Restorative justice for victims: inherent limits?

ABSTRACT

Campaigners for restorative justice suggest that we should deal with criminal behaviour by encouraging those responsible to repair the harm they have caused and that those who cause and suffer harm should be at the centre of deliberation and decision making. This paper explores ‘internal’ obstacles to achieving this goal: structural weaknesses in the case for restorative justice. The focus is on contradictions in the way the campaign for restorative justice has thought about the role of victims in restorative encounters. Involvement of victims is crucial for two quite different reasons: they have an essential role to play in the reform of offenders and they need to be involved to benefit from the healing effects of restorative encounters. Tensions between these two ways of thinking about the rationale for victim involvement have been insufficiently acknowledged. This hampers the campaign for restorative justice from achieving its loftier ambitions.

KEYWORDS:

• Restorative justice
• victims
• offender reform
• healing

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1 The campaign for restorative justice is distinctive, but not unique, in this respect. In the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, these assumptions were also challenged by those who argued that criminal behaviour was a symptom of some underlying disorder which should be treated (see Johnstone, 1996).

2 See article 12 of Directive 2012/29/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council; text available at www.eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?qid=1421925131614&uri=CELEX:32012L0029 (last accessed 14 November 2016). For background see Ezendam and Wheldon (2014).

3 For an overview, see Dignan (2005).

4 For a useful overview see Cayley (1998: chapter 12).

5 For an interesting suggestion to this effect, see Bennett (2008: 1–10).

6 But see the Zwelethemba project described by Froestad and Shearing (2007).

7 See, for example, www.turningpointjustice.com/About (last accessed 20 October 2016).

8 President, Association Québécoise Plaidoyer-Victimes.

9 For a detailed discussion of concerns within the victims’ movement about restorative justice being over-sold as a victim-centred approach to crime, see Green (2007).

10 www.rjvictoria.wordpress.com/about/how-our-clients-benefit/, emphasis in original (last accessed 20 October 2016).

11 There is now a significant amount of empirical research into victims’ views and reactions to participation in restorative justice (see, for examples, Angel et al., 2014; Choi, Bazemore, & Gilbert, 2012; Poulson, 2003; Strang et al., 2006; Shapland, Robinson & Sorsby, 2011: 139–148). Amongst the findings of this literature are that the majority of victims who participate in restorative encounters have a satisfactory experience; a minority report an unsatisfactory experience and this is often due to their sense that the focus of the encounter was on achieving a beneficial outcome for the offender (see Rossner, 2017: 979–981 for a brief overview). This research is, understandably, conducted with subjects who have agreed to participate in restorative justice encounters. What such research cannot tell us, of course, is about why victims (who may well benefit from participation) do not in fact take part.

12 Howard Zehr cites Herman's thoughts on parallel justice as complementary to his own thoughts on restorative justice (see Zehr, 2015: 319).

13 I have briefly considered Herman's ideas about parallel justice in order to highlight that some of those whose point of departure is to bring about a reform that will benefit victims tend to regard restorative justice as limited in its potential, precisely because this is not its point of departure. I wish to emphasise, however, that it is not my goal here to advocate the adoption or development of parallel justice.