NCJ Number
119505
Date Published
1989
Length
41 pages
Annotation
This publication contains three articles debating the merits and problems of restorative justice.
Abstract
Restorative justice, which emphasizes community service and victim-offender mediation strategies, is offered as an alternative to the present system of criminal justice in the United States and Canada, where it is characterized as retributive justice. The pain-inflicting dimensions of retributive justice are discussed in the first article, along with movements toward restorative justice in some European countries. The second article focuses on describing an actual operational model of restorative justice being developed over a three-year period by the Justice Fellowship. The restorative justice model demonstrates the dynamic relationship among government, community, victim, and offender in restoring the imbalance created by crime. The article identifies the role community churches would play in implementing elements of the model. The third article challenges the intellectual assumptions underlying the second article's proposed model for a restorative justice program and suggests that individual needs are emphasized to the detriment of societal remedies. The third article proposes an ethical construct for making the restorative justice philosophy more realistic and specific.