The realisation of the effectiveness of Restorative Justice over our favoured Punitive measures

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Permalink Reply by Kelly J. Matlak on February 21, 2011 at 18:24

Aye. I agree. Here in the states our juvenile system is very disjointed and with each individual state dishing out their own variation of punishment... it is hard to determine what is working and what is not. I agree that locking them up and throwing away the key is not the answer, but determining the best method is a difficult task. Our system is overloaded that these kids are all heaped into one "classification" and the individual cases are lost in the system. Changing would mean completely revamping the way society views juvenile offenders and convincing our government to spend the money to make it right... good.luck.there.

Permalink Reply by Thomas J Gale on February 21, 2011 at 18:28

I see what you mean... in the UK we do have a menu of sentences for young people of different ages and most of them now are relatively restorative and focus on welfare more than punishment. Honestly, I'm not actually that worried about our systems at the moment, with the use of the Referral Order (wikipedia it), we're dealing with young people earlier and in a kinder way than before using restoration and involving victims and the community. It's only the hatred from the media and community that bothers me. As John Muncie likes to call it, the Demonization of young people.

Permalink Reply by John Howard Society of Ontario on March 4, 2011 at 18:15

I think it would help if there was more reserach done on the effectiveness of Restorative Justice programs. One problem is the fact that participants in RJ programs must be voluntary and cannot be randomly assigned to participate in a program. This makes controlled outcome studies vulnerable to a self-selection bias, which decreases their reliability. To combat this bias, Canada's Department of Justice recommends administering questionaires designed to measure participants' motivation to adjust their attitudes and behaviours prior to participaation in an RJ program. This would allow evaluators to compare the motivation of voluntary particpants to those inthe randomly assigned control group, thus combatting the self-selection bias.

There is also a dearth of RJ reserach on female particpants, on the relationship between restitution and victim/offender satisfaction and on the demographic details of those partipating in RJ programs.

Permalink Reply by Thomas J Gale on March 25, 2011 at 20:29

The used of restorative justice is indeed largely voluntary, however in the UK we have an extreme amount of volunteering interest from the public... which is great! But I agree that more needs to be done to get the victims involved in restorative measures... like the referral order. Perhaps after a while, we could release the inevitable statistics that show greater victim, offender and community satisfaction through restorative justice measures. 

 

Youths in the UK are given a short questionnaire called "what do you think?" before they attend a mediated Youth Offender Panel meeting. It works really well in allowing the team to work with that individual young person and their emotions. 

Permalink Reply by helenjacko1991 on July 18, 2011 at 11:14

During my undergraduate I had an essay on the effectiveness of restorative justice for young offenders, and you summed it up in your post. The area interests me greatly.

Permalink Reply by Thomas J Gale on July 18, 2011 at 11:24

It makes me furious at how ignorant and deluded people are with regards to this subject. Everyone I know (who did not do my course at university)... all just say "ahh the little £*^$!, lock em up!" And when I tell them, "that's 50 years of red top tabloids and political agenda talking" they get annoyed. It's really starting to bug me.

Permalink Reply by helenjacko1991 on July 18, 2011 at 11:30

All of my friends are the same, they genuinely say they all need shooting or gassing. It's naive, the research I completed showed a decrease in re offending when using restorative justice for some crimes but other people say they still should be locked up, I argue that its wasting a lot of money but they don't understand. It bugs me too, ahh people that read red tops and then tell me that my academic books are obviously wrong...

Permalink Reply by Thomas J Gale on July 18, 2011 at 11:34

Haha, I feel your pain. £44,000 + /year for individual young people in YOIs and Secured  Estates. All for an 80% failure rate..... OR only the cost of a few full time staff and many volunteers for an 75% success rate!?! It's a no brainer really isn't it! 

 

Makes me think of the 80-80 rule... the public would never support a scheme (prison), where 80% of the budget produces an 80% failure rate. But still, until us, as educated individuals get into some kind of power position, there's not much that can be done at the moment. 

Permalink Reply by helenjacko1991 on July 18, 2011 at 11:40

You talk so much sense! Finally a breath of fresh air, people outside of my degree just do not get it. I even explain all of this to them and they go well that is wrong, that doesn't work and I say here and the studies and they say well they are made up :/ I have volunteered to sit on a young offender panel, to which a ex detective told me was stupid and they never work. I eagerly await us getting into power, it is clear something needs to be done.

Permalink Reply by Thomas J Gale on July 18, 2011 at 11:43

I currently sit on a Youth Offender Panel... in Kent. Though now they're being called "restorative meetings". And young people can now get more than one! Neither of these changes I agree with and I think they've made a big mistake. Ignore your friends, that's what I do... it pisses them off when they can't inject their tabloid rubbish into your head, so take some comfort in the though of annoying them beyond belief.

Permalink Reply by helenjacko1991 on July 18, 2011 at 11:51

Oh really? What one? I have applied for one in Kent too, been looking at the lectures from Sam Poyser and Jo O'Mahoney that are up too, I have a feeling we are from the same university. What are you experience of these meetings? 

 

Yes, I let it in one ear and back out now, I originally studied to complete a law degree but once starting reading around the subject I realised that we don't need to aim to put people in prison we need a more effective system. 

 

Permalink Reply by Karen Guerrieri on July 20, 2011 at 16:49

I have a few comments regarding this discussion. I would like to start by agreeing that restorative measures are definately the way to go. Not just because the research supports it, but because often our youth offenders lack appropriate supportive adult figures who are willing to model and teach prosocial behavior. Professionals in the juvenile justice field have the opportunity to serve youth to that end. I agree that practices are different from state to state and would add that practices differ greatly from county to county within states. Thus, state numbers and success rates are virtually useless in determining who's getting it right. You really need to study individual counties as county juvenile court judges influence the climate and practice within their respective courts. The county I live and work in supports restorative justice both in our detention center and court based programming. Our neighboring county has a 23 hour lockdown facility and limited services beyond probation and specialized dockets. In response to needing educated people in positions to make decisions. I, unfortunately, believe they are. They understand the research. They also understand that spending additional dollars on juvenile offender rehabilitation and programs for diversion and prevention comes out of their budget, verses housing the adult offenders of the future. That will be the future leaders problem and budget issues