Theory Articles -- Full List

Articles discussing theoretical issues related to restorative justice.

. Effective justice for victims of sexual assault: Taking up the debate on alternative pathways.

The aim of this article is to take the debate forward and propose an alternative pathway for appropriate cases based on principles of restorative justice and therapeutic jurisprudence. Therapeutic jurisprudence focuses attention on ‘the extent to which a legal rule or practice promotes the psychological or physical well-being of the people it affects’.13 Restorative criminal justice aims to provide a ‘restorative’ process for both victims and offenders, through a nonadversarial and relational model of disposition. Therapeutic and restorative approaches are also drawn on here from a framework of feminist concern about the gendered power relations involved in sexual assault and embedded in the criminal justice system. (excerpt)

. Introducing restorative justice: Re-visioning responses to wrongdoing.

Learning about restorative justice involves examining conventional thinking about crime (or wrongdoing generally), values in relation to how people associated with wrongdoing are treated, and best responses when a wrongdoing occurs. In this introductory article, I highlight key developments in the restorative movement and main distinctions between the conventional and restorative justice approaches. I describe what restorative justice interventions involve and consider claims about effectiveness. In the article's conclusion, I note ongoing tensions and recent developments. (excerpt)

. Restorative justice and victimology. Euro-Africa experiences.

The aims of this study are two fold: to contribute original evidence to international debate on victims' participation in restorative justice, and to contribute 'Afrocentric' knowledge to international literature and body of knowledge in restorative justice and victimology. The research considers the fundamental understanding of 'restorative justice' including the philosophical arguments in support of and/or against restorative justice model world wide. Consideration was also given to the evaluation of the historical development and evolution of this concept and the fundamental principles that have led to its popularity in recent times. The theoretical justifications for restorative justice initiative are highlighted. Anecdotal and empirical evidences in support of the practice methods, and victims' experiences of restorative justice around the world were also reviewed. (excerpt)

. Restorative justice in schools: The influence of race on restorative discipline.

Schools today are more frequently using punitive discipline practices to control student behavior, despite the greater effectiveness of community-building techniques on compliance that are based on restorative justice principles found in the criminal justice system. Prior research testing the racial threat hypothesis has found that the racial composition of schools is associated with the use of more punitive and less reparative approaches to discipline, just as it has been associated with criminal justice harshness. However, no research to date has assessed the possibility that school-level racial composition may affect the likelihood that specific restorative justice techniques, which are the most commonly used alternative, will be implemented. This study is the first to test the racial threat perspective in relation to use of the restorative practices student conferences, peer mediation, restitution, and community service. Using a national random sample in logistic regression analyses, we find that schools with proportionally more Black students are less likely to use such techniques when responding to student behavior. This finding has several troubling implications for minority students in particular and for education as a whole. (author's abstract)

. Restorative justice: Pedagogy, praxis, and discipline

In the ongoing effort of designing school contexts in support of proactive discipline, a range of practices and theoretical frameworks have been advanced, from behaviorist approaches to social and emotional learning. This article describes the theory and practice of restorative justice with the aim of defining this distinctive paradigm, in comparison to other forms of discipline, as one that uniquely emphasizes social engagement over social control. In so doing, a responsive regulatory framework supports pedagogy, praxis, and discipline such that relational school cultures are nurtured; wherein, behavior is understood in social context, individuals are recognized as being part of a social web of relations, and building, maintaining, and repairing relationships become priorities. This focus on developing rich and embedded relational ecologies finds its strength through nurturing motivational bonds of belonging that support individual development and social responsibility. This is distinct from formal institutional responses that rely on systems of institutional sanctions to leverage compliance. (Abstract courtesy of the National Criminal Justice Reference Service, www.ncjrs.gov).

. The paradox and promise of restorative attorney discipline.

Our contribution to this debate is to envision a specific structure and form for public participation in disciplinary processes. We draw upon theory and practice in the field of Restorative Justice. Developed primarily in the context of criminal and juvenile justice, Restorative Justice animates diversionary programs such as victim offender mediation, conferencing,and sentencing circles and emphasizes two important elements that are currently undervalued in attorney discipline: 1) deliberation and decision making by a diverse group of stakeholders and 2) discussion that focuses on repairing the damage caused by the offender. A restorative approach sees “that ‘justice’ can only be realized when the stakeholders most directly affected by a specific offence—the victim, the offender and the community—have the opportunity to voluntarily work through the consequences of the offence with the emphasis on repairing the harm and damage done.” In our view, the legal profession both constitutes and creates community. By strengthening that community, a more restorative disciplinary process can in turn improve the morale of practicing lawyers, prevent ethical misconduct, and protect the public. (excerpt)

. Truth and Reconciliation Commissions and Transitional Justice in a Restorative Justice Context.

