If you're just entering into this topic, you may want to start with Part 1 of this blog series on Transformative Justice and the Community Accountability Process. Here we go...
4 Habits of Mind
Try things. Test things out. Failure is a given. Keep trying until you find what works for your practice.
It is a process. Messy. Takes time. Changes Course. May hit a wall and need to pivot. Notice, Adapt.
Ask for help. Collaboration is key. Teams make good process work.
Again, failure is a given. CAP and Transformative Justice Practices interrupt traditional and linear notions of progress, success, and failure.
CAP Guiding Questions
Who has been hurt/harmed? Center that person
What do those people need?
What do those people need?
Whose obligation is it to meet those needs?
As the CAP coordinator determine the following:
According to the people and centering the survivor, was there harm, hurt, and/or trigger? What happened? Is harm still happening? (Mapping this out with a drawing helps.)
Who consents to an Accountability Process?
Who is the community? (Use podmapping as a resource)
What do we need that we do not have for this process?
Who will be the Community Accountability Teams?
Building a Community Accountability Team
Do not do this at the time of the crisis. If the harm is presently happening, it is time for harm reduction and intervention, not CAP. Do this after therapeutic processes have been started. The coordinator organizes a Survivor Team and a Person Who Caused Harm Team.
The survivor's team should not be made up of the survivor's best friends, but they should be folks that the survivor trusts and folks the survivor wants to be held accountable to. The Person Who Caused Harm Team should be made of respected folks who are not going to see things and let them go; they should be mentor/coach like people.
