Restorative Justice in Canada and USA

This is a strategy that is comparable to victim-offender reconciliation because it also entails both the victims and offenders in the extensive conversation concerning the crime and its impacts. However this program additionally encompasses the participation of the police, community support groups, families, attorneys and social welfare officials (Marshall, 1999). This is to indicate to offenders mostly juvenile that the society is concerned and still cares for their welfare. Conferencing is only used in circumstances where offenders plead guilty of committing offences.

This is a program that offers services to the victims while recovering from a crime and happens through criminal justice system. The purpose of this program is to give legal representation to the crime victims, meet their physical and psychological requirements, and also offer them a chance of successfully reintegrating into the community as restored persons. This is done by a coordination of community support groups and victim’s rights activists (Bright, 1997).

Other programs of restorative justice include ex-offender assistance, circles, restitution and community service all of which have an ultimate goal of ensuring that both the offenders and the victims stay together in harmony and their 

The criminal justice system has various ways of dealing with offenders through offering different forms of sentences. All of these sentences depended on the magnitude of the offense and legislative provisions concerning the punishment of the offenses in question.  Examples of these sentences are probation, restitution and restorative justice that help to bring justice in the society.

The three related conceptions regarding restorative justice include encounter conception, reparative conception, and transformative conception. According to encounter conception, restorative justice is concerned with the programs bring the stakeholders together so as to make an agreement on how react to crime. With the reparative conception, restorative justice is seen as a theory of preventing and healing the harm that is caused due to crime. According to the transformative conception, restorative justice is regarded as a peace-building process that involves a dialogue and an agreement between the stakeholders as far as criminal justice is concerned (Cornwell et al., 2006). In this discussion comparisons will be made between the forms of restorative justice in Canada and criminal justice in the United States.

Miller (2008) defines Restorative Justice as an approach to justice that centers on the repair of the harm revealed or caused by a criminal behavior. The offenders are encouraged to be responsible in repairing the harm they have committed either by return the stolen property, doing community work, or apologizing. Restorative justice is concerned with how crimes hurt and destroy people's relationships within a community. A committed crime is perceived to be against a community as well as a victim and not just a misdemeanor against a given country or state. So as to ensure highest rates of offender accountability and victim satisfaction, a restorative justice must foster a dialogue between the stakeholders (Cornwell et al., 2006).

In Canada most crimes are solved by the mediation between the victims and offenders, which involves a face-to-face type of negotiation between the victim and offender (Miller, 2008). The needs of the victim, for instance needing to be consulted, are the primary focus.  The offenders are given an opportunity to repair the harm they caused to their victims. The reparation includes monetary compensation, an explanation concerning the occurrence of the crime, and an apology. The offenders are deeply affected due to mediation experience but get a positive motivation as they make reparations. The mediation meetings are always effective since the skilled mediators are involved in the facilitation of conversations. The participation at every stage of the mediation process is always voluntary. The mediation process is accompanied by confidentiality so that the decisions of National Parole Board are not influenced.

In the United States, criminal justice system is still used to charge the criminal offenders (Roberts, 2005). Criminal justice system is defined as a set of social and legal institutions used to enforce the criminal laws by following a set of practical rules and limitations (Cole & Smith, 2007). This system is characterized by the use of harsh punishments on the offenders and locking them up in prisons. With criminal justice system, the offender is accountable to taking a punishment instead of understanding the effects of the crime on the victim and in compensating them. Criminal justice system depends on proxy professions such as lawyers and judges, whereas the restorative justice system involves the participants directly. According to criminal justice, the response is centered on the past behavior of an offender and not on the harmful effects due to offender's behavior (Roberts, 2005).    

According to Hadley (2001), the Victim-Offender Mediation Program (VOMP) has been well established in Canada. The VOMP centers on dealing with the issues of healing and accountability for those affected or involved in traumatic criminal activities. The mediator is never perceived as an intrusive intervener but a facilitator. The staff of VOMP plays their role as supportive and respectful facilitators during a therapeutic dialogue. The cautious and lengthy evaluation and preparation processes are characteristically therapeutic and are informed by current clinical practice and theories regarding the treatment offender and trauma recovery of the victim. It has been formally established that VOMP is the most successful tool in accomplishing the goal of enhancing a healing experience for the offender and victim (Hadley, 2001).

Marshall (1999) asserts that restorative justice is one form of sentencing used in criminal justice system that emphasizes on restoring the harm brought about or revealed by criminal deeds. In other words, restorative justice is a problem-solving move toward crime that entails the parties themselves, together with the community in general in an active association with the statutory agencies. It involves a set of principles that may familiarize the broad practice of any group or agency in relation to crime as opposed to any specific practice (Bright, 1997). These principles include: creation of room for individual involvement of those largely concerned, visualizing criminal problems in their social context, a futuristic or preventive problem solving course and finally creativity of the practice (flexibility).

Restorative justice has its core objectives which include: attending fully to the needs of the victim, prevention of re-offending through reintegration of offenders into the community, allowing offenders to take full responsibility for their actions, recreating a working community which encourages rehabilitation and crime prevention and provision of ways of preventing escalation of legal justice and the linked delays and costs (Marshall, 1999).

This involves a meeting between the victims and offenders usually facilitated by a trained mediator. The victim and the offender are aided by the mediator to start resolving their conflict and develop their own strategy of achieving justice before their specific crime. The meetings ends with efforts to reach agreement on ways that the offender will use to repair the harm caused on the victim. Participation here is purely voluntary and researches indicate that the program is highly satisfactory (Bright, 1997).