Restorative Justice Theoretical Foundations

This title explores the theoretical foundations of restorative justice. It looks at restorative justice philosophy and the ways in which models have been applied to adults, corporate crime, family violence and to cases of extreme violence.

This book brings together a selection of papers originally presented and discussed at the fourth international restorative justice conference, held at the University of Tübingen. The contributors include many of the leading authorities in the field of restorative justice, and they provide a comprehensive review of the theoretical foundations underlying this rapidly expanding movement. Restorative Justice: Theoretical foundations addresses a wide range of fundamental questions about restorative justice,considering amongst other things ways in which conceptual pitfalls can be avoided, and how traditional models of peacemaking and healing developed in traditional societies can be integrated into the justice systems of late modern societies. Overall it provides an authoritative overview of contemporary thinking about restorative justice and will be essential reading for anybody concerned with the future direction of criminal justice and criminal justice systems. leading world authorities address the theoretical foundations of restorative justicea rapidly expanding area within criminal justiceincludes chapters on restorative justice as applied to corporate crime, family violence and cases of extreme violence

Covers scholarly work in criminology and criminal justice studies, sociology of law, and the sociology of deviance.

Restoring Justice: An Introduction to Restorative Justice offers a clear and convincing explanation of restorative justice, a movement within criminal justice with growing worldwide influence. It explores the broad appeal of this new vision and offers a brief history of its development. The book presents a theoretical foundation for the principles and values of restorative justice and develops its four cornerpost ideas of encounter, amends, inclusion and reintegration. After exploring how restorative justice ideas and values may be integrated into policy and practice, it presents a series of key issues commonly raised about restorative justice, summarizing various perspectives on each.

Restorative Justice: Integrating Theory, Research, and Practice provides students, practitioners, and criminal justice professionals with a comprehensive introduction to restorative justice that combines theoretical foundations, guiding principles, empirical evidence, and real-world implementations of various restorative processes and practices. Through easy-to-navigate chapters, the authors present readers with information concerning how and why restorative practices are implemented within communities in order to expand and enhance conventional approaches to crime prevention, community building, and criminal justice. Though designed for the college classroom, this text is an ideal and accessible introduction for anyone interested in exploring the philosophy, evaluation, and application of restorative justice. In the second edition, the authors have added new boxed features, updated the text to reflect current information and statistics, and expanded chapters relevant to the implementation of restorative practices in justice systems, processes, and movements.

This bold, uncompromising essay offers a dual challenge to anyone interested in issues of justice. First, it poses a radical critique of current criminal justice practices in favor of a restorative justice alternative. Then, it advocates a radical reformulation of the thinking and practices of restorative justice itself.Restorative justice is a growing movement that strives to achieve reconciliation between crime victims and the persons who have harmed them through the use of various forms of mediation and nonviolent conflict resolution. Many programs embodying this approach have been launched in North America and abroad. The authors call for two vast revisions in restorative justice thinking:replacing justice practices based on rights and "deserts" with approaches that seek to meet the needs of all - including the harm-doer and the community, as well as those directly affected by a harm; andapplying these principles to a broad range of social institutions -- including families, schools, workplaces, and neighborhoods-- in addition to the justice system.

Restorative justice has developed from a barely known term to a central role in debates on the future of criminal justice. But as it has moved into the mainstream so new tensions and issues have emerged as it becomes increasingly integrated into normal practice, and part of broader legal and judicial systems ­ both in common law countries and those with centralised legal systems. The purpose of this book is to explore this developing relationship between the concepts and practice of restorative justice on the one hand, and the law and legal systems on the other. Amongst the questions it addresses are the following: how are informal processes to be juxtaposed with formal procedures? what is the appropriate relationship between voluntarism and coercion? how can the procedures and practices of restorative justice be combined with legal standards, safeguards and precepts?

