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We Need to Talk: The Prison Industrial Complex

In this episode, we focus on giving you the history of the continuous injustices faced by black individuals at the hands of the police, from the ending of slavery, to the Jim Crow laws and segregation, to the war on drugs and today’s for-profit prisons and the disproportionate number of black people in them. There’s a lot to cover in this episode and we will try to give you as concise and clear of an explanation as possible, but the learning does not stop and should not stop here. We highly encourage you to please check out the resources that we have listed on our website, we include books as well as documentaries and social media accounts you can follow for more information.

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We Need to Talk series: Resources

Documentaries
13th (Netflix)
When They See Us (Netflix)

Books
Are Prisons Obsolete – Angela Davis 
Women, Race and Class – Angela Davis

(More!) Reading lists
the southeast asian anti-racism toolkit
Antiracism Resources for White-led Organizations
Antiracism resources for Singaporeans
The Marshall Project: Articles on the US criminal justice system

By Episode

We Need to Talk: The Prison-Industrial Complex

  • Angela Davis (Women, Race & Class)
  • 13th (Documentary)
  • The Kalief Browder Story (Documentary)
  • Just Mercy (Book/Movie)
  • So you want to talk about race (Book)
  • https://time.com/5405158/the-true-history-of-americas-private-prison-industry/ 
  • https://www.history.com/topics/crime/the-war-on-drugs
  • https://www.sentencingproject.org/publications/un-report-on-racial-disparities/
  • https://www.aclu.org/other/drug-war-new-jim-crow
  • https://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/amendmentxiii
  • https://www.historyisaweapon.com/defcon1/gilmoreprisonslavery.html
  • https://www.raceforward.org/videos/systemic-racism
  • https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/24/upshot/how-redlinings-racist-effects-lasted-for-decades.html
  • https://www.investopedia.com/terms/r/redlining.asp
  • https://www.howard.edu/library/reference/guides/reconstructionera/
  • https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/08/19/magazine/history-slavery-smithsonian.html
  • https://eji.org

We Need to Talk: Abolish the Police?

  • On legal punishment: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/legal-punishment/  
  • Ruth Wilson Gilmore on the case for abolition: https://theintercept.com/2020/06/10/ruth-wilson-gilmore-makes-the-case-for-abolition/
  • Broken Windows theory: https://www.theatlantic.com/ideastour/archive/windows.htm
  • On the creeping expansion of regulation: 
  • https://www.aclu.org/issues/juvenile-justice/school-prison-pipeline/school-prison-pipeline-infographic 
  • https://www.aclu.org/issues/juvenile-justice/school-prison-pipeline/bullies-blue-problem-school-policing-infographic
  • https://www.equalrightstrust.org/ertdocumentbank/ERR8_Brenda_Parkes.pdf
  • Implicit bias training doesn’t change police behaviour: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/implicit-bias-training-doesnt-actually-change-police-behavior_n_5ee28fc3c5b60b32f010ed48 
  • Washington v Davis: https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2020/07/washington-v-davis-supreme-court-systemic-racism.html
  • https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/12/opinion/sunday/floyd-abolish-defund-police.html
  • #8cantwait proposals: https://www.gq.com/story/deray-mckesson-interview-8-cant-wait
  • Don’t abolish the police, reform them: https://thebulwark.com/dont-abolish-the-police-reform-them/
  • https://bostonreview.net/race-politics-law-justice/alex-vitale-scott-casleton-problem-isnt-just-police%E2%80%94its-politics

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Season 4 Episode 10 – Wet’suwet’en Strong: Indigenous Land Rights in Canada

This episode discusses the Unist’ot’en campaign to protect their land and preserve it for future generations. In 2010, the Unist’ot’en began constructing a cabin within their territory in the exact place where three companies, TC Energy, Enbridge, and Pacific Trails, intended to build pipelines. Their campaign has faced hostility and violence, including from the government of Canada, and its national police force, the RCMP. Most recently, TC Energy’s Coastal GasLink project was backed by the RCMP in an attempt to gain access to the Unist’ot’en camp. To the dismay of Coastal GasLink and Canada’s colonial government, the camp has also received immense support both locally and internationally, with solidarity blockades of Canada’s railroad threatening to shut Canada down. 

