by Lawrence Cox, LSPC Regional Advocacy & Organizing Associate
I did not come to this work through theory, I came to this work through my life.
Reparations, for me, is not an exercise in morality or symbolism, meant to heal the past. It is a living question of power, of who labors, who benefits, who makes decisions, and who is punished for their refusal to comply. It is a question I have lived with, and one I now organize against as the Regional Advocacy and Organizing Associate with Legal Services for Prisoners with Children and All of Us or None.
This is important. Being impacted by the carceral system, while also working to dismantle the most entrenched logics of it, gives me no space for romanticism. I have witnessed the ways in which the harms of the system are justified, the ways in which coercion is justified as opportunity, the ways in which “voluntary” labor becomes mandatory through punishment, delay, and deprivation. Reparations, as a concept, must engage with this reality, not just acknowledge it.
The dominant narrative around reparations as a concept is that it is a memory project: an exercise in looking back, in accounting for the wrongs of the past by doing nothing more than issuing an apology in the pages of a report or in passing a recommendation on to future generations. It is a convenient way for institutions to pay lip service to the harms without ever conceding any power, to remember without ever redistributing. But the work we are in the midst of demands more. This work demands we understand that reparations is not a memory project, it is a project of governance.
California’s constitution still carries the framework that enables forced labor. We continue to extract labor from incarcerated people under the threat of increased sentences, loss of credits, and disciplinary actions. This practice continues under the guise of rehabilitation and benevolence. Those of us who have lived under this system know the truth. When the consequence of refusal is punishment, then the illusion of choice is nothing but that—an illusion.
This is why our Abolish Bondage Collectively Coalition’s Freedom & Repair Alliance (ABCFRA) campaign is situated at the nexus of abolition and repair, uniting campaigns to abolish involuntary servitude and advance material, enforceable reparations. Repair without abolition is modernizing harm. Abolition without repair leaves the original theft in place. The fight to end involuntary servitude inside prisons is not tangential to the fight for reparations; it is core to it. It is the fight to determine whether the state can continue to coerce labor under the guise of confinement. It is the fight to determine whether punishment can be extended under the guise of rehabilitation. It is the fight to determine whether rehabilitation can be extracted under the guise of coercion. These questions challenge the status quo, and that is why they are being fought.
I have watched bills be watered down in real-time. I have watched language be stripped of any meaningful recourse under the guise of viability. I have watched politicians tout the symbolism of abolition but run away from the substance. I have watched efforts fail, and failures be couched as messaging. But this is not a messaging problem. This is a problem of power. Coalitions are not ornamental. They are not the parade of logos and the occasional convening. They are the attempt to build alternative governance structures outside of the state and pressure the state to do better. This is not easy work. It requires discipline, clarity, and trust, particularly when the stakes are constitutional and the timelines are short.
This is where youth leadership is not only necessary, but critical.
Youth are too often brought into the movement as a symbol of the urgency we must all address. I have never been comfortable with this model. Youth are already living with the results of the political cowardice that has defined our era. Climate collapse, prison expansion, economic insecurity – these are not things that the young face as hypothetical threats. They face these things as reality. Working in partnership with youth-led advocacy groups like Get Free in the fight for reparations is a monumental task because it means moving the center of this work from nostalgia to necessity.
Youth don’t ask us to speed up the pace because of their impatience. They ask us sharp questions because they will have longer to live with the results. They ask us why the work of repair is always delayed and the work of punishment is immediate. They ask us why the people who are most impacted are always brought in last. They ask us why the system gets infinite time and the people don’t. These are not naive questions, they are questions informed by their world. They are questions informed by the reality that the future is not waiting its turn. It is already happening. Our task is not to bring the youth into the movement as an afterthought: We must work alongside them and prepare them not just to protest the injustice we see today, but to envision and govern a way out of it.
The stakes of this moment are high. If we don’t dismantle coerced labor now, it will come back under the justifications of climate emergencies, labor shortages, or fiscal efficiency. If we don’t create reparative structures now, inequality will continue to be codified in our contracts, institutions, and constitutions. Inaction is not a delay; it’s a choice, and it’s a choice to perpetuate inequality for those who are not yet impacted.
Reparations, therefore, is not just a passive process. It’s a process of redistribution, but it’s also a process of redesign. It’s a process of rebuilding institutions so that the harm is not just compensated, but prevented. It’s a process of ensuring that those most impacted are not just advisory, but are the architects of the solution.
I do this work because I have lived the alternative. I know what it means when systems are allowed to define exploitation as opportunity. I know what it means when society forgets the lessons of the past as soon as the pain is hidden behind policy and law. Reparations aren’t about being remembered. They’re about changing what is permitted. And so, I know why this work continues. I know why it’s been a process of generations, of movements, and of working alongside young people who are not waiting for power, but are actively redefining it.
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