CONFERENCING: A WAY FORWARD FOR RESTORATIVE JUSTICE IN EUROPE Estelle Zinsstag Marlies Teunkens Brunilda Pali EUROPEAN FORUM FOR RESTORATIVE JUSTICE FINAL REPORT OF JLS/2008/JPEN/043 With financial support from Criminal Justice Programme European Commission Directorate-General Justice, Freedom and Security CONFERENCING: A WAY FORWARD FOR RESTORATIVE JUSTICE IN EUROPE Estelle Zinsstag, Marlies Teunkens and Brunilda Pali European Forum for Restorative Justice, v.z.w. 2011 A publication of the European Forum for Restorative Justice (EFRJ) The views expressed in this report are those of the authors, not necessarily those of the European Forum for Restorative Justice v.z.w. © European Forum for Restorative Justice 2011 Hooverplein 10 B‐3000 Leuven www.euforumrj.org Criminal Justice 2008 With financial support from Criminal Justice Programme European Commission ‐ Directorate‐General Justice, Freedom and Security The sole responsibility of this publication lies with the European Forum for Restorative Justice. The European Commission is not responsible for any use that may be made of the information contained herein. 3 COLOPHON This publication is the result of a two years research project co‐financed by the European Commission under Grant JLS/2008/JPEN/043 and implemented by the European Forum for Restorative Justice in the period from 1 May 2009 and 28 February 2011. Several people have contributed to this publication. Project coordinator: Estelle Zinsstag, European Forum for Restorative Justice and KU Leuven, Belgium Project Researchers: Estelle Zinsstag, Marlies Teunkens, Carmen Borg and Brunilda Pali, European Forum for Restorative Justice and KU Leuven, Belgium Project supervisors: Ivo Aertsen, Leuven Institute of Criminology, KU Leuven, Belgium Inge Vanfraechem, (formerly National Institute of Criminal Sciences and Criminology, Belgium) European Forum for Restorative Justice and KU Leuven, Belgium Project partners and steering group members: Joanna Shapland, University of Sheffield, UK Kelvin Doherty, Youth Justice Agency, Northern Ireland, UK Rob Van Pagée, Eigen Kracht Centrale, The Netherlands 4 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS This project has benefited from the collaboration, initiative and commitment of an impressive list of people, who we would like to briefly mention here and thank very warmly. First and foremost it has been an exciting and challenging experience but it would all have been impossible without the work of our local team in Leuven which included Carmen Borg, Brunilda Pali, Marlies Teunkens. Amongst them Inge Vanfraechem and Ivo Aertsen deserve a special mention for the commitment and energy that they have put in this project. We are very thankful to Joanna Shapland, Kelvin Doherty and Rob van Pagée, the external members of the steering group of the project, for their guidance, work and support throughout. We would also naturally like to thank the European Commission for co‐funding and supporting this project, as well as the European Forum for Restorative Justice for hosting it: in particular we would like to thank for their assistance Karolien Mariën and Jeanine Dams as well as Anniek Gielen and the board members of the Forum, in particular Niall Kearney. We would like to thank everyone at LINC (KU Leuven) but in particular: Daniela Bolivar, Vicky De Mesmaecker, Marieke Vlaemynck, Stephan Parmentier, Sonja Wellens and Andrea Ons. Finally we also would like to thank for their technical assistance: Bram Decroos, Jan Ooghe and Martino Tattara. We would then like to thank all the people in the different countries which we have included in this project, either for their help on the country reports, whom we have met during our study visits, who have written in the special issue of the newsletter on conferencing or who took part in the expert seminar. The countries from which they are from are cited in alphabetical order. In Australia: Michaela Wengert, Anna Eriksson and Kathleen Daly. In Belgium: Bie Vanseveren, Koen Nys, Nathalie Van Paesschen, Francesca Raes, Joanne Cescotto, Antonio Buenatesta and Lode Walgrave. In Brazil: Daniel Achutti and Raffaella Pallamolla. In Canada: David Gustafson and Tinneke Van Camp. In Germany: Otmar Hagemann. In the Netherlands: Eric Wiersma, Annette Pleysier, Sven Zebel, Manon Elbersen, John Blad, Margo Schreuder, Steijn Hogenhuis, Lineke Joanknecht, Gert Jan Slump and Bas Van Stokkom. In New Zealand: Gabrielle Maxwell, Helen Bowan and Douglas Mansill. In Northern Ireland: Alice Chapman, Martin McAnallen, Graeme Cumming, Bill Lockhart, Stephen Donaldson, Muireann Kerr, Lee Russell, Tim Chapman, Shadd Maruna, Debbie Waters, Gwen Gibson, Jim McCarthy and Mervyn Bates. 5 In Norway: Tone Skåre, Ethell Fjelback, Torunn Bolstad and Siri Kemeny. In England: Martin Wright, Vince Mercer and Geoff Emerson. In South Africa: Mike Batley. In the USA: Dan Van Ness. At the European Commission: Levent Altan. In addition we would like to thank all the respondents to our survey for their patience and commitment and also the people who have helped us find these respondents! On a personal note, I would like to end by thanking my beloved husband Georgios Pavlakos for his unwavering support and encouragements and our daughter Charlotte, born half‐way through, for tolerating to share me with this project. Estelle Zinsstag, May 2011 6 TABLE OF CONTENT Criminal Justice 2008 ........................................................................................................................................... 3 Colophon ................................................................................................................................................................... 4 Acknowledgments ................................................................................................................................................. 5 Table of Content ..................................................................................................................................................... 7 Acronyms ........................................................................................................................................................... 16 Introduction .......................................................................................................................................................... 18 1. Conferencing .............................................................................................................................................................. 18 2. The research project ................................................................................................................................................... 18 3. Methodology .................................................................................................................................................................. 19 4. Structure of the report ............................................................................................................................................... 21 PART 1 ­ THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK, DEFINITIONS AND TYPOLOGY ........................................... 23 1. Introduction .................................................................................................................................................................. 23 2. Theoretical framework and rationale ................................................................................................................ 24 2.1 Restorative justice ................................................................................................................................................ 24 2.1.1 ‘Patchwork’ history: origins, theories, and practices .................................................................... 24 2.1.2. Highlighting the main debates ............................................................................................................... 30 2.1.3. Definitions and principles ....................................................................................................................... 37 2.1.4. Practices and models ................................................................................................................................. 39 2.2 Mediation ................................................................................................................................................................. 41 2.3 Conferencing ........................................................................................................................................................... 45 3. Types of conferencing ................................................................................................................................................ 52 3.1 Introduction ............................................................................................................................................................ 52 3.2 Main conferencing models ................................................................................................................................ 53 3.2.1 Family Group Conferencing ..................................................................................................................... 53 3.2.2 Police led‐conferencing ............................................................................................................................. 57 3.2.3. Comparing the main conferencing models ......................................................................................