About Us
LION is a grassroots collective of Black and People of Colour getting land through reparations.
Reparations are for Black and People of Colour (BPOC) who experience intergenerational, colonial-rooted violence that has dispossessed and separated us from ancestral lands and land practices. In Britain, we are 60% less likely to be able to access green space and natural environments than our white counterparts (Natural England).
Our collective is based in London and works to reconnect Black and People of Colour to land, both in the city and the countryside. Our work addresses the inequalities in access to land and food and reimagines land stewardship towards climate and racial justice.
– The LION team, 2024. Photo by Dre Ferdinand.
Our Values
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Reparations are multi-dimensional, focusing on both the redistribution of resources such as money and land, but also on repair through healing, decolonising knowledge, connecting as a community and organising towards liberation.
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Exploring alternative models of managing financial resources through pay-parity, centring solidarity economic models, collective ownership, and how to institute accountability and transparency both within our organisation and our community.
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Practicing holistic, sustainable and regenerative practices in our work. Drawing from ancestral and afro-indigenous practices and honouring the land and earth as kin.
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Celebrating the knowledge and skills of elders and youth, and exploring how we can integrate different generations into our work and community.
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Honouring the different intersections that shape our lives, seeing the ways that our liberation is tied together and our oppression is intricately linked to the extractivism of capitalism and colonialism.
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Creating opportunities to cultivate care between individuals in the collective and our community within each of our capacities, empowering individuals to care for themselves and creating collective caring systems and structures. Considering LION as part of a wider ecosystem of care.
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Striving towards the redistribution of land, decolonising land ownership, land rematriation, reparations, and land management practices that are sustainable and equitable.
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Asserting the rights of disabled folks, both presently disabled and soon-to-be disabled, to access care, support, and stability. Challenging toxic organising and working practices which disable us as comrades and coworkers. Centring disability justice in how we model our reparative futures.
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Honouring ancestral and spiritual wisdom in our work, the way we envision the future, understand the past, connect to one another and to the land.
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Building upon the work of anti-colonial and decolonial movements, integrating their practices and theories into our own aims and work.
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Black liberation and the dismantlingement of white supremacy and institutions that uphold structural racism. Striving toward a future where racialised folks can thrive and be free.
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Through the centring and celebration of women, trans and gender-queer people in our work, we liberate all genders to exist and thrive.