There is much debate about which interventions are most effective at rebuilding societies, and the international community has struggled to find acceptable, affordable, and sustainable ways to help communities recover from violence. While criminal prosecutions of war crimes are still an important transitional justice tool, over time several limitations with the traditional retributive justice approach have emerged. In a range of post-conflict settings, trials can be politically unfeasible, and the rule of law is often weak, underdeveloped or suffering from corruption. There are problems of jurisdiction, and the evidentiary rules governing court proceedings can limit investigation into the nature of human rights violations. Furthermore, trials are not victim-centered. In response to these problems, truth and reconciliation commissions have emerged as a restorative justice-based alternative to assist societies to confront their past and are now considered a core transitional justice intervention. (excerpt)

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Abu-Nimer, Mohammed. Reconciliation, Justice, and Coexistence: Theory & Practice

While researchers and practitioners in general have focused more on the prenegotiation and negotiation phases of response to conflict, less focus has been placed on the postsettlement reconstruction phase. In recent years however, the focus of research and practice has begun to expand to include postconflict conditions and processes. An essential element in this postsettlement phase concerns the parties’ ability to reconcile and reconstruct a new relationship. Much has been written on justice and forgiveness, particularly from theological and philosophical perspectives, yet comparatively little research has been done on ideas and processes of justice, reconciliation, and coexistence. This book, therefore, consists of a number of essays intended to advance the state of knowledge on concepts and practices related to reconciliation, justice, and coexistence. The book is organized into two main parts. The essays in Part I focus on the theoretical framework for reconciliation in peacebuilding. The essays in Part II focus on practices related to reconciliation, justice, and coexistence in areas of conflict; these essays highlight case studies from around the world (e.g., South Africa, Ghana, Northern Ireland, and Cambodia). Contributors represent much of the pioneering work being done by scholars and practitioners in the field of peacebuilding.

Achilles, Mary. Will Restorative Justice Live up to Its Promise to Victims?

Several years ago Mary Achilles collaborated with Howard Zehr on an article on the promises and challenges of restorative justice with respect to victims. They raised concerns about what they perceived as the offender-centered nature of many restorative justice programs and practitioners. As she writes in this chapter, Achilles still believes those concerns to be legitimate, yet she is also now inclined to take a more expanded view about the possibility that restorative justice can live up to its promise to victims. Specifically, she sees the promise of restorative justice to be the elevation of victims to the position of stakeholders in a justice process that begins immediately from the point of the harm caused by wrongdoing. With that in mind, she sketches how restorative justice can be the basis for changing the way we respond to victims to their benefit.

Acorn, Annalise. Compulsory Compassion: A Critique of Restorative Justice

At first, writes Annalise Acorn, restorative justice ideas and practices appealed greatly to her. She had deep misgivings about criminal justice as commonly conceived and applied; especially, as she puts it, with criminal justice as a 'conflation of justice with punishment as imprisonment – or as any pure infliction of suffering on the wrongdoer.' Restorative justice seemed so much more right and worthy as an approach to wrongdoing and injustice. Eventually, however, doubts about restorative justice began to chip away at her initially positive assessment. Her growing skepticism came from several sources, including reflection on her own personal experience, her sense of moral intuition, discomfort with what she perceived as a kind of wishful-thinking 'romanticism' in restorative justice perspectives, and analysis of restorative justice concepts. With all of this in mind, Acorn seeks in this book a critical examination of restorative justice. In particular, she critically assesses the claim that restorative justice can successfully bring together the values of love and compassion, on the one hand, and the requirement of justice and accountability, on the other hand. Toward these ends, she discusses the seductive vision of restorative justice; justice and the teachableness of universal love; restorative optimism; sentimental justice; love and justice; compulsory compassion; and restorative utopias.

Adams, Caralee. The talk it out solution.

What makes for a safe school? Security guards patrolling the hallways? Metal detectors? Zero-tolerance policies? The answer may be none of the above: Educators are searching for new solutions to achieving harmony in the classroom and, surprisingly, they’re increasingly holistic. “There aren’t enough bars, metal detectors, or police to make a school safe if there is a culture of violence in a school,” says Ted Wachtel, founder of the International Institute for Restorative Practices (IIRP) in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. “You need to strike at the heart of the culture.” (excerpt)

Aitken, Jonathan. Divine Justice

What is justice? That sounds like the topic for a school essay. Yet in the marketplace of spiritual ideas, faith-based solutions and religious discussion, the question of justice—and an innovative answer to it—are moving up the agendas of thoughtful politicians and justice administrators across the world. (excerpt)

Allen, Jonathan. Memory and Politics: Three Theories of Justice in Regime Transitions

