Restorative Justice and Family Violence

This 2002 book addresses the potential for restorative justice to deal with conflicts within families.

Heather Strang (Edited by), John Braithwaite (Edited by)

9780521818469, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 8 July 2002

302 pages
22.9 x 15.2 x 1.7 cm, 0.57 kg

'… all contributions provide intelligent commentaries on this troubled field of practice. Read together, they provide a critical discourse on restorative justice when it is applied in family violence cases, expanding the reader's understanding about this complex set of issues. This book has relevance for lawyers, police workers, and policy makers; as well, family counsellors and human service workers need to read this book.' Journal of Family Studies

This 2002 book addresses one of the most controversial topics in restorative justice: its potential for dealing with conflicts within families. Most restorative justice programs specifically exclude family violence as an appropriate offence to be dealt with this way. This book focuses on the issues in family violence that may warrant special caution about restorative justice, in particular, feminist and indigenous concerns. At the same time it looks for ways of designing a place for restorative interventions that respond to these concerns. Further, it asks whether there are ways that restorative processes can contribute to reducing and preventing family violence, to healing its survivors and to confronting the wellsprings of this violence. The book discusses the shortcomings of the present criminal justice response to family violence. It suggests that these shortcomings require us to explore other ways of addressing this apparently intractable problem.

1. Restorative justice and family violence John Braitwaite and Heather Strang
2. Restorative values and confronting family violence Kay Pranis
3. Domestic violence and women's safety: feminist challenges to restorative justice Julie Stubbs
4. Sexual assault and restorative justice Kathleen Daly
5. Children and family violence: restorative messages from New Zealand Allison Morris
6. Feminist praxi: making family group conferencing work Joan Pennell and Gail Burford
7. Transformative justice: anti-subordination processes in cases of domestic violence Donna Coker
8. Balance in the response to family violence: challenging restorative principles Gordon Bazemore and Twila Hugley Earle
9. Lessons from the mediation obsession: ensuring that sentencing 'alternatives' focus on indigenous self-determination Larissa Behrendt
10. Restorative justice and Aboriginal family violence: opening a space for healing Harry Blagg
11. Using restorative justice processes in developing ways of addressing family violence in Aboriginal communities Loretta Kelly
12. Domestic violence and restorative justice initiatives: who pays if we get it wrong? Ruth Busch.

Subject Areas: Family law [LNM], Crime & criminology [JKV], Gender studies, gender groups [JFSJ]