Adult Restorative Justice and Gendered Violence: Practitioner and Service Provider Viewpoints from Queensland, Australia
Abstract
:1. Introduction
2. Literature Review
3. Methodology and Research Participants
4. Victims’ Justice Needs
4.1. Empowerment and Control
4.2. Acknowledgement of Wrongdoing, Accountability, Change, Reduced Offending and Future Safety
4.3. Isolation, Re-Victimisation and Trauma
5. Conventional Justice Systems
5.1. Victim Disempowerment and Lack of Control
5.2. Re-Victimisation, Trauma and Limited Support
“my issue with the whole thing (gender-based violence) is that it’s always about power and control. Still we have a system that’s about power and control. The victim if you like has been going through this process of control and power over and over and then they end up in a system which is still trying to control and put power over them.”
“basically, our clients are traumatised by the act of violence and their own trauma is used against them in the process. I think that whole process of the criminal justice approach; the cross examination, the reporting to the police. It’s just so overwhelming and shocking.”
“don’t have support through the system. The whole criminal justice system was [not] set up to deal with highly traumatised people in the sexual violence realm and in domestic violence where you’ve got an ongoing relationship. It’s really the setup for strangers in a pub; they fought one another on a night out when they got on the piss and they really don’t have anything to do with one another ever again.”
5.3. Lack of Offender Accountability and Change
6. Benefits of RJ
“some victims do want the opportunity to face the perpetrator. [With RJ] they get the opportunity to face them and really tell them what the impact has been of their violence on them. Some people, particularly with relationships, they find that gives them some level of closure. I think that would be the benefit—it’s having them feel like they have a voice and getting to put that forward to the perpetrator. Empowering the victim and making them feel like they’ve got something out of the process.”
7. The Challenges of RJ
7.1. Gendered Power Imbalances, Re-Victimisation, Harm and Victim Voluntariness
“I just think we have to be extremely careful and aware of the dynamics of power and control and that these perpetrators are highly manipulative, quite charming and is this [RJ, being used as] just another process of abuse. If you don’t understand the dynamics of violence and how manipulative and how cunning some of these blokes are then [you risk] colluding with him in his ongoing violation of her.”
“the risks are very high [after] leaving a conference [that the victim] is going right back into the same setting, [and this] could be, trouble because this controlling perpetrator has had the victim giving voice to him. That’s what you’re trying to do [in RJ]—trying to build a victim to be able to say that stuff. But you’ve got a high-end risk, when they leave. If the perpetrator has not got the accountability to be able to sit with what they’re hearing, then they’re going to be angry and then they’re going to go out and do something.”
“pressure on her to either resume the relationship or continue the relationship. If that manipulation isn’t picked up on. If he’s a manipulative, controlling liar. If he doesn’t mean it. He can get back together with her and he can continue his abuse. He could then use that in the future—oh that was behind us. That doesn’t matter. I apologised for that. Anything he does or any engagement he has with her he uses against her in the future. So yeah, I mean he can gaslight her about it.”
“new partners weighing in on situations, new partners helping to polarise, that’s hard. I remember having one awful referral where the offence was like an historical offence that had happened 10 years ago or something and the offender had a new partner and she just painted the victim as like this horrible bitch who was just trying to destroy their lives. So, in that case you would say that the offender was able to use the conference to victim blame.”
“totally voluntary, it should be a decision-making of their own free will, and that they’re not making that decision to make their parents happy, or to provide something to their brother [who has sexually victimised them]. You know that you’re ruining their [perpetrator’s] life and they share that sense of guilt. I find this to be a problem.”
7.2. Perpetrator Accountability and Apologies
7.3. One-Off Incident
7.4. Facilitator/Convenor Neutrality
7.5. Broader Social-Structural and Symbolic Implications
“I do think that there is real risk [that if] RJ really sort of blossomed and bloomed and the police actually became aware that it was an option… I can see real risk in a woman reporting to police and police going, ‘oh that’s a bit of a he said, she said case. It’ll never get through court… let’s just send you off to RJ’ and it really concerns me.”
7.6. Indigenous Peoples
“there is immense potential, but that really depends on your analysis of criminal justice, racism and how all of those things intersect. [Also] if I’m talking about the RJ process that I’ve seen and witnessed, there is huge work in terms of adding a cultural healing component that, as far as I can see, just isn’t there.”
