Failure of accountability initiatives

From today’s discussion in class on accountability I was left with more questions than answers. The one that floated to the top of my mind was, how can we redefine our understanding of justice in such a way to not reproduce the same systems of inequality the prison industrial complex and structures of violence continue to reproduce. Now before I delve further into the topic I want to reiterate that I believe survivors should always be the central figure within discourses of sexual assault. Perpetrators are too often given the sympathetic viewpoint whilst survivors and their opinions are marginalized. With both this and my own experiences in mind, I want to continue to question our notions of justice and accountability.

“A look at feminist forms of justice that don’t involve the police” by Kristian Williams goes into detail about the different accountability initiatives across the US. Williams lists the different processes used by organizations and their approach to perpetrators. Most interesting though are the reasons listed as to why many of these organizations fail to achieve their goals and why people within those groups are disillusioned by the process.

Genevieve Goffman lists out four main difficulties with the accountability process, namely practical problems, structural problems, strategic, and finally political problems. Most interesting to me in reflection of our class discussion is Goffman’s admittance that the real flaw behind accountability processes are that organizations seek a “cultural shift” through personal transformation of the perpetrator. When in fact a “cultural shift [should be] a predecessor to personal transformation.” Then we can create meaningful, long lasting social change.

From this I will likely continue to struggle with our current cultural understandings of justice and accountability. How can we create a safe space, a community, that both supports the survivor whilst holding accountable, though no ostracizing, a perpetrator within that community? How can one organization engage with both parties?