Until We Reckon by Danielle Sered: Promotion of Restorative Justice

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Danielle Sered’s Until We Reckon Chapters 5-7 Summary
Sered’s Until We Reckon suggests that over-reliance on incarceration as an intervention for deviance contributes to insecurity in our communities. The author invokes the need to rethink the role of incarceration and argues that violent crime survivors’ needs could be effectively reinstated by requesting the perpetrators to take responsibility for their actions and make reforms for an amicable resolution of coexistence relations. In chapter 5, Sered reiterated the need to conceptualize incarceration as the intervention of last resort to create a criminal justice system where imprisonment would be viewed as the alternative to community-based intervention rather than community interventions being the alternatives to incarceration (Sered 160). By emphasizing community-based interventions against wrongdoing, Sered promotes the restorative justice concept to ensure the wellbeing of both the perpetrator and the victim. Rather than relying on legislative reform to achieve restorative justice, prosecutors should exercise discretion to make incarceration the verdict of last resort (Sered 163). Sered laid out diverse policy reform areas in this chapter, including sentencing reforms and releasing those in prisons.
Questions: What community-based interventions would you suggest for eliminating incarceration entirely? Is it feasible to achieve a community devoid of incarceration requirements?
In chapter six, the author notes that the failed reliance on mass incarceration creates a culture that drives and constrains policy reforms required to enhance safety and address the status quo (Sered 191). The United States (U.S) has a vast history of downplaying the pains experienced by people of color (Sered 192). Contrary to Sered’s narrative, diverse population groups are harmed by crime and the skewed criminal justice s...