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Season 4 Episode 10 – Wet’suwet’en Strong: Indigenous Land Rights in Canada

This episode discusses the Unist’ot’en campaign to protect their land and preserve it for future generations. In 2010, the Unist’ot’en began constructing a cabin within their territory in the exact place where three companies, TC Energy, Enbridge, and Pacific Trails, intended to build pipelines. Their campaign has faced hostility and violence, including from the government of Canada, and its national police force, the RCMP. Most recently, TC Energy’s Coastal GasLink project was backed by the RCMP in an attempt to gain access to the Unist’ot’en camp. To the dismay of Coastal GasLink and Canada’s colonial government, the camp has also received immense support both locally and internationally, with solidarity blockades of Canada’s railroad threatening to shut Canada down. 

Dr. Tait narrates her daily journey home on Highway 16, also known as the Highway of Tears. It received this name because of the numerous indigenous girls and women that have disappeared and supposedly been killed across the stretch of the road that leads from more populated areas to the territory of the Unist’ot’en. From the side of official authorities, there has been no attempt to resolve the cases. In fact, the Canadian police force is actively perpetrating violence against indigenous people and thus further increase the fear that Dr. Tait and other women experience travelling the 66 km road to their remote territory, knowing they could be stopped and abused at any time. 

In the 1990s , the Canadian government recognised the legal jurisdiction of the Unist’ot’en over their territory, meaning they acknowledged the clans’ right to occupy and use the land. However, both the government and police pretend as if the law doesn’t exist. This disparity in Canadian laws is as old as Canada itself. To deal with the colonial trauma that indigenous peoples have had to deal with for generations, Dr. Tait set up a cabin to function as a Healing Centre that would help indigenous peoples cope with colonial trauma. This includes the disappearance and murder of thousands of indigenous women, as well as arrests of innocent people. 

The situation is worsened by the construction of the Coastal GasLinks pipeline, planned to run directly through the Unist’ot’en territory. Following an interim injunction at the BC supreme court, the company received permission to access the territory for pre-construction work. This resulted in the establishment of a land camp, containing hundreds of workers that are further undermining the indigenous peoples’ security. 

“It is worrying that industrial workers, who come freely and go freely from our territory without any kind of police checks, without any kind of accountability, without any connection to the land or the people in the area” 

Nevertheless, the chiefs at first decided not to resist, hoping for a just verdict. However, the courts’ final verdict was that anyone attempting to interfere with CGLs’ work would be breaching injunction and thus subject to arrest. When the chiefs attempted to resist, basing their actions on Wetsueten law, the police violently enforced the courts’ decision and further marginalised the indigenous clan. The episode gives an insightful overview over the legal human rights abuses taking place in Canada. These should be seen in the bigger picture, as globally indigenous peoples are discriminated against the law and find themselves in powerless positions to challenge authorities. 

Link for further information:

  • Unist’ot’en website with recent updates – https://unistoten.camp/wetsuweten-hereditary-chiefs-meet-with-mohawks-of-tyendinaga-set-conditions-for-nation-to-nation-talks/
  • Link between ‘men camps’ and violence against women – https://thenarwhal.ca/b-c-failed-to-consider-links-between-man-camps-violence-against-indigenous-women-wetsuweten-argue/
  • Interview with another activist – https://www.democracynow.org/2020/2/13/wet_suwet_en_territory_pipeline_opposition
  • On indigenous law – http://jfklaw.ca/making-space-for-indigenous-law/
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Season 4 Episode 9 – Forced Labour in China’s Prisons: A Conversation with Peter Humphrey

In December, a six year old British girl buys cheap Christmas cards from Tesco for her friends. Suddenly, she turns to her dad and says: “Daddy, someone has already written in this one”. What he finds is a cry for help from a Chinese prisoner forced to manufacture the cards. In this episode we talk to Peter Humphrey, who was himself wrongly incarnated in the Shanghai prison where the Christmas card was manufactured. This episode touches on the conditions of forced labour in Chinese prisons, corporate social responsibility and the steps consumers can take to stop such grave human rights violations from happening. 

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Season 4 Episode 9 – Forced Labour in China’s Prisons: A Conversation with Peter Humphrey

In December, a six year old British girl buys cheap Christmas cards from Tesco for her friends. Suddenly, she turns to her dad and says: “Daddy, someone has already written in this one”. What he finds is a cry for help from a Chinese prisoner forced to manufacture the cards. In this episode we talk to Peter Humphrey, who was himself wrongly incarnated in the Shanghai prison where the Christmas card was manufactured. This episode touches on the conditions of forced labour in Chinese prisons, corporate social responsibility and the steps consumers can take to stop such grave human rights violations from happening. 

