StopWatch is working towards a world with safe and thriving communities.

We imagine supportive public safety infrastructure that enables communities to live without fear of disproportionate violence and threat.

StopWatch uses research, advocacy, litigation and community engagement to understand the impacts of disproportionate policing – primarily but not exclusively through the lens of stop and search – advocate for more effective public safety practices and hold the police to account.

The police’s current practices – including that of stop and search – are incompatible with our vision of supporting public safety infrastructure that enables communities to live without fear of disproportionate violence and threat.

We seek to change this.

Our research, resources, and communications enable communities to build shared analysis and take collective action for their safety. We help translate intelligence that lives in the community into policy advocacy, litigation, and community engagement projects – pushing for limits on the reach and powers of the police to mitigate and eradicate disproportionality and injustice.

By connecting and engaging with impacted communities, sector / grassroots groups, and policymakers, we aim to:

• Translate evidence and data into stories, analysis, recommendations and demands
• Reveal the structural and systemic racism inherent in policing practices
• Support overpoliced communities to connect their experiences to the broader structures to build shared analysis and collective demands
• Facilitate dialogue between impacted communities and policymakers
• Share harm reduction practices, tools, and resources (including legal rights education) that support public safety
• Disseminate counternarratives around effectiveness, disproportionality, and policing by consent, to catalyse change

Over the last 15 years, our dedication and commitment to the cause has effectively reframed both the sector and the wide public's understanding of stop and search and disproportionate policing. But the fight for justice for marginalised and racialised communities is far from over. If you are interested, please join us via the contact details below. We'd very much welcome your support.