Beyond Survival

Strategies and Stories from the Transformative Justice Movement

Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha, Ejeris Dixon

• Publisher: AK Press
• Year: 2020
• Print ISBN: 9781849353625
• eBook ISBN: 9781849353632
• Edition: 0
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Violence in Society
• Index: Social Sciences

Transformative justice seeks to solve the problem of violence at the grassroots level, without relying on punishment, incarceration, or policing. Community-based approaches to preventing crime and repairing its damage have existed for centuries. However, in the putative atmosphere of contemporary criminal justice systems, they are often marginalized and operate under the radar. Beyond Survival puts these strategies front and center as real alternatives to today’s failed models of confinement and “correction.”

In this collection, a diverse group of authors focuses on concrete and practical forms of redress and accountability, assessing existing practices and marking paths forward. They use a variety of forms—from toolkits to personal essays—to delve deeply into the “how to” of transformative justice, providing alternatives to calling the police, ways to support people having mental health crises, stories of community-based murder investigations, and much more. At the same time, they document the history of this radical movement, creating space for long-time organizers to reflect on victories, struggles, mistakes, and transformations.

Table of contents

• Dedication
• Foreword
• Introduction
• Part One: Making the Road by Dreaming
• 1: Building Community Safety
• 2: Beyond Firing
• 3: Isolation Cannot Heal Isolation
• 4: Excerpt from “Black Queer Feminism As Praxis: Building An Organization And A Movement”
• 5: From Breaking Silence to Community Control
• 6: What to Do When You’ve Been Abusive
• 7: Transforming Family
• Part Two: We Got This
• 8: Philly Stands Up!
• 9: Goal-Setting Tool
• 10: Excerpts from Ending Child Sexual Abuse: A Transformative Justice Handbook
• 11: Pods and Pod-Mapping Worksheet
• 12: When It All Comes Crashing Down
• 13: Why No Nonconsensual Active Rescue?
• 14: Maybe You Don’t Have to Call 911?
• 15: Excerpts from the Whose Security Is It Anyway? Toolkit22
• 16: Excerpt from Community Defense Zone Starter Guide
• 17: Excerpts From The Safer Party Toolkit
• Part three: We Didn’t Call It TJ, but Maybe It Worked Anyway?
• 18: When Your Money Counts on It
• 19: I Would Like to Return My TJ Process, or Discarding TJ Like We Discard Femmes
• 20: Vent Diagrams as Healing Practice
• 21: Facing Shame
• 22: Cripping TJ
• 23: What Is/Isn’t Transformative Justice?
• Part Four: What Did We Dream Then, What Do We Know Now?
• 24: Our Hearts Are Beating Together
• 25: Every Mistake I’ve Ever Made
• 26: Be Humble
• 27: Excerpt from “Moving Beyond Critique”
• 28: How We Learned (Are Learning) Transformative Justice
• Acknowledgments
• Contributor Biographies
• Index
• Copyright
• Praise for Beyond Survival
• Friends of AK