All our justice: People with convictions and ‘participatory’ criminal justice

Abstract

Criminalised people play varied roles in the development and delivery of criminal justice services and advocacy around the world, yet rarely feature in texts on service user involvement. The chapter explores how people with lived experiences of the criminal justice system are involved with, and too often excluded from, formal criminal justice knowledge production. We reflect on ‘leaders’ with lived experiences and how they produce, contribute to and constitute criminal justice knowledges. These reflections highlight the importance of being sensitive to the needs of people sharing their shame/trauma-invoking life experiences, offering substantial opportunities beyond volunteering or insecure contracts and real commitments to power sharing. As a single ‘user voice’ is not possible, it is also important that a range of perspectives are represented from activist/practitioner to managerial levels. Importantly, this should include black and minority ethnic men and women, who are overrepresented as recipients of punishment and underrepresented as leaders and influencers, with or without lived experience.