Victim‐offender mediation: Lessons from the Japanese experience

Abstract

In emphasizing offender correction and restoration to the community, law enforcement authorities in Japan have learned that encouraging confession, remorse, victim compensation, and victim pardon is essential to correcting socially deviant behaviol: US. experience with victim-oflender mediation in the context of a broad program of commonly bused reintegrative efforts suggests that the Japanese approach is at least partly transferable. Thus, anywhere victim-offender mediation is to become more than a victim assistance program, its expansion in concert with other reintegrative, community-bused programs should be a high priority.In the United States, the first experiments with structured programs for mediation in criminal cases apparently began in the late 1960s in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and in Hartford, Connecticut, under American Arbitration Association sponsorship with funding from the Ford Foundation (Kole, 1973;Hoff, 1974). Referred to somewhat misleadingly-for mediation became their primary emphasis-as 4-A Projects (Arbitration as an Alternative), those early efforts were followed in the 1970s by a variety of other projects (see, for example, Beer, 1986;Rice, 1977;Snyder, 1978;Stulberg, 1975). Prominent among these were victim-offender reconciliation programs (VORPs) organized as voluntary private nonprofit agencies with strong support from religious communities (see Umbreit, 1985). Other efforts, exemplified by victim-offender mediation through community dispute resolution centers, reflected an extension to criminal cases of civic efforts that had begun as informal extrajudicial alternatives for settlement of neighborhood disputes. A few states, notably New York, expanded these early experiments into state-funded mediation centers operating under the auspices of formal law enforcement authorities and victim-assistance programs. A quarter of a century later, hundreds of victimoffender mediation projects and programs were operating throughout the United States and Canada and an increasing number of similar programs had

Arab customary law and the modern Western idea of restorative justice.

“…According to the retributional approach, an offence is treated as a wrongdoing against the state and is examined in terms of laws broken and the guilt of the perpetrator. In this approach, judicature is concerned with the determination of guilt and punishment and this process generally involves the state and the perpetrator 9 . The restorative justice movement aims to change the dominating social responses to crime and wrongdoing 10 .…”

Toward a Culturally Competent Restorative Justice Practice Framework: A Focus on Asian Americans

“…Consequently, Chan (cited in Morelli, 2005) notes that public disclosure of family problems, although it is to provide information to a helping professional, is still very difficult for many Asian families, because it may be considered a betrayal of family trust as well as a disgrace of family honor. Haley (1995) asserts that restorative justice programs in North America and Europe do not reflect a global experience. Many scholars have found that the restorative elements of Japanese social control are both influential and sophisticated (Braithwaite, 2002;Haley, 1995Haley, , 1996Zehr, 1990).…”

“…Haley (1995) asserts that restorative justice programs in North America and Europe do not reflect a global experience. Many scholars have found that the restorative elements of Japanese social control are both influential and sophisticated (Braithwaite, 2002;Haley, 1995Haley, , 1996Zehr, 1990). Kawashima (cited in Stookey, 1975) reports that the Japanese system of restitution is almost entirely settled by extrajudicial agreements; the Japanese prefer extralegal decisions because they do not focus on the conflict, but rather on the negotiating process.…”

“…Kawashima (cited in Stookey, 1975) reports that the Japanese system of restitution is almost entirely settled by extrajudicial agreements; the Japanese prefer extralegal decisions because they do not focus on the conflict, but rather on the negotiating process. Haley (1995Haley ( , 1996 observes that Japan has been successful in significantly reducing crime during the 1980s and 1990s because of the communitarian orientation of Japanese culture and because of their restorative model of criminal justice. Since effective crime control requires reintegration of the offender into the community, communitarian societies can be more effective in crime reduction and prevention (Braithwaite, 1989).…”

Myths of restorative features in the Japanese justice system and society: the role of apology, compensation and confession, and application of reintegrative shaming

“…Moreover, not only is it encouraged implicitly by justice professionals, but also offenders (likewise often through their family members and lawyer) can even try to offer material or monetary compensation to victims. In return, they ask victims to send a letter to justice professionals stating that the offenders' apology is genuine, and demanding lenient punishment for the offenders (Haley, 1995). Offenders are also encouraged to confess their crimes during investigation and interrogation in order to show their repentance (Haley, 1982).…”