While China has been using forced labour in prisons since the 1960s, the horrific human rights abuses associated with it only became known in the 1990s. Since then, forced manufacturing has become ever more important for the Chinese economy, which is under pressure from other Asian countries producing cheap goods. Officially, the prisons aim to combine education and labour to transform criminals into law-abiding citizens. However, when asked about the effectiveness of this strategy, Peter told us: 

“When it comes to the issue of reform and punishment there is not much reform, it is pretty much all punishment” 

– Peter Humphrey 

The attempt to reform is an attempt to cover up a system that exploits and profits from the prisoners. No one comes out a new, reformed man. In fact, Peter explains that neither the prisoners nor the wardens take the reform aspect serious – prisoners only pretend to be going trough the motions to not cause any trouble. If you want to reform a man you need to treat him with dignity and respect – as Peter explains – and forced labour is not the way to do that. 

Peter Humphrey was living and working in China when his involvement with an American client led to collisions with the police. Based on false allegations, he spent two years in Qinpu prison. The episode gives insight into the chilling strategies used in the prisons to “grind you down, crush you and break your will”. Starting from day one, untried citizens are exposed to unliveable conditions, pushed into writing confessions for crimes they haven’t committed. Peter shares with us that upon his release, he was immediately diagnosed with cancer, a consequence of having been denied treatment in the prison cell though the wardens were aware of his worsening condition. Upon arrest, Peter requested to be given a copy of the UN treaty on imprisonment and torture. When he finally received the document after his trial, he found that it contained a checklist of conditions that had to be met for prisons to live up to the treaty. Peter estimates that Qinpu prison would fail on roughly 70% of the points mentioned. For instance, the document says that prison cells need to be furnished, yet Peter and 11 other inmates shared a completely empty prison cell, where they were sleeping and eating off the floor.  

Apart from these outright-violent measures to coerce prisoners into abiding the prison’s rules, they also use a merit system to convince people to contribute to manufacturing work. When Peter was in prison, manufacturing labour was optional, yet prisoners participating in it were given merit points that could reduce their sentence. In the past four and a half years, the conditions have become even harsher. The system has moved from voluntary to mandatory labour, and various forms of punishment were applied to those not abiding to the system. 

The discussion leads to the topic of corporate social responsibility, and the role that companies and consumers can play in preventing these atrocities from happening. Peter, who was himself involved in supply-chain work, argues that it is almost impossible for MNCs to drill down through the supply chain to “the bottom of the pond” and be certain that no prison labour is involved. Firstly, Chinese authorities prohibit investigations by foreign companies. Also, if low-margin work is sub-contracted to Chinese firms, it is likely that these will further sub-contract the work, thus you can’t find out the working conditions simply by auditing the supplier. Lastly, Chinese prisons are often registered as an enterprise and thus well-hidden from investigation. Thus, the only possible solution is for consumers not to buy low-margin, cheap products that are manufactured in China. 

Link for further information: 

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Season 4 Episode 8 – The Immigrant ‘Race’: Part 2 with Jacinta Gonzales

In this episode we are joined by Jacinta Gonzales, a Senior Campaign Organizer with Mijente, to discuss her current activism against hostile environments in the US. After bringing to the forefront the racial processes underpinning the Ellis Island legacy, our panellists and guest discuss the intersection of technology and state infrastructure in targeting and detaining immigrants at the US border. 

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Season 4 Episode 8 – The Immigrant ‘Race’: Part 2 with Jacinta Gonzales

In this episode we are joined by Jacinta Gonzales, a Senior Campaign Organizer with Mijente, to discuss her current activism against US hostile environments. After bringing to the forefront the racial processes underpinning Ellis Island, our panellists and guest discuss the intersection of technology and state infrastructure in targeting and detaining immigrants at the US border. 

In the first part of this series on the immigrant ‘race’, we learned about the racist foundations of the current UK border regime. This episode picks up this threat to draw parallels to the violence of the US immigration system, which has become increasingly visible throughout the Trump administration. Though the fight against illegal immigration has been going on for many years, with the Obama administration seeing record numbers of deportation, this trend is only getting worse as the government is implicating modern technology to expand surveillance. From the beginning of his campaign, Trump painted immigrants as scapegoats for broader political issues in the US. Since coming to power, the presidents’ administration created policies that explicitly use cruelty to make political points, activating a far-right and xenophobic base to protect his agenda. 

Jacinta takes us back to the legacy of Ellis Island, the United States’ busiest immigration station that saw approximately 12 million immigrants pass through its ports between 1892 and 1954. The euphoria associated with having ‘made it’ to the safe haven that was the US is a scene familiar to everyone, having been replicated in movies, books and photos. What is often forgotten, however, are simultaneously occurring atrocities of land theft, alienation of native populations and forced labour of black people. In recognising that the immigration process at Ellis island was heavily racialised, we can begin to draw parallels to todays’ immigration processes. For instance, narratives of the ‘right’ immigrant are seeping into administrative decisions over people’s worth and a value to the US. The episode highlights how contemporary practices of policing and control are based around race and class rather than public safety. 

