Initiative
Countering
State Repression
When state power expands, movements need defense.
A movement lawyering project working against surveillance, detention, rights violations, and repression while supporting movements in the U.S. South and the Global South.
Movement Lawyering
Rights are defended in the places power tries to narrow them.
The Countering State Repression Initiative works to prevent counter-movement and state surveillance attempts and to shut down Georgia ICE prisons.
The initiative protects fundamental rights for Black, Muslim, and migrant populations while supporting social justice movements in the Global South.
What the work confronts
Repression changes form. The work has to meet it there.
Shut down Georgia ICE prisons.
Protect Black, Muslim, and migrant populations.
Support social justice movements in the Global South.
Law + Liberation
Human rights abuses don’t occur in a vacuum.
Global systems can enable violence without accountability. Liberation seeks to dismantle those systems so people can thrive in safety and with dignity.
Listen to Director of Legal and Advocacy Azadeh Shahshahani discuss European colonialism, interventionism, international violence, and how those dynamics return to shape domestic rights violations.
Law at the MarginsLaw + Liberation: Episode 12 — Human Rights
From the field
Movement defense is collective work.
From the field
Explore the other initiatives