We have take off!

We are delighted to have launched Justice Futures this week, along with our guest speakers who inspired a rich and thought-provoking discussion about transformative change.

We started by asking people how they felt about justice reform at the moment …

The word cloud highlights the mixed emotions many of us feel: from despondent and disillusioned, to cautiously optimistic and hopeful.

Our mission at Justice Futures is to energise and empower people to explore and evolve future approaches to crime and justice by seeing, thinking and doing differently, to build tomorrow today.

To hear more about co-directors Gemma Buckland, Nina Champion and Anita Dockley, and how we came to set up Justice Futures, watch the video clip below:

We then welcomed our first two guest speakers. Firstly, Anna Birney, Chief Enabling/Evolving Officer (we love that job title!) at The School of Systems Change, where Justice Futures Co-Directors have all trained. Anna also spent many years as a trustee of The Forgiveness Project.

She discusses how transformative systems approaches are ‘a way of seeing the world as alive and ever-changing’ and that ‘we need to see the system differently. We need to make choices and strategise differently’ if we want to bring about transformative, paradigm-shifting change in complex areas such as education, climate and justice.

Rachel Sinha, co-founder of The Finance Innovation Lab and Founder of The Systems Studio (calling in from Missouri) then shared her experiences using transformative approaches in different sectors. She describes how these approaches often involve ‘people getting together to talk to people that they don’t normally talk to’ and ‘allowing space for conversation, deepening that conversation and capturing ideas that could bring about change.’ Hear more from them below:

The conversation then moved to why we need transformative approaches to build the justice systems of tomorrow today.

We heard from Jeffrey Allen, Lead System Designer from the Ministry of Justice (talking in a personal capacity), who reflected that problems, such as how we ensure our justice systems keeps people safe, secure and gives them the support they need to turn their lives around, are complex i.e. they have an infinite number of inter-related, component elements that continually change in unpredictable ways. He reflected that ‘systems of government are geared towards complicated problems, not complex.’ However, he’s encouraged that statements made recently by the Prime Minister and Cabinet Office ministers indicate ‘we are moving along a pathway to reinventing government and rewiring the system’ with a transformative ‘test, learn and adapt’ approach.

Kamali Stevens (Founder of the Growth App and Consultant for Grow, Transform, Belong CIC) set out how the criminal justice system is ‘outdated, fails to address root causes and is disconnected from the people who it’s meant to serve’ and called for ‘real transformative change. We don’t need sticking plasters or plugging gaps. It’s not a choice, it’s a necessity.’ He echoed Jeffrey’s call for being more open to trying new things, especially innovations from other countries, and ensuring people who have been impacted by the system are involved in co-creating solutions. Listen to their presentations below:

We then introduced Justice Futures’ offer of growing understanding, capacity and movements. We do this by providing transformative learning opportunities, facilitating transformative spaces and fostering transformative collaboration, working across civil, criminal and social justice systems (including the family justice system).

We discussed how Justice Futures can help people ‘see, think and do differently’ to shift paradigms and build the justice systems of tomorrow today. To hear more about our offer and some of the exciting projects we have been working on, click on the recording below:

Thank you to all our brilliant speakers and everyone who supported the launch. We had some lovely feedback from attendees including:

“Good luck - so, so necessary to shift the paradigm and to widen the conversation.”

“Really interesting and inspiring session.”

“Highly impactful launch. Insightful speakers.”

“I’m feeling more positive about change coming.”

“So excited for real change to happen.”

We look forward to collaborating with you - so please sign up for our monthly newsletter to hear about opportunities and updates; and get in contact to book a free ‘curiosity call’.

Gemma, Nina and Anita