Decolonizing Approach to Understanding Intimate Partner Violence in Belize

Countries like Belize, located in the Global South, often have limited financial resources to address problems such as intimate partner violence, and financial support from the Global North is often accompanied by the inherent problems caused by the effects of colonization. As violence is one of the leading causes of death for women in Belize, the need to understand the reasons is pronounced. A decolonized approached is utilized to center the voices of women who had been victims of intimate partner violence. In conducting this research I address, the W questions: who, why, where, and how, in order to recognize my role in the research process and to center the voices of the collaborators. All of the collaborators, through sharing their stories, revealed the impact of colonization on how they see themselves and the world around them. These findings indicate the need for further research on the effects of colonization, as well as the decolonization methods needed in order to restructure how victims of intimate partner abuse are treated and provided suppor

Decolonization and Restorative Justice: A Proposed Theoretical Framework.

The concept of decolonization has been used in numerous disciplines and settings, including education, psychology, governance, justice, transitional justice, restorative justice as well as research methods. Fanon (1963) saw decolonization as a process of both unlearning and undoing the harms of colonization. For Monchalin (2016), decolonization is both a goal and process to bring about a fundamental shift in colonial structures, ideologies and discourses. According to Alfred (2009, p. 185), decolonization requires “nation-to-nation partnership” for “justice and peace”. In the context of Restorative Justice (RJ), decolonization entail a) addressing historical harms of colonization; b) recognizing grievances of indigenous and marginalized communities about the justice system as genuine; and c) acknowledging  that state- or INGO-funded RJ practices may do more harm than good. This paper begins with a brief overview of decolonization discourses from micro and macro perspectives to then locate decolonization in justice settings, arguing against “copying and pasting” Eurocentric models of RJ practices. Grounded in the findings of RJ visionaries and practitioners in Bangladesh and the work of Cunneen (2002), and Tauri and Morris (1997), this study proposes a decolonizing framework for RJ practices

Necropolitics and the violence of Indigenous incarceration

Since the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody, over thirty years ago, there have been over 400 Indigenous deaths in custody, with 28% of the Australian prison population identifying as Indigenous. Indigenous over-representation in the criminal justice system continues to be an unresolved issue despite varying attempts to reduce the high incidence of incarceration experienced by Indigenous Australians. This paper proposes a fresh approach to analysing the violence of Indigenous incarceration using the theory of necropolitics. The paper represents a critical discussion of a work-in-progress of how an analytical framework based on necropolitics has the potential to elevate the often-silenced voices of vulnerable populations, such as Indigenous Australians, within the criminal justice system. This is because the proposed study will present a multi-level analysis of the overt and covert forms of violence perpetrated against Indigenous Australians within the criminal justice system and unlock the potential of exposing the extent to which unequal relations of power contribute to these forms of violence.  The significance of this research therefore lies in its capacity to provide policymakers with deeper insights into how such forms of violence impact upon and further disempower Indigenous Australians in the Australian criminal justice system

Reparative Justice Quartet: A Poetic Interpretation of ‘Burnt Norton’ by T.S. Eliot

Eliot was confessing the sins of Europe against Indigenous people&nbsp

Writing Another as Other: A Retro-Intro-Extrospection

Autoethnographies such as Ajil and Blount-Hill’s (2020) in DCJ, 2(1), which demonstrate the disempowerment suffered by the othered at the hands of colonial systems are valuable contributions to decolonial literature. Still, as the othered gain in status, privilege, and power, narrative provides a worthy method of analyzing the othered and powerful

Throughcare for Indigenous Peoples Leaving Prison

The concept of throughcare for Indigenous peoples leaving prison has attracted a lot of attention in Australia over the last couple of years. The reason for this is the ongoing overrepresentation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples in the criminal justice system and, more particularly, in prison. Recent approaches to address this overrepresentation are focusing on the back end of the criminal justice process, investigating reintegration needs after release to prevent reoffending. This is particularly the case for Indigenous peoples as we know that high recidivism rates are one of the main drivers for overrepresentation in prison. In this contribution, I want to provide an overview of recent throughcare related government reports, academic research and publications, as a guide to new information now available. In the discussion, I am looking for convergences and divergences and recommendations for the way forward

“Writing the Other as Other”: Exploring the Othered Lens in Academia Using Collaborative Autoethnography

Trends seemingly signal the decay of White heterosexual male hegemony in academe. Still, while changes have addressed lack of access to an academic system whose benefits are assumed, critical literatures call into question Western-based theory and traditionally Eurocentric ways of knowledge production. An important programmatic component of decolonizing knowledge production consists of arguing for increased inclusivity and diversity among scholars. The present study is inscribed in these decolonial tendencies and focuses on the experience of otherness inside academia. Using collaborative autoethnography, we set side-by-side the academic and professional experiences and epistemological reflections of two criminal justice and criminology scholars: an Arab European scholar of politico-ideological violence and a Black American scholar of identity and the psychology of justice. We explore otherness as a ‘social fact’ and identify three dimensions, namely (1) otherness as a lens to read coloniality, (2) feeling and coping with otherness, and (3) otherness as connection. We suggest that promoting the “othered lens” in academia, especially criminology, may not only be healthy and necessary for a diversification of views and perspectives, but also epistemologically and methodologically vital for how criminology engages with the socially deviant or harmed Other it is, by its very essence, preoccupied with