In his essay, “The Contest of the Facultiesâ€?, published in 1798, Immanuel Kant presents an intriguing reflection on the French Revolution. The moral significance of the revolution, he suggests, is to be found, not in any event directly connected to it, but in the reaction of “disinterested sympathyâ€? towards the revolutionary cause on the part of onlookers. Because this response was potentially hazardous and had nothing to do with selfinterest, Kant sees it as the result of a “moral disposition within the human raceâ€?, and thus as a moral phenomenon that can never be forgotten. Presumably for Kant, this serves as grounds for hope of moral progress in the form of movement towards a global “federal unionâ€? of independent republics, a union that would secure universal peace. Though I am no latter-day Kant, my central aim in this paper is to identify a novel moral phenomenon that is surely as significant, though considerably less exhilarating, than the circumstances noted by Kant in 1798. I am referring here to the remarkable rise of a series of practices and institutions operating at both the national and global level, designed to respond to war crimes, atrocities, human rights abuses, and grave injustices committed by states or political movements against minorities and individuals. Arguably, this is a development that takes its inception in the Nuremberg Trials and the passage of the United Nations Genocide Convention in 1948. The Eichmann Trial of 1961 also played an important role in alerting people to the idea that past human rights abuses require a response in the present; indeed, most of the manifestations of memory politics that concern me here have occurred since this trial. (excerpt)

Amstutz, Mark R.. The quest for peace and justice: A Biblical code of international relations

Mark Amstutz begins his consideration of the quest for peace and justice by referring to Michael Walzer's account of basic justice or 'moral minimalism.' Moral minimalism is not to be construed as shallow and virtually vacuous justice. Rather, it is to be construed as broad in scope, general in claims, and universal in applicability. Minimal morality is rooted in foundational claims of truth, common humanity, and basic justice, not in the particularities of common education, similar cultural values, or shared political ideologies. In contrast, maximal public justice is full-bodied and embedded in specific cultures and legal systems. Though it is rudimentary, minimal morality provides a framework for public justice, and an ethical basis for pursuit of global order and international peace. With all of this in mind, Amstutz explores elements of a 'minimal' Biblical account of international political ethics, the aim being to illuminate core political principles rooted in a Biblical tradition.

Anderson, S. Willoughby. The Past on Trial: Birmingham, the Bombing, and Restorative Justice.

The community, media, and scholarly responses to these trials point to the way that a crime's effects can reach far beyond the individual perpetrator and victim. In the context of unresolved civil rights-era violence, one murder or bombing inevitably expands outward and into the larger story of segregation and massive resistance; into the systemic, racially-based injustices of southern law enforcement; and to the New South's willingness to move quickly forward without reconciling its troubled past. Restorative justice theory, a reform movement within the criminal justice system, can help contextualize the broad consequences of these crimes. Taking the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church bombing as an example, I use restorative justice theory to expand the concept of harm resulting from this one incident. Rather than understanding the crime in traditional terms as an abstract harm against the state, we must imagine it as an act with consequences for the victims, the community at large, the offenders themselves, and the relationships among all three. By viewing this larger harm through the lens of restorative justice theory, we can expand our concept of 'victim,' and explore the need to think creatively about extrajudicial remedies that may to restore the damage wrought by crime. (excerpt)

Andrieu, Kora. 'Sorry for the Genocide': How Public Apologies Can Help Promote National Reconciliation

The aim of this article is to defend the politics of official apologies as part of a liberal conception of state and society. To acknowledge this is to defend a subjective conception of state legitimacy, not solely based on its objective efficiency but also on the meaning that citizens give to it and their belief in its legitimacy. I will argue that official apologies for past wrongs can be an essential component of this belief, and help building or rebuilding civic trust in the aftermath of mass atrocity. The acknowledgment of a wrongdoing, the acceptance of one's responsibility, and the expression of sorrow and regret for it can therefore appear as a reliable way to promote national reconciliation. I will show that in order to understand how pure words can provoke such an important shift, we need to `unfold' the meaning of an apology and to review our conception of reconciliation itself. Only if we consider reconciliation as the achievement of trust can apologies become part of the reconstruction process of post-conflict societies. I will draw upon a Habermassian conception of discursive solidarity to show that, rightly understood and formulated, apologies, as a form of dialogue, could become an essential norm-affirming and community-binding measure in the aftermath of mass atrocities, one compatible with a liberal project of transitional justice. (author's abstract)

Antkowiak, Thomas M.. Remedial Approaches to Human Rights Violations: The Inter-American Court of Human Rights and Beyond

This Article argues that reparative approaches that include only compensation and declarative relief are not only insufficient in egregious cases such as Plan de Sanchez, but they are also inadequate, inefficient, and even unwanted in many other scenarios of rights abuse. Thus, I espouse a remedial model that emphasizes the restorative measures of satisfaction and rehabilitation, as well as general assurances of non-repetition, in response to all human rights violations. (excerpt)

Aquino, Karl and Goodstein, Jerry. And restorative justice for all: Redemption, forgiveness, and reintegration in organizations.

We explore the topic of restorative justice in organizations. The tradition of restorative justice directs attention to the aftermath of wrongdoing. We highlight three ways offenders (making amends), victims (extending forgiveness), and organizations (fostering reintegration) restore justice in the workplace. Our paper concludes with questions for future research and inquiry. (author's abstract)