Michelle Alexander

Michelle Alexander is an acclaimed author, social justice advocate, and legal scholar. Born in 1967, she is the author of The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness, which has sold over two million copies worldwide and was named one of the most influential books of the past 25 years.

Alexander is a graduate of Vanderbilt Law School and a former member of the Stanford Law faculty. She currently is the Director of the Racial Justice program at the Microsoft Social Justice Institute at the Kirwan Institute for the Study of Race and Ethnicity at Ohio State University.

Alexander's earliest works involve her advocacy efforts in civil rights. She served on staff at the ACLU and as the director of the Racial Justice Project – a position she founded – in Northern California. She has also served at a variety of civil rights organizations, including delivering pro bono legal services to prisoners in solitary confinement and litigating cases surrounding the death penalty, police brutality, and other issues.

The New Jim Crow, her best-known work, was released in 2010 and charts the history of mass incarceration in the US. It argues that the US legal system has essentially created a "caste system," where citizens are stripped of their rights, stigmas attached, and discriminated against first on the basis of skin color and then for their criminal records. Alexander says that this system, in addition to perpetuating racial injustice, disproportionately affects people of color and leads to an unbalanced system of power and privilege.

In this work, Alexander draws on the theories of scholar Barbara Fields and the historical unconscious, which relates to the lingering effects of past decisions and practices. She also draws a distinction between race and racism and examines the biases of the American criminal justice system.

Alexander has written extensively on the issues she raised in The New Jim Crow, including articles in the New York Times and the Washington Post. In addition, she is the author of The House We Live In: Race, Prison, and the Lockdown of American Politics; and her latest work, The Change We've Been Waiting For, which focuses on tackling systematic racism through organizing, voting, and criminal justice reform.

Alexander has received several honors and awards for her work, including the NAACP Image Award, the Hillman Prize for Book Journalism, and the prestigious Steinbeck Award for the promotion of social justice. She has also been named one of the 100 Most Influential People by Time Magazine, one of the Top 50 Women in America by Essence Magazine, and one of the Leaders of the Law by the National Law Journal.

Michelle Alexander is one of the most prominent voices in the study and criticism of the US criminal justice system. Her work has inspired advocates and academics and served as a wake-up call to reveal the ongoing, systemic injustice of the American system and its effect on people of color. Alexander continues to electrify the conversation around police brutality, criminal justice reform, and racial discrimination, and her work stands as a powerful and enduring testament to social justice.