In recent years, the conversation around reparations has gained significant momentum, with formalized local, state, and national efforts emerging to study the legacy of chattel slavery and other forms of state-sanctioned violence and make recommendations for redress. However, there is growing concern that as the state becomes more and more involved in the historical question of reparations, the concept itself is being co-opted and reduced to symbolic gestures, like apologies and one-time financial payments that fail to meaningfully alter the conditions that produced the violence at the center of the conversation. And, in many modern cases, the state-sanctioned violence for which government officials and programs seek to apologize continues completely unabated.
What is an apology from the President of the United States worth if genocide persists? What exactly is so progressive about liberal leadership if reparations do not include cessation of settler colonial violence, and why has our demand failed to make it clear that we are unwilling to accept less?
A Case Study in "Repair" Under Liberal Leadership: Reproductive Violence in California
A striking example of this disconnect between liberal leadership's reconciliation efforts and the reality of material conditions can be found in the bright blue state of California.
In 1909, California became the third U.S. state to enact a sterilization law, establishing a state-run sterilization program. By the time the law was repealed in 1979, over 20,000 people had been involuntarily sterilized—approximately one-third of all state-sponsored sterilizations in the U.S. during this period.
In 2003, then-California Governor Gray Davis issued a formal apology to survivors of these sterilizations, calling it a "sad and regrettable chapter" in the state's history and expressing deep regret for the suffering caused by the state's eugenics-era policies.
However, despite Davis' apology, the material consequences of this violence—reproductive trauma, loss of autonomy, and the ongoing legacy of racialized reproductive violence within California's legal and healthcare systems—were left largely unaddressed.
Though the state's sterilization law was repealed in 1979, state-sanctioned reproductive coercion persists. In 2013, investigative reporting revealed that at least 148 involuntary sterilizations had occurred in California's prisons between 2006 and 2010—long after the state's sterilization law had been repealed. These sterilizations were done covertly, with little to no records kept (if there was ever documentation at all), ensuring that those responsible remained unaccountable.