Black Lives, White Law: Locked Up and Locked Out in Australia

by Russell Marks

Indigenous Australians are the most incarcerated people on the planet. Indigenous men are fifteen times more likely to be locked up than their non-Indigenous counterparts; Indigenous women are twenty-one times more likely.

Featuring vivid case studies and drawing on a deep sense of history, Black Lives, White Law explores Australia’s extraordinary record of locking up First Nations people. It examines Australia’s system of criminal justice – the web of laws and courts and police and prisons – and how that system interacts with First Nations people and communities. How is it that so many are locked up? Why have imprisonment rates increased in recent years? Is this situation fair? Almost everyone agrees that it’s not. And yet it keeps getting worse.

In this groundbreaking book, Russell Marks investigates Australia’s incarceration epidemic. What would happen if the institutions of Australian justice received the same scrutiny to which they routinely subject Indigenous Australians?

Genres: Nonfiction, Australia, Law, History, Audiobook, Politics, Race

368 pages, Paperback

First published August 2, 2022

Reviews

[Cesc]

An information dense consideration of how white law has been imposed on First Nations People in Australia since colonisation. It’s written by a man I would probably find annoying in real life and I’m not sure if this was his story to tell, but he did a good job at it. There was good analysis of the plethora of case studies mentioned and Marks had a clear voice. I learnt a lot and was intrigued throughout the book, although it did sometimes feel like a University essay.

P.S. I am begging the audiobook narrator to look up pronunciations of words he’s not familiar with (I’m looking at you, Groote Eyelandt).

[Lee Anne · Rating 5 out of 5]

The history lesson I wish I learnt at school

[Lainey · Rating 5 out of 5]

4.5 ⭐️ The author’s knowledge and experience, whilst incredibly valuable and engaging, ultimately is that of a settler. When beginning this book I’d made the assumption (my fault) that the perspective within was that of an Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander person, and felt a tad disappointed when it wasn’t. This is the only real critique I have, hence the almost perfect rating.

This was one of the few books I’ve read where I found myself literally exclaiming out loud in anger. The individual case studies and direct quotes shared from settler judges and police were infuriating, yet sadly not surprising. If you feel yourself slowing down in the first few chapters as the author provides historical context, please persevere.

I didn’t think I could feel any angrier about this settler state, law and police… but Marks proved me wrong.

[Emily · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an incredibly important book - an opportunity for Settler Australians to take a long hard look at the systems that have resulted in the reality that our nation experiences today. Told with frank honesty, and including stories and testimonies from various communities around the country, this is a landmark book. A very in depth and worthwhile read.

[Jordyn Harvey · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 I’ll write a review later

[Emma Haddock · Rating 5 out of 5]

Essential reading for anyone in Australia

[Zara Chauvin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Pretty big complex area to cover in one book!
Tracks the complex and contradictory history of white Australian law and how it interacts with First Nations Peoples.

Major TW’s: the whole book is just jam packed full of accounts of extreme violence including official criminal cases of domestic abuse, rape, child abuse, murder, etc, and also many many really difficult and enraging to read accounts of police brutality, prison official brutality and negligence, various horrific crimes by racist white people who got away totally Scott free, absolute racist disdain and explicit discrimination from judges, lawyers, and politicians. It’s a very difficult book to get through. For this reason I’d recommend it to anyone not directly affected by racism often, though anyone reading it should really take care of themselves taking on this much secondhand trauma - but I’m not sure I’d easily recommend it to someone who’s likely to be highly triggered from personal experience by these topics.

Additional TW: The book comes across as relatively compassionate and empathetic to various perpetrators of violence and sexual assault, including paedophilic sexual assault. It’s handled well and I actually totally respect this approach and agree that it’s important to contextualise assailants with their own histories of trauma and oppressive influences, especially when considering how best to reform or replace the carceral system and it’s practices. However, just warning that it might be really hard to read if you’re triggered by these areas, especially if you’ve dealt with difficult or apparently unjust legal proceedings around them.

