incarceration.
Crimmigration
Exploited No More
How organizing workers in immigrant detention can serve as a foundation for abolition and liberation for all.