Jackie Kaplan-Perkins, Human Rights Watch

Q:                    As you know I'm interested in criminal justice reform Everyone that I've interviewed has very different answers to my questions which has been amazing because I've learned so much about what criminal justice reform is. So, to start, can you describe your job in two to three sentences?

JKP:                I come at this a from a bit of a different perspective. I'm a development person so my ultimate goal with Human Rights Watch as the Chicago and Midwest Director, is to develop relationships that will help expand resources for the organization. For the most part that means financial resources, so fundraising, but also developing relationships with other community organizations or partners with whom we can collaborate.

Q:                    Great. Could you talk a little bit about your path to your current position?

JKP:                I love my path because it's landed me here. I imagine everybody's path is unique to them.  I went to the University of Wisconsin and I got out and wasn't sure what I was going to do. And people told me to volunteer and so I volunteered with an organization called the Peace Museum which is sadly no longer in existence. It was committed to peace education through the arts. And I went there because Bono from U2 was known to hang out at this museum. I'm being completely honest. They wrote a number of albums and songs that they named after exhibits they had seen at the museum, so I thought volunteering there would be great. And while I never did meet Bono, I did end up meeting really fantastic people who cared about social justice issues and taught me a lot. My first boss at the Chicago Foundation for Women was involved with the Museum. She hired me for six weeks and I stayed for six years. And then from there, my social justice path was formed. I got involved politically, and I got involved with a number of different organizations and then ultimately found my way to Human Rights Watch. 

What I’ve learned over the past twenty-five years is how interconnected all the social justice issues are, including criminal justice.

Q:                    Yes.

JKP:                And so you can't talk about one in a vacuum, although I'm very happy that some organizations have specific focuses. I worked at the Chicago Foundation for Women, I worked at the National Center on Poverty Law, I worked for Jan Schakowsky, I co-chaired the LGBT committee when President Obama was running for Senate. You realize that every one of those groups has some concentric circles. So that was my path that led me to HRW which is incredibly unique as an organization because I think there are few places where you get to work on every one of these issues

Q:                    Is it significant that your work is located in Chicago?

JKP:                Personally or professionally?

Q:                    Both.

JKP:                Chicago is a very big small town as I like to say. What I have discovered from a personal aspect is that I'm incredibly integrated here and so the people that I met 25 years ago at the Peace Museum or at the Chicago Foundation for Women are still many of the same people that I'm turning to at Human Rights Watch, either as supporters or as advocates or as policymakers. That’s been very important. As for my job at Human Rights Watch right now, I'm the Chicago and Midwest Director so it would be hard to be placed somewhere outside of Chicago.

Q:                    That makes sense! 

JKP:                I think that I can be more impactful because I've built up deep ties here.

Q:                    What does criminal justice reform look like for you?

JKP:                For me criminal justice reform is about racial equality and economic equity. What are the symptoms that have caused a failed criminal justice system? I know you know about the U.S. houses the most prisoners in the world and that we are the only country to have a life sentence without parole, etc. These are shocking statistics and I think about the unique piece of this being a human rights issue in this country goes back our racist past.

Q:                    Yeah. I agree.

JKP:                Economically the divide is only getting larger. If we don't talk about this, we can’t make change.

Q:                    How is your work related to criminal justice reform?

JKP:                Human Rights Watch is an international organization. What most people don't recognize is that our largest program is our U.S. based program and we focus on

three issue areas — immigration, national security, and criminal justice. For instance, life without parole for juveniles ended in California because my colleague Elizabeth Calvin was instrumental in getting that passed.

We highlight issues such as the how the bail system impact people in poverty, and how our drug policies are putting black and brown people in jail and we are able to raise these as human rights issues.

Q:                    And how do you start that conversation?

JKP:                We start by getting people who are interested around our table. And I think what makes my job unique is that I'm able to bring people who are really thinking about these issues —policy advocates, policy makers and philanthropists around a table together to talk and educate each other and collaborate. We do that through informal breakfasts and lunches or larger events like the movie that I mentioned which will be a more public event to highlight our work and the work being done in Chicago. And then we also have broad social media campaigns as well.

Q:                    Thank you. What has stood in your way?

JKP:                I think what has stood in Human Rights Watch's way and I think for a lot of organizations in general is at times we've misunderstood what people value or where people are in relation and understanding on certain issues. I think there was an assumption here in the US - and I think we saw this in other countries with Brexit – that we all share values that value human rights. And I think what we took for granted is that there are a lot of people in this country who feel like their voices are not being heard. I think we need to do better at understanding where the people we're trying to communicate with are starting out and their understandings of the issues. We need to be doing a lot more talking about all of this. I think you and I know that statistic like I mentioned earlier about what our population is versus who is in jail, and how many people we jail here, about the for-profit prison system, But many people don't know that or ever think about this day to day. So many of us get our news these days through Facebook, so it's also whatever our friends are forwarding us whether it's true or not. I think we need to do better on getting our messages across. I feel quite humbled right now. 

Q:                    I agree.

JKP:                Why is criminal justice reform important? Why should you care about any of this if you are busy going to work every day and you come home and you're just trying to make a living, why should we care about these folks who appear to be criminals? And I think there's all sorts of conversations that we haven't had – like how much it actually costs us as a society. I think there is an argument for criminal justice reform no matter where you are on the spectrum. And I think it goes back to perhaps we've been talking to too many like-minded people. We need to be talking to people whose views may be different. 

Q:                    Yeah, I agree. Is there someone you've met or someone you've worked with that has been particularly influential in shaping your views on the system?

JKP:                I've thought about that question a lot because there have been so many. I think any one of Human Rights Watch's researchers, particularly for criminal justice reform, Elizabeth Calvin who I mentioned earlier. But our researchers are collectively hopeful and strategic and understand that movement and change take time. They don’t get defeated very easily. Another one of my heroes in Chicago has always been John Bouman who's the head of the Shriver Center on Poverty Law. I've also met some of the victims who were tortured by John Burge who got them to confess to crimes they didn't commit, and these people were on death row. To see people who have hope after times like that has been humbling. I really am grateful every day to get to do this work.

Q:                    Wow, thank you. Before we conclude, is there anything else you think would be important for me to know as I'm studying the criminal justice system and criminal justice reform that we haven't already talked about?

JKP:                I continue to think about the importance of highlighting race in this conversation. I have a good friend who is a lawyer who has helped a number of wrongly convicted people gain their freedom. He's seen firsthand how this system is stacked against particularly poor and minority people. And we've talked a lot about drug reform. Interestingly enough, many of his clients have been behind jail walls because of minor drug convictions. And now many white folks and mostly rich white people, like my lawyer friend, are set to make a tremendous money off the system. The irony is painful. On a personal level this has been something I've been thinking about a lot, in part because one of my closest friends is State Rep Kelly Cassidy who is trying to get pot legalized in Illinois. I'm thinking about how we make reparations with some of the money because I think it's a matter of time before it happens in Illinois. 

Q:                    Thank you so much. This was so interesting