Jacinta highlights the importance of building power both inside and outside of the state. The NGO Migente brings together networks of campaigners to create a political home that fights on all these fronts. The term ‘political home’ signifies the dedication to certain principles – Migente is pro black, pro women, pro planet, pro workers – “because our communities are all those things and more”. 

‘Sometimes we have to fight and create alternatives outside of the state, and that is where we are able to use the beauty and intelligence and the brilliance of our communities to create options that our community needs. Sometimes those are co-ops, sometimes those are collectives, sometimes those are community gardens. We have so much to offer that we can build for and between each other.’

Jacinta Gonzales

Part of Jacinta’s activism is the campaign #NoTechforICE. It fights against the technology companies contributing to the U.S. Immigration and Custom Enforcement’s (ICE) deportation machinery, fuelled by modern data provision and storage technologies. Coupled with an increasing amount of financial resources made available to strengthen the U.S. police force, the power available to ICE directly results in violence against immigrants. The episode touches on the power configurations between the government and private companies, and highlights the shocking ways in which these transcend data privacy laws. Jacinta highlights the next steps that need to be taken to expose and dismantle the actions of ICE, which are resulting in arrests, separation of families and trauma of thousands of people. 

“We face the hard task to work on both understanding and dismantling hundreds of years of oppressive systems that have been used against our communities while at the same time have the vision of understanding where these governments and companies are trying to go with new systems of control” 

Jacinta Gonzales

Links for further information:

  • The work of Mijente – https://twitter.com/ConMijente 
  • #NotechforICE – https://notechforice.com 
  • An example of how facial recognition is used by ICE – https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/ryanmac/clearview-ai-fbi-ice-global-law-enforcement
  • Student protests against Palantir, a private tech company – https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/campus-activists-find-target-intersection-immigration-technology-palantir-n1093136
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Season 4 Episode 7 – Declarations in Conversation: The University Strikes Back

From 25th Nov – 4th Dec, lecturers in 60 UK universities went on strike with UCU. We hit the picket lines of Cambridge to find out why they were swapping their blackboards for banners.

At the end of last year, the University and College Union (UCU) organised a strike action at 16 universities across the UK, including in Cambridge. During this time, staff members refused to do university-related work. This was followed by an ‘action short of strike’, meaning that they were working strictly to contact and not rescheduling missed lectures or teaching. By intentionally disrupting teaching, striking staff raised awareness to some of their most pressing concerns, including the gender and ethnicity pay gap that continues to exist in universities like Cambridge. 

For this episode of Declarations, our producers Jing and Matt set out to Cambridge’s picket line – a symbolic line formed by bodies around university buildings. Here, they talked to staff and students about the motivations, causes and possible consequences of the strike. Being aware of the mixed feelings that students and the media had towards the strike, the Declarations team wanted to give insight to the myriad reasons that moved academics to take such drastic action.  The recordings paint a vivid picture of the solidarity that brought staff and their students together, showing that the decision to strike was not taken lightly. 

“For me the strike is about closing the gender pay gap, closing the race pay gap, ending casualisation, fighting for a dignified retirement, reducing mental health issues.” 

 – A striking lecturer 

Each strike day was organised around a theme, many of which broadly corresponded with human rights’ issues covered on Declarations. We talked to staff about one of these: issues of racism and migration. Those students and academics lucky enough to be able to enter and leave the UK freely aren’t aware of the difficulties created by ‘hostile environments’, a term that refers to policies set in place by the UK home office to stop immigration. In conversation with foreign staff, we find out how they are affected by these rules, and how this can adversely affect our education. For more information, listen to this seasons’ third episode on the Politics of Exhaustion. 

“All I want to do is get back to work. I love my job and I love my students.” 

– A striking lecturer 

The episode helps to see the strike action as a single occasion that is part of a much larger picture. The University of Cambridge is becoming increasingly intertwined with global capitalism, technological frameworks and national immigration systems – as are many centres of education. One of our panellists, Matt, is engaged in fighting the institutional support that Cambridge receives from technological companies, which enable increased surveillance of university environments. 

 
“We cannot in good conscience claim to solve some of the worlds’ most pressing problems as a leading university while enabling the marginalisation of people who fled and are fleeing conflict, persecution, hunger. Our student body includes refugees and migrations from across the world. In standing in opposition to Palantir, we stand in solidarity with them.” 

Matt, panellist 

Links for further information