At its core, Transformative Justice is a framework to prevent, intervene in, and address harm and violence through non-punitive accountability. It’s a framework that prioritizes relationship building, developing our skills, and uprooting oppression. It seeks to address violence without using violence, policing or state systems.

As Mimi Kim of Creative Interventions writes, transformative justice is not simply a method but a flexible set of politics and practices committed to collective and community-based mobilization, non-punitive practices of accountability, and a theory and practice of violence prevention and intervention that addresses the context of historic and systemic oppression.

Key facts about Transformative Justice:

  1. TJ was created by Black, brown, Indigenous, LGBTQ, immigrant, sex working, poor, disabled people who could not and/or did not want to rely on law enforcement and social services when they experienced harm.

  2. TJ is preventing, intervening in, and transforming violence and harm by focusing on repair, healing, and resources AND works to transform the root causes that created the harm. 

  3. TJ is not a program. TJ is a vision, a framework, and practice.

  4. TJ never “partners” with law enforcement.  TJ is rooted in abolitionist politics.

  5. TJ rejects punishment and embraces non-punitive accountability. 

  6. TJ processes are rooted in communities because they are community-based responses to harms.

  7. TJ includes community organizing because we are trying to uproot oppressions.

  8. TJ is not only about people who have been harmed. It is also concerned with the people who have harmed others and with the broader community / TJ always strives to be survivor-informed because TJ is a vision and framework that was created and is often led by survivors. But TJ rejects simple binaries of perpetrators vs victims.

You can always make an appointment with the Transformative Justice Help Desk for thought partnership about how these concepts can be applied to your work setting or project.

This Transformative Justice curriculum has been divided into three “semesters.” Feel free to do them at your own pace, with your friends and comrades, or as part of your organization’s political education program! The semesters are: Spring: Overview of Transformative Justice, Summer: Building Safer Communities Without Policing, and Fall: Supporting Survivors Without Police.

Semester One — Spring

Overview of Transformative Justice

These resources created by IC and our movement partners give us a chance to get familiar with the depth and breadth of Transformative Justice work and its inseparable connection to abolishing prisons and police.

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QUESTIONS FOR REFLECTION:

  • What surprised you about the materials this semester?

  • What resonated with you about the materials this semesters?

  • How do these descriptions/discussions of transformative justice align with your understandings? With your organizing demands? With your practice?

  • What questions do you have?

  • What conversations will you have and actions will you take based on this information and/or connections you made this semester?

Semester Two — Summer

Building Safer Communities Without Policing

How do we build safety without relying on prisons and police? Who keeps us safe? What should we do about crises and emergencies? This semester’s readings speak to these questions and get into some experiments that people are trying to get us to an abolitionist future.

And, to get to the world we want to live in without prisons and police, we need to skill up in conflict resolution and learn to collectively navigate discomfort, hurt, and harm. If you’re a part of a grassroots group, organization, or collective, how are you addressing internal conflict/harm? External conflict? This semester’s readings take us through toolkits, offer us skill-building resources, and give us some big picture thinking about how we can transform conflicts into a resource for our movement.

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QUESTIONS FOR REFLECTION:

  • How do you envision interrupting violence, responding to crises,  and resolving conflict, harm, and abuse without police? 

  • What skills, resources, relationships do you think would be necessary to make this vision real? 

  • How is your organization, collective or grassroots group building the things you need to make your vision a reality? Where are you facing challenges?

  • What are common "but what about" questions you face in your organizing? How do you respond?

  • What surprised you about the materials this quarter?

  • What resonated with you about the materials this quarter?

  • What questions do you have?

  • What actions will you take based on this information and/or connections you made this quarter?

Semester Three — Fall

Supporting Survivors Without Police

Transformative Justice frameworks were developed by Black, Indigenous and people of color who are largely queer and trans and survivors of violence. The very first practices and experiments were engaged by people who knew that the police and prisons were failing survivors and were sites of sexual and gender-based violence themselves.

This semester, join us in an exploration of the frameworks, practices and tools that BIPOC survivors have been building to end sexual violence, intimate partner violence, and domestic violence without using the cops.

READ:

WATCH / LISTEN:

QUESTIONS FOR REFLECTION:

  • What surprised you about the materials this quarter?

  • What resonated with you about the materials this quarter?

  • What questions do you have?

  • What actions will you take based on this information and/or connections you made this quarter?