Radical Acts of Justice: How Ordinary People Are Dismantling Mass Incarceration

Jocelyn Simonson argues that solving mass incarceration requires action from ordinary people working together, not from experts and technocrats alone. While many books on mass incarceration suggest technical solutions, Simonson contends that the problems of the American carceral state involve fundamental moral questions. Radical Acts of Justice documents stories of ordinary people engaging in collective resistance: paying bail for strangers, using social media to document courtroom proceedings, creating videos about individuals for judges, and presenting budget proposals to city councils. Through these actions, groups challenge assumptions that prosecution and imprisonment increase safety, that officials maintain the will of the people, and that justice requires incarceration. When people organize collectively to contest conventional ideas about justice and safety, they demonstrate alternative visions of what justice can be. Simonson shows how collective action can shift power from prominent courtroom figures toward broader public participation.