The book is very heavy in every way. Systemagic oppression seems insurmountable sometimes when you try to tease apart obscene incarceration rates of First Nations people and find layers and layers and layers of colonial forces sedimenting the pattern. Intergenerational trauma and unemployment, police bias, poverty turning unpaid fines into prison sentences, fucked up remand/bail system that functionally imprisons people before proven guilty, unless they plead guilty first, intergenerational family and cultural disruptions from ‘welfare’ help and missionaries, police brutality, judge bias, racist laws and precedents (especially in the Northern Territory!, e.g. lots of “minimum” sentences for small crimes, prohibiting agency of anti-racist judges), etc etc. The book is so informative but it also just feels very overwhelming and not productively oriented when it’s explaining case after case after case of often graphic and traumatic examples of white violence. I suppose it’s productive just to get white people like me feeling this uncomfortable about the systems function though.

“at some point in history, an invaders justice system became the only justice system for people already living here. Nobody can say exactly when that was in a way that makes sense to the First Nations, to international law, or even to the internal rationales of British and then Australian law.”

Fairly “objective” or apolitical language used, (I.e. just literally relating lots of facts without many adjectives or personal opinions clearly expressed) which I suppose is important to make the book come across as appropriately credible and to get the biggest audience it can without toning down the content, however it does just grate a bit to hear things like [the situation] “spiralled out of control and ended with an acting [police] sergeant shooting an eighteen year old man dead.” Like? You meant to say that ‘a white cop murdered an Indigenous teenage boy’? Idk fair enough for the author to go with this ‘neutral’ storytelling style but it does seem really cold and wrong at times.

Final section of the book came through focused on progressive, positive and healthy approaches moving forward, putting many wonderful research-backed propositions forward including integrative or parallel pluralistic systems of justice, working with both settler and indigenous laws; abolishing or reconfiguring prison structures and systems; truth telling and acknowledging past and present realities of racism and colonialism; ceding sovereignty back to First Nations custodians, or even acknowledging that Always Was and Always Will Be, and many other great points.

If you’re going to read any part: read the final section, although the book until then is deeply important context to explain why the conclusions drawn at the end are necessary, appropriate, and would be positive and effective.

[Ronan Hussey · Rating 5 out of 5]

The most alarming book I’ve ever read, challenged my thinking completely and shook me awake.

[Sigh Howard · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read during National Reconciliation Week 2024.

This was a confrontating and insightful read. I would say it's more of an intermediate level academic resource. For me some of the impact was lost because I'm not used to reading dense, research heavy references. It was an okay attempt to both cover an extremely complex issue while also trying to be easily accessible to the general public.

This book is not only an overview of the systemic racism that First Nations people face in Australia, but is also a great resource for arguments against incarceration, which is widely applicable to many intersections of Australias prison population.

Overall I think reading this has given me a good foundation on which I can continue to buildup my knowledge.

[Judy · Rating 5 out of 5]

An incredible book that gave me so so much detail about settler law and the impacts on First Nations peoples of this land -history and current and on-going

I don’t think anyone would call this a good book but it sure is an essential read.

The reading feels excoriating and devastating, as it should.

But with all I have said above PLEASE READ IT.
Learn

It hurt. But I think at the same time, if me as a pretty privileged settler origin senior woman feels hurt by the facts how must the people who are caught in this dreadful seemingly endless cycle feel.

[Lindsey Clewett · Rating 4 out of 5]

Well, when you put it like this, Australia as a nation, and one mainly full of white people, with a western justice system and a disproportionate number of indigenous people incarcerated, really makes no sense at all. Well worth a read but it might make you a wee bit angry.

[Alieysha Nicholls · Rating 4 out of 5]

Extremely informative, disheartening and revealing.

[Georgina Chambers · Rating 5 out of 5]

Definitely worth reading to understand the impact of Australia’s colonial history, the intergenerational trauma and ongoing casual and systemic racism in Australia today.

[Steve · Rating 5 out of 5]

An insightful read from a white lawyer who works with indigenous peoples about how settler law impacts the lives of Indigenous peoples. Thought-provoking and challenging, yet also accessible.

[Shaya · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great book! Must read if you're interested in building knowledge on the issues in Indigenous communities and Australian Law.

[Sophie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fantastic read spot on analysis gives so much perspective on the issue and great to suggest to those who deny or do not understand the context of Aboriginal disadvantage in 2024.

[Abbi · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fuck the settlers. 🔴 ⚫️ 🟡

[Charlotte · Rating 5 out of 5]

Kind of wish it wasn’t written by a white guy, but very interesting history lesson all the same

[Nancy · Rating 3 out of 5]

#AusReadingMonth23
Non-fiction