Retributive Justice Or Restorative Justice

Published Date: 02 Nov 2017

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Retributive Justice or Restorative Justice

Justice is the quality of being righteousness, fair; equitableness, or moral correctness (Shapland et al, 152). The term Justice is mostly confused with or used interchangeably, by many people, with the term fairness. In many circumstances, whether at the workplace, at the local bar or in a courtroom, people always want to be treated fairly and think that this is what justice is. There are difference types of justice: Restorative justice and retributive justice or customary adversarial. Restorative justice aims to heal relationships between offenders, victims and the community in which an offence takes place. (Gibbs and Jacobson, 59) Restorative justice always concentrates on both the needs of the offenders and victims, in addition to the general public. In this approach to justice, victims always take a very important role in the process; while the offenders always take charge for their actions in order to undo the damage they've already done to the victim. On the other hand, Retributive justice aims to find fault and punish the guilty. Retributive justice is an approach of justice which emphasizes that penalty for a crime is acceptable provided that it is a proportional response to the offense committed (Gibbs and Jacobson, 63). Restorative justice should be used as the best option in dealing with the offenders, victims and the community due to it approaches which are aims at the healing process unlike retributive justice which aims to find fault and punish the guilty.

This paper will seek to show how restorative justice is the best option in dealing with the offenders, victims and the community. This will include showing explaining its advantages/benefits. The paper will also look at retributive justice in order to compare it with restorative justice and show the appropriate approach to be employed in handling the offence being committed.

The following is the discussion on restorative justice:

Restorative justice is usually used as a substitute to standard criminal justice practices, with origins in customary and native systems of justice. It concentrates mainly on mending the harm instigated by crime, in the context of communities and relationships (Ronen, 58). Due to the effectiveness of this approach to justice, there is an increasing interest in restorative justice as a significant feature of criminal justice development in different parts of the world.

Restorative justice usually takes numerous forms which often includes a face-to-face meeting between offender and victim. Occasionally, it may involve other members of the public.

Members are given the chance to discuss the crime's influence and they cooperatively agree how the offender can make compensation (Ronen, 47). This may encompass paying for stolen property, doing service to the community or pursuing treatment for primary problems. The aim of doing this is to inspire healing for the members, compensation of the harm and rehabilitation of the wrongdoer into the society as a law-abiding civilian.

Principles of restorative justice include: Justice requires that people work to repair those who have been hurt; those most openly affected and involved by crime should be given a chance to participate completely; government's role is to maintain a fair public order, and the society’s is to create and maintain an impartial peace (Shapland et al, 157).

Restorative Justice, being the best option in dealing with the offenders, victims and the community, there are process that it employs in order to operate effectively. The following are programs Restorative Justice Processes:

Firstly, victim-offender resolution programs are used in which skilled mediators bring together both the victims and offenders so that they discuss the misconduct, its outcome, and the procedure that is required to make everything right (Shapland et al, 157).

Secondly, there are conferencing programs which are very similar to victim-offender reconciliation. These program processes involve the victim, offender, and also their community representatives and family members.

Also, there are victim-offender panels which are mandated in bringing together groups of unrelated offenders and victims, connected by a mutual kind of crime but not by the specific offenses that have involved the others.

Still, there are victim support programs which offer services to crime victims in helping them to recover from the offense and carry on through the criminal justice process (Ronen, 69). This program is also important in helping the victims to forget what have happened to them and move on with their lives.

All this programs show the importance of restorative Justice in dealing with victim, offender, and the general community. This also explains why restorative Justice is the best option of all the other approaches to justice.

Benefits of Restorative Justice

This approach, which holds wrongdoers responsible in constructive and meaningful ways, can lead to a more sustaining experience of justice for victims and societies (Gibbs and Jacobson, 66). Both victims and wrongdoers have high levels of gratification with the practice and the outcomes. Offenders are more prospective to bring to the end with community or restitution service, and that there is some bargain in recurrence offending.

Restorative Justice interprets criminal acts more widely: instead of defining crime only as law-breaking, it distinguishes that wrongdoers harm victims, communities and even themselves (Gibbs and Jacobson, 67). This approach therefore is important in ensuring justice to all since it take all the parties into consideration.

Also, restorative justice includes other parties: instead of giving key roles solitary to government and the lawbreaker, it take account of victims and communities too. This is a very crucial move in ensuring justice is done to all the parties involved.

Restorative justice measures success contrarily to other approaches to justice: instead of measuring how much penalty has been imposed, it measures how much injury has been mended or prevented (Gibbs and Jacobson, 67). This is very vital benefit of restorative justice since by doing this; restorative justice ensures that there is truth and reconciliation. This ensures justice to all the parties.

Very important, restorative justice acknowledges the importance of community envelopment and initiative in reacting to and decreasing crime, instead of leaving the issues of crime to the government alone (Ronen, 75). This is very important since the community is able to deal with issues of crime at the grass-root level. This help in ensuring a crime-free community where all the people in the community are able to avoid involvement in criminal activities.

In addition, involvement of victims and offenders is always observed as a benefit of restorative justice. This participation gives them a role, occasionally decision-making supremacy, and a right to be heard. Restorative justice puts the offender at the kindness of a judicial system which can go either way (Ronen, 71). The offender can either be guilt or not. Thus, this is important in ensuring justice to the wrongdoers equally as done to the victim.