Participatory action research and policy change

The Morris Justice Project (MJP) works in an area of New York City that is internationally renowned for its place in urban music and culture as much as the stigma that is associated with its reputation. MJP is an informal collection of collaborators and, through its members, is connected with an academic institution. The Project engaged in research-driven activism which attempted to change aggressive community policing methods. One core idea was to use participatory action research methods to generate fresh data on the official policy of ‘stop and frisk’ of residents who were seen as suspect by police. This data was then discussed with a wider set of local people, and used by MJP as part of a city-wide movement for reform of New York Police Department’s ‘Broken Windows’ and ‘zero tolerance’ policies. Theirs is a powerful and uplifting story of community mobilisation for social justice. With 12 authors actively involved in producing and editing, this writing team is itself an example of co-produced knowledge from the start of the inquiry through to and including writing this contribution. It is an illustration of what it could mean for all parties to take seriously multiple forms of expertise. This is not only about elites or professional experts respecting lived expertise, but includes community experts advocating the value of research, or what one participant in the MJP describes eloquently as ‘coming from a place of knowing’.