Reparations

Reparations are not only necessary, but achievable. When done right, they benefit us all.

Reparations shows that reparations are not about lingering on the past, but about building a better future. Opening a conversation about reparations is not about imposing collective guilt or punishment, but acknowledging shared responsibility  for a more equal society. 

Reparatory justice is not just a call to redistribute money, but an opportunity to reconfigure structures which exist to benefit a handful of people, and spread the potential for prosperity. 

Reparations are not an abstract model, but a fact of reality: reparations are a standard element of international human rights law and have frequently been paid by other nations including Germany, Canada and the USA,  in response to historical injustices. Cruelly, countries subject to colonial rule have already been forced to pay reparations to their oppressors: 

• Haiti was subject to a £21 billion payment (in today’s money) by France in return for the recognition of its independence; 
• The Democratic Republic of Congo – one of the most resource-rich countries on earth – inherited the debts of its former colonial ruler, Belgium.

Perhaps most shockingly, Britain already paid vast sums in reparations at the abolition of slavery  –  an astonishing £20 million, equivalent to over £100 billion today - which was still being repaid by taxpayers until 2015. These sums were paid not to the people who had been enslaved, but to those who had enslaved them.

Global economic structures are still set up to serve the interests of Western elites. 3.4 billion people now live in countries that spend more on debt interest than on either health or education. 

Through this collection, we call for redistribution, repair, and the creation of a renewed alternative. It’s not a call for a cash payment from wealthy elites, or for philanthropic gestures that fail to confront structural harm. It’s an opportunity to radically redesign our political and economic systems in a way that benefits all, and addresses the many global crises we are facing.

Through 11 chapters written by experts in their field, we hope not only to destigmatise the conversation around reparations, but offer a proactive way to bring this conversation to life. Covering areas including wealth divisions, aid, drug policy and reparatory justice, education policy, climate justice, death, and proposals for a National Commission on Reparative Justice, we show how reparations can move beyond a divisive abstract idea. 

This conversation is about the restoration of dignity, the reckoning with history, and the creation of new possibilities. The question is no longer whether reparations should be considered, but how they might be thoughtfully implemented.

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Dr Shabna Begum, CEO of the Runnymede Trust, said:

“This report rejects assertions that reparations are a far-fetched ideal not rooted in reality. Instead, it highlights how relevant the processes of enslavement and colonisation have been to shaping present day inequalities, the reparatory justice efforts that are already active in the UK and, critically, that a reparations lens can help us to build a fairer economic model that prioritises prosperity for all, rather than profit for some. 

“It is not that we cannot afford the cost of reparations. What we cannot afford is to continue avoiding core issues regarding wealth, inequality and the climate, whilst people get poorer and the planet teeters towards climate catastrophe.”

Dr Kojo Koram, academic and co-author of the report, said:

"This report makes an urgent intervention in the reparations debate, both domestically and internationally. It should be read by all those who seek to better understand how our collective past informs the inequalities we see in the present."