Dr Ariel Breaux Torres

Dr. Breaux Torres is a HCPC Registered and BPS Chartered Clinical and Forensic Psychologist and abolitionist. Her work is rooted in pro-Black liberation, anti-oppression and racial justice, with a focus on transforming systems of care for marginalized communities, challenging the deeply entrenched anti-blackness that sits within systems of oppression. She deeply believes in collective power as the key to true systems change, which can only be achieved by listening to, collaborating with, and acting upon the knowledge, wisdom, solutions, and insights from people most at the margins. She draws on her experience collaborating with clients in US correctional and clinical settings, bringing an abolitionist lens to equity – challenging harmful structures and advocating for community led approaches to health and wellbeing. She’s spent the past few years working with UK health and mental health organizations to embed anti-racism and anti-oppression into their organizations, challenging and changing their practices around partnership, community engagement, service delivery/development, and participation. She also supports executive leaders to embrace and understand anti-racist leadership in to make their commitments more than words on a page. As an abolitionist, her work is driven by the belief that many systems are operating exactly as they were designed and that alternatives are not only possible, but necessary, meaning that we are capable of dreaming up and bringing about a liberated future for us all. 

Currently, Dr. Breaux Torres is a trustee of Race on the Agenda, one of the leading antiracist organizations in the UK, and the Centre for Mental Health, a UK based think tank. Dr. Breaux Torres is also a founding member of the Black Mental Health and Wellbeing Alliance, a group who has created and launched the Black Mental Health Manifesto in the UK, a demand for change coproduced with Black people with lived experience of mental illness.