This research explored youth and civil society nonviolent artivism against police brutality in two Kenyan locations: Nairobi and Kisumu. “Nonviolent artivism” here includes the use of wall paintings and pictures (murals, graffiti, and visual art), spoken word, poetry and music, when they are used as unarmed civilian protection strategies.

Over the years, there have been advocacy initiatives and public demonstrations against police brutality. The demonstrations have often been met with brutal force from the police, sometimes leading to deaths of civilians. For example, in 2020 there were 109 demonstrations and protests on diverse social issues of concern. The demonstrations were in compliance with the law of the constitution which gives citizens the right to self-expression and peaceful public demonstrations. Despite this, there were 9 deaths that were directly attributed to excess use of force by the police and 113 unlawful arrests.

Many civil rights groups have realized that direct physical demonstrations against the police often have a negative impact and bear a high risk of police brutality. As an alternative, artivism was adapted as a strategy for unarmed civilian protection against brutality. This research has taken a special interest in studying artivistic strategies applied by both the youth and civil society organizations and exploring the extent to which these strategies have succeeded in reducing incidences of police brutality.

RESEARCH TEAM

• Martha Okumu, Peace Tree Network (principal investigator)
• Elias Opongo, Hekima University College

PROJECT OUTPUTS

Shadow to Strength: Exhibition, performances, and discussions

In December 2024, the project team organised the exhibition and event “Shadow to Strength: Resilience in the Face of Adversity” in Nairobi’s Kenya National Theatre.

This documentary captures highlights of the event as well as reflections of its organisers and participants.

There is also a series of short videos capturing some of the artistic highlights from the exhibition and performances.

The event also featured a panel discussion on artivism against police brutality in Kenya, which you can listen to in this video.

Song/Poem: When a young blood bleeds

This song/poem was written by Spontaneous the Poet, and recorded as part of this project. Spontaneous the Poet says, “This piece was written in remembrance of people who’ve lost their relatives from extra judicial killings. It is actually based on a true story and I’m so grateful that they took part in the shooting of the video.”

Images of artwork

This project has produced images of artwork related to police brutality in Kenya. Some of these have been shown as part of the Creating Safer Space exhibition, which has toured around the world and is also available to view online as a virtual 360° Exhibition.

RESEARCH SUMMARY

In carrying out this research, we undertook the following activities:

• Key informant interviews: A total of 56 respondents were interviewed. These respondents were youth and women community leaders, artists, victims and survivors of police brutality, CSO members, Police Officers and Judiciary Staff.
• Focus group discussions (FGDs): We conduced 3 FGDs with two being held in Nairobi and one in Kisumu. A total of 36 respondents took part in these discussions.
• Validation workshop: Our final research activity was the validation workshop, which was held in Nairobi. We presented the research findings for validation to 14 research respondents from Nairobi and Kisumu.

From our research analysis, we found that respondents had experienced some form of police brutality at a personal level or through family members. The major forms of police brutality experienced included:

• Excessive use of force by the police while undertaking their duties;
• Extra judicial killings by the police especially in low-income areas;
• Arbitrary arrest;
• Torture;
• Excessive use of teargas;
• Beating of civilians;
• Shooting of civilians;
• Some respondents had experienced all of the above.

Role of artists in addressing police brutality in Kenya:

By employing their creative abilities to spread awareness, spark debate, and promote change, artists significantly contributed to the effort to combat police brutality in Kenya. Our research sought to understand the techniques employed by Kenyan artists to help raise awareness of cases of police brutality, and to promote change by addressing incidences of police misconduct.

The respondents identified four major roles that artists play to help address police brutality in Kenya, namely:

1. They act as a mirror to the society;
2. They create awareness on issues of police brutality;
3. They show solidarity to the victims of police brutality;
4. They shape knowledge on how to deal with cases of police brutality.

Successful artivism strategies used to address police brutality:

• Poems/spoken word
• Music
• Plays
• Graffiti
• Cartoons

It is important to note that the success of the above strategies varied depending on the location of the research.