The Institutionalization of Restorative Justice: A Canadian Perspective

Abstract

Restorative justice emerged in the western world as an alternative to the existing retributive penal system. An alternative that no longer relied on lawyers and judges to resolve criminal matters and community disputes, but rather empowered victims, offenders, and community members to do justice themselves. Throughout the past thirty years restorative justice has distanced itself from the traditional criminal justice system by focusing on repairing the harm caused by an offence rather than charging an offender for committing a crime against the state. This study focuses on the institutionalization of restorative justice. Specifically, this thesis conducts a content analysis of five Canada institutionalized restorative justice programs with the purpose of answering one primary research question. This question asks: are institutionalized restorative justice programs within Canada structured to reflect the core values of restorative justice? In order to answer this question, this thesis analyzes all the available textual documents pertaining to the five selected restorative justice programs for evidence of core restorative justice values and values associated with the co-opting institution, the retributive criminal justice system. This thesis concludes that yes, the five analyzed restorative programs are structured to reflect the core values of restorative justice. Although, the programs are also structured to reflect the core values of the current political ideology of neo-liberalism.