International Women's Day, top reading recommendations, new initiatives and resources
A newsletter from Women Beyond Walls - together we can build collective power and amplify voices to end the over-incarceration of women and girls worldwide.
Dear friends,
Firstly, thank you to everyone who has subscribed to this newsletter so far - we really appreciate your support. Please do keep sharing this newsletter, and help us to amplify voices, build collective power and share some great resources.
For the Women Beyond Wall’s March Newsletter we’ll be: sharing resources with you so you can celebrate the people who inspire you in their efforts to end the over-incarceration of women and girls worldwide; we’ll be highlighting news from around the world; we’ll be recommending some insightful books.
Join us in celebrating inspiring people on International Women’s Day 2023
International Women’s Day offers us a moment to uplift people who put in the graft every day of the year to make a difference in the lives of women and girls in touch with criminal justice/legal systems. Every single day of the year women with lived experience - lawyers, activists, academics, philanthropists, criminal justice professionals, feminists and allies - work hard to bring about the end of the over-incarceration of women and girls. On 8th March 2023 we want to flood social media with virtual bouquets of gratitude to those people who make a difference and often go unrecognised for their tireless efforts.
So we are asking everyone in the Women Beyond Walls community to join us with this simple act on 8th March 2023.
How to take part
Pick your social media platform of choice.
Choose a graphic from our social media pack, we’ve given you lots of colours to choose from.
On 8th March 2023, tag a person/people you believe make a difference in the lives of women and girls in touch with justice/criminal systems. Use our sample tweet/post below, or write your own message of recognition, for a person/people who inspire you. Don’t forget to tag them and @womenbeywalls on Twitter or @womenbeyondwalls on Instagram (we will retweet/share your post!)
Sample social media language for 8 March 2023
[when you want to share your gratitude with multiple people]
This #WomensDay I’m tagging people and organisations I think are doing remarkable work every day of the year with and for incarcerated women and girls worldwide. Thank you - you inspire me!
#WomensDay2023 @womenbeywalls
[when you want to share your gratitude with one special person]
This #WomensDay I’m thankful for the work of [insert handle or name of person] - you inspire me with all you do every day of the year with and for incarcerated women and girls worldwide.
#WomensDay2023 @womenbeywalls
This International Women’s Day, I’m joining others in the @womenbeyondwalls community and highlighting the work of people and organisations I think are doing remarkable work every day of the year with and for incarcerated women and girls worldwide. Thank you to the following inspirational individuals and organisations for all they do:
[Insert handles of organisations you want to highlight]
#IWD2023 #WomenBeyondWalls #IWD #InternationalWomensDay #WomensDay #WomensDay2023 #incarceration #womensincarceration #inspiringindividuals
USA: Today, the Mellon Foundation announced their new ‘Imagining Freedom’ initiative - a fund to support the work of “organisations engaging in creative and intellectual work that counters the criminal legal system’s forces of dehumanisation, isolation and separation”. Alongside the new initiative they are also awarding grants to “groups and individuals whose “lives have been impacted by the carceral system.” Well done to all the grantees, and to the Mellon Foundation for prioritising this kind of funding. We highlighted in our Forgotten by Funders report how rare this sort of resourcing is - we hope to see many more foundations and trusts prioritising this sort of grantmaking.
USA: Apply for the Justice Innovation Prize which is awarding $1 million to disrupt the criminal justice system and build a world beyond mass incarceration.
USA: Mass Incarcerations Trends report by The Sentencing Project released highlighting the growth in state and federal prison populations in the USA - 2023 marks the 50th year since the U.S. prison population began its unprecedented surge.
USA: People’s Justice Leaders are launching a new programme for women who are formerly incarcerated/directly impacted by incarceration (Applicants must be a resident of Cincinnati or Kentucky).
AUSTRALIA: An interesting article from LSJ Media Online on women in prison in Australia and the case for “a radical re-look at Australia's laws and criminal justice system.”
KENYA: Clean Start and ICJ Kenya released a report, Re-Thinking the Bars: Access and Administration of Justice for Women who Commit Petty Offences.
UK: Women in Prison released a report, The Value of Women’s Centres, highlighting the important role of these centres in providing community based support to women in contact with the criminal justice/legal system.
UK: Working Chance’s report, Worst Case Scenario, highlights how racism in the criminal justice system harms women’s chances of finding work.
UK: We Level Up are campaigning to end the imprisonment of pregnant women.
MEXICO: Important commentary from Coletta Youngers and Corina Giacomello on the harms of electronic monitoring for women.
COLOMBIA: WOLA unpacks Colombia’s new law on alternatives to incarceration for women heads of households, which was the result of campaigning by many organisations, such as Dejusticia and Mujeres Libres Colombia. Listen to this podcast for more information about women's imprisonment in Colombia and the law on alternative sentences.
GLOBAL: World Prison Brief released the 5th edition of their World Female Imprisonment List, which highlights how the number of women and girls in prison worldwide has increased by nearly 60% since 2000.
What should I read next?
We have created a book recommendations list on our website that we will keep up to date with some great reads if you want to find out more about ending the over-incarceration of women and girls worldwide.
This month we’ll be reading ‘Imperfect Victims’ by Leigh Goodmark, about the need to protect criminalised survivors of gender-based violence. In many of our Women Beyond Wall’s podcast episodes our guests have highlighted how often women who have suffered intimate partner violence, rape, sexual assault, or trafficking have ended up being arrested, prosecuted, convicted, and incarcerated.
Let us know if we need any other books on our list!
Thank you for reading this newsletter, we hope you will join us in celebrating inspiring individuals on March 8 with our suggested social media action - let’s flood the internet with positivity!
Thank you for being a part of the Women Beyond Walls community. If you have any future events/resources/reports you want us to consider highlighting in future newsletters don’t hesitate to contact us on hello@womenbeyondwalls.org.
The Women Beyond Walls Team