2023 Theses Master's

Abolition and Gender Justice: South Asian Perspectives on Covid-19, Abolitionist Values, and the Future of Nonprofit Service Provision

Vijayakumar, Varsha

Through qualitative interviews with eight service providers at South Asian organizations addressing gender-based violence in the United States, this research explores the influence of the Covid-19 pandemic and the 2020 Black Lives Matter protests on nonprofit service provision. This research indicates that the Covid-19 pandemic significantly altered programmatic priorities at these organizations, with heightened attention to food justice, housing security, and immigration support.

Findings as they relate to the effects of the Black Lives Matter protests uncover a moderate impact on nonprofits’ language choices and programming, focused on improving the inclusion of Black survivors. Participants’ impressions of police and prison abolition are decidedly complex; these assumptions are informed by a combination of individual political beliefs and experiences working in the anti-violence sector. This research also identifies funding constraints, and their related impact on staff capacity, as the largest obstacle currently threatening the sustainability of South Asian gender-justice nonprofits. In documenting the ways in which these organizations have adapted in response to social unrest and protest, this preliminary research offers a culturally-specific lens that is otherwise largely absent in the literature.