The American criminal system is at a crossroads. The killings of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Eric Garner, Michael Brown, and so many others have ignited national and international protests against the long-standing use of police violence against African Americans. We are seeing widespread and unprecedented recognition that our criminal system remains plagued by racism: commercial, educational, and political institutions across the social spectrum are publicly stepping forward to reject racialized police violence and to affirm their support for #BlackLivesMatter.
In this lecture series, Harvard Law School faculty members Andrew Manuel Crespo and Alexandra Natapoff will bring together an interdisciplinary group of scholars in conversation with police, prosecutors, activists, and other leading voices to analyze the complex and democratically vital questions raised by the institution of American policing. These conversations are aimed at illuminating the current moment, what brought us here, and the opportunities it presents to us as a legal and national community moving forward.
The colloquium series will take place on select Fridays from 12:00 – 1:30pm EST, and registration for live viewing is open to all members of the Harvard community (anyone with a harvard.edu email address). You can register for the Webinar here. Upon approval, you will receive a Zoom link to your harvard.edu email address. All sessions will be recorded and videos will be available afterwards on this website for broader public viewing.
Agenda: Further details about each session, including topics, dates, times and moderator and panelist information can be found on our Agenda page.
Topics: For further readings and resources on each topic, please consult the “Topics” drop-down menu above.
The opinions expressed in each session represent the views of the speakers alone. No information provided by any speaker can be taken as legal advice.