'Sered argues that communities are safer when they do not rely on prisons.' Photo: Book cover of Until We Reckon: Violence, mass incarceration, and a road to repair, by Danielle Sered
Until We Reckon: Violence, mass incarceration, and a road to repair, by Danielle Sered
Author: Danielle Sered. Review by Tim Newell.
The movement for prison abolition has a strong voice in this book. Danielle Sered offers pragmatic alternatives, meeting the needs of survivors and suggesting ways for people who have committed violence to repair harm. She argues that reckoning is owed not only by people who have caused violence, but by those who have caused an over-reliance on incarceration. Sered argues that communities are safer when they do not rely on prisons.
Although the book is based on US experience, there are many resonances for us. The emasculation of our non-custodial services, and the escalation in prisons, show how we are following suit. The longer sentences we are experiencing reflect the US policy of ‘two strikes and you’re out’. We have much to heed from this book.
Our system has begun to work with restorative practices, but only with the young is there really a systematic approach. There have been significant improvements but restorative practice remains the most-researched and yet most-poorly-applied approach.
The focus of restorative practice is on the needs of survivors, but political pressure uses victims to justify long sentences. Survivors do see the need for retribution – for restitution, apologies, to look the person in the eyes, for a public hearing, and space to talk about the experience – and they care about transformation. But most of all they express the need to know that the person who hurt them will not hurt anyone else. The experience becomes meaningful when they know that their experience will protect others. By contrast, there is no evidence that long sentences increase the well-being of victims. Sered says it is therefore unethical to tell survivors that the sentence will ease the pain.
Sered’s key principles are survivor-centred, accountability based, safety-driven, and racially equitable.
The process of exercising accountability involves acknowledging responsibility for one’s actions, acknowledging the impact of one’s actions, expressing genuine remorse, taking action to repair and no longer committing further harm. As Sered writes: ‘Each step has meaning and benefit for the responsible party, for the harmed party, and for the larger community or society. Unlike punishment, accountability is not passive. It is active, rigorous demanding of the responsible person’s full humanity.’
At this time of challenge in our justice system, with underfunding and yet more prisons planned, this powerful book gives us possibilities for the future health of our justice arrangements. A recent report (‘Making Sense of Sentencing’, from the Independent Commission into the Experience of Victims and Long-Term Prisoners) gives us strong evidence that it doesn’t have to be like this. There is another way of hope and healing open to us.
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