Hawaiʻi Peace and Justice (HPJ) works to promote peace, social justice, and ea (life, sovereignty, rising, breath) in Hawaiʻi through community organizing, popular education, art and nonviolent direct action as tools for social change. As a multigenerational and multi-ethnic organization of Kānaka Maoli, immigrant descendants of the sugar plantation era and other BIPOC communities operating in the context of a U.S. occupation, we are building power to dismantle oppressive structures, particularly the military-political-economic complex, that prevent Kanaka Maoli sovereignty. We understand that militarized notions of “national security” produce violence and conditions of economic, social, political and ecological insecurity for Indigenous communities around the world. Our collective vision is what international feminists call “genuine security- centering health and well-being through policies and actions that meaningfully redistribute funds away from industries of violence and towards that which feeds and enriches ourselves, our neighbors, and our broader communities.
