Building relationships, influencing conversations, and shifting narratives. It’s not what most would think of as the first line of defence against a failing justice system, but for PRF partner Justice Reform Initiative (JRI), an advocacy organisation working to reduce the number of people in Australian prisons, these three elements are key to building a sustained shift in public political narratives away from 'tough on crime' approaches and towards evidence-based justice policy.
“We know that jailing is failing,” says JRI Executive Director Dr Mindy Sotiri, “and that the over-use of incarceration causes enormous harm, is ineffective at addressing the drivers of crime, and is a misuse of taxpayer dollars.
“Too many people are ‘managed’ in prison settings, instead of having access to critical resources, supports and care in the community. For example, without appropriate housing, healthcare and job opportunities there is a much higher chance people will come into contact with the justice system. The majority of people entering prison have experienced multiple and intersecting disadvantage, and prisons operate to exacerbate and entrench this disadvantage.”
Prisons cost the Australian economy $6.3 billion annually, yet the evidence shows that prison does little to address the drivers of incarceration or reduce crime, and in fact increases the likelihood of a person reoffending. Regardless of historically low crime rates in most of the major offence categories, almost all Australian jurisdictions are investing in new prisons or prison infrastructure.
In 2024 the Northern Territory and Queensland elections were fought on political commitments to reduce crime, and despite the evidence that imprisonment has no significant impact on crime rates, prison is still centred as the main response.
Together with an alliance of people who share long-standing professional experience, lived experience and/or expert knowledge of the justice system, JRI has been focused on building relationships, engendering commitments to move away from law-and-order politics and policy making and towards cross-party evidence-based approaches to justice.
In 2020 PRF provided $500K seed funding to establish JRI, and in 2021 provided $3.2 million to enable JRI to advocate key reforms to state criminal justice systems. In the three years since, JRI has built a reputation as a trusted voice on justice system reforms, publishing 23 reports and discussion papers, and attracted significant media engagement to bring evidence more sharply into the conversation about justice.
“Influencing conversations and shifting narratives takes time,” says PRF Head of Community Wellbeing & Justice Dominique Bigras, “but by working collaboratively with other advocates in this space, JRI has been able to help raise awareness of the failures of our prison system and start to build the case for prison reform and support for investment in community-led prevention.”
In October this year PRF granted JRI a further $6.8 million over five years to drive a national public facing advocacy campaign to highlight the failure of incarceration and mobilise communities and parliaments around Australia to shift from a political and policy preference for imprisonment to more effective and economically sustainable justice approaches.
This story first appeared as a case study in PRF's 2024 Annual Review.