This is the 2nd edition of Gavrielides’ 2007 monograph “Restorative Justice Theory & Practice: Addressing the Discrepancy”, a ground-breaking book that examines the harmful gap between the restorative justice theory and its application covering the UK, the U.S., Europe, and internationally. Data were obtained from four international surveys with over 300 restorative justice practitioners, using a combination of qualitative methodologies, including questionnaires, interviews and focus groups. The 2nd edition provides critical updates for restorative justice research, policy and practice. Restorative justice projects strive to restore peace after a crime has been committed by involving victims, offenders and community representatives in dialogue. Previous studies reviewed by Dr. Gavrielides have credited these programmes with such benefits as lower recidivism, and higher levels of satisfaction with outcomes among victims, offenders and community representatives, compared to the traditional criminal justice system. However, the author’s seven-year research programme uncovered a pervasive gap between restorative justice principles and current restorative justice operations. This gap is blamed for widespread difficulties such as insufficient funding for restorative justice, inadequate training and accreditation of practitioners, lack of faith and commitment among staff, and a tendency for restorative justice over time to become increasingly similar to the standard criminal justice system. Dr. Gavrielides warns that if these problems are not corrected, the original values and benefits of restorative justice may never be realised. Foreword Part One: Arguing and Analysing the restorative justice literature CHAPTER 1: Restorative theory and practice in context; CHAPTER 2: Restorative justice: The Perplexing concept; CHAPTER 3: The International Dimension of Restorative Justice: From Theory to Policy and Practice; Part Two: Measuring the Gap between the restorative justice theory and practice; CHAPTER 4: The Practitioners’ Account; CHAPTET 5: Evaluating restorative justice CHAPTER 6: Problems in the Practical and Theoretical Development of Restorative Justice; CHAPTER 7: The UK Practitioners’ Account; Part Three: Pushing the Barriers – The application of restorative justice with hate crimes and sexual offences CHAPTER 8: Restorative justice and hate crimes: Addressing the gap between theory, policy and practice; CHAPTER 9: Restorative justice and sexual offending Part Four: Critical Reflections CHAPTER 10: Mind the Gap Between the Restorative Justice Theory and Practice; ——————————————- APPENDIX I. ORIGINAL SAMPLE OF SURVEY I (INTERNATIONAL) APPENDIX II. FINAL SAMPLE OF SURVEY I (INTERNATIONAL) APPENDIX III. SAMPLE OF SURVEY II (ENGLAND AND WALES) APPENDIX IV. SAMPLE OF SURVEY III APPENDIX V. SAMPLE OF SURVEY IV APPENDIX VI. CHRONOLOGY OF SEXUAL ABUSE CASES AGAINST THE NORTH AMERICAN CATHOLIC CHURCH BIBLIOGRAPHY Book Reviews “In a time when restorative justice has been embraced with unbridled enthusiasm by virtually every criminal justice network and dispute resolution stakeholder outside of the criminal justice system, Theo Gavrielides presents us with an original, comprehensive, and essential examination of the subject. This work should be read by anyone and everyone who is the least bit interested in the future health of the restorative justice movement.” Prof. John Winterdyk, Ph.D. Department of Justice Studies, Chair, Mount Royal College, Canada “Theo Gavrielides has provided a constructive and thought-provoking contribution to our understanding of the dynamics of one of the most significant contemporary developments in thinking about criminal justice.” Professor Nicola Lacey, LSE, UK “Restorative justice is a noble concept, but if the actual practice does not match the ideal, it could be discredited. That would be a great loss. Theo Gavrielides has brought together some challenging thoughts about this danger…” Dr. Martin Wright, European Forum of restorative justice and Restorative Justice Consortium, UK and EU It is a concise, engaging, innovative and informative book for practitioners and scholars. This comprehensive introduction to restorative justice provides a much-needed textbook for an increasingly popular area of study and practice, which can be used as a basis for further theoretical development and elaboration on the concept’s limitations and accountability. Dr. Effi Lambropoulou Professor of Criminology Department of Sociology, Panteion University of Social and Politic, Greece As a restorative justice practitioner for ten years, I continue to be impressed with the in-depth research Theo Gavrielides does in the field of restorative justice. He meets the challenges with provocative and cutting edge topics directly and succinctly… The struggle of theory vs. practice has been a difficult one in the field since restorative justice began mostly with practice. Gavrielides approaches this struggle with wisdom of historical roots and with encouragement that restorative justice is developing theory to catch up with practice. Linda Harvey Program Director and Founder of the Restorative Justice Council on Sexual Misconduct in Faith Communities, USA “Dr. Theo Gavrielides’ book provides a special journey from the underlying theoretical foundations to the daily practice of restorative justice. By his thought-provoking and critical approach, he gifts the restorative justice field with an essential analysis that bridges theory and practice in an interdisciplinary and multisectoral way” Borbala Fellegi, researcher and lecturer at the ELTE University, consultant of the Ministry of Justice in Hungary in the field of restorative justice, Hungary

Discussion of the histories, meanings, and assumptions of restorative justice have enriched the development of its theory, research, and practices. While some of this work has addressed the role of communication, the treatment of communication within restorative justice remains rather under-developed. Communication plays a central role in processes of restoration and justice and a constitutive role in making restorative justice what it is. In Creating Restorative Justice: A Communication Perspective of Justice, Restoration, and Community, Gregory D. PaulandIan M. Borton argue that by centering communication in restorative justice as it occurs in various contexts (from families, to schools, to communities), we can simultaneously deepen our understanding, enrich our practice, and amplify our study of restoration and justice. From a communication perspective, restorative contexts both use and are created by the communication present. Any outcomes from restorative processes are thus the product of the communication both within and between restorative practices’ participants. As the world addresses the challenges presented by injustice, inequality, and insecurity, it is incumbent we expand our understanding of restorative processes to account for the vital role of communication.