8. Best Practice: RJ for IPDFV/SV
8.1. Pre-Conference
“opportunity to get clarity on the events and that’s where a lot of the pre-work comes into it…working with the perpetrator around accountability and getting clear with the survivor around their experience of what happened. All of that needs to be done before the conference, so there is this mutual shared sense of we’re on the same page.”
“it’s not always just the safety of that woman [current victim]. We see that happen frequently. Where he [perpetrator] is focussing that anger toward the previous partner onto the current partner. [Or] if the [perpetrator] is still having contact with the children [that he shares with the victim] and blaming them. It could really put those children at risk.”
“an understanding of the power dynamics going on in their lives. There are instances where [victims] might have a family member or partner who just wants to speak for them, they know what’s right [for them] and those voices can be totally overbearing. [The victim’s needs] aren’t always the same [as the needs of others] so there can absolutely be a tension there…it comes back down to power and control, and so the work needs to be done with the [victim pre-conference] to fully understand what it is they need” [and supporting] “them to express this.”
“The starting point is let’s have a conversation about justice. Really spending time with [victims] teasing out their own personal theory of justice and accountability. It requires quite a lot of groundwork and support so that they [victims] feel comfortable in knowing what accountability genuinely looks and feels like for them. It requires a nuanced analysis to be developed with the victim to understand their needs and how those might be addressed. [For example] what do they want in terms of an apology? What feels safe? What feels meaningful?”
“it needs to be coupled with more stuff like behaviour change programs for men and counselling for women because we as convenors, we’re not the experts in this [area], we’re not therapists. Like [victims] may not be at that stage where they’re recognising that they are in that cycle of violence [and] offender might be in total denial that they’ve got an issue and that they are participating in that cycle. It’s not our space to kind of delve into that.”
“in preparation for going into the conference we are looking at trauma history [so] the advocacy and support [should be] combined with a therapeutic response—trauma related therapeutic intervention. There needs to be some sort of opportunity for therapeutic connection. In case things are being triggered [by the RJ process]. How they [victims] tolerate conversations about the offences.”
“I do think somebody with experience in domestic and family violence needs to assess that person [perpetrator] for their suitability before they participate. They meet first and foremost with that person on a one-on-one basis, and then they do an assessment as to whether that person is suitable because if you’re not trained in it, you’re not going to pick up the nuances.”
8.2. In Conference
“so you have one person who will lead the conversation. Who facilitates the meeting essentially and then they’ve got another person whose job is to attend to [conference] safety. While the convener who’s doing the questioning is speaking with people, the other person can attend to how other people are responding. And so, then they can call attention to [any issues] and kind of check in. It’s another set of eyes.”
“having that authority there could be a benefit, reassurance and validation for some victims. That police are part of this process and are listening. But also, for the [perpetrator] to see that police are part of this process. That this is their message from community and the state that their involved in this process and domestic violence is not okay.”
“maybe we need to look at our model and take that stuff [offence re-telling] out, because if we’re going to do it under the model that exists now, then, to say to a rape victim, okay, tell me what happened, from what you remember, and then have to listen to the perpetrator recount—they’re reliving it twice. So, the model would have to change. Maybe we don’t do the reliving. Maybe we just talk about the harm. Maybe we talk about how that’s going to affect the person, moving forward.”
8.3. Post-Conference
9. Training
10. Summary and Discussion
Author Contributions
Funding
Institutional Review Board Statement
Informed Consent Statement
Data Availability Statement
Acknowledgments
Conflicts of Interest
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Jeffries, S.; Wood, W.R.; Russell, T. Adult Restorative Justice and Gendered Violence: Practitioner and Service Provider Viewpoints from Queensland, Australia. Laws 2021, 10, 13. https://doi.org/10.3390/laws10010013
Jeffries S, Wood WR, Russell T. Adult Restorative Justice and Gendered Violence: Practitioner and Service Provider Viewpoints from Queensland, Australia. Laws. 2021; 10(1):13. https://doi.org/10.3390/laws10010013
Chicago/Turabian StyleJeffries, Samantha, William R. Wood, and Tristan Russell. 2021. "Adult Restorative Justice and Gendered Violence: Practitioner and Service Provider Viewpoints from Queensland, Australia" Laws 10, no. 1: 13. https://doi.org/10.3390/laws10010013