Some juvenile and criminal justice reform advocates laud restorative justice — it requires those who commit crimes to make amends, rather than merely face a prison sentence — as a potent solution to curbing crime. This model presumes that the wrongdoing is corrected when a defendant’s apology and efforts to take accountability somehow satisfy the victim. Restitution is measured by the defendant engaging in dialogue with the victim, alongside a neutral third-party, for months, if not years.
Certainly, it’s essential to make a harmed individual feel as restored as possible, but this approach does not result in true justice.
Developed in culturally, ethnically and racially homogenous communities such as Nepal, restorative justice has achieved some success in those settings. However, in the comparatively heterogenous United States, where Black and brown people disproportionately are on the socio-economic margins and disparately treated in the criminal justice system, restorative justice is inadequate. It holds criminally charged individuals accountable, but does not hold accountable the systems and institutions that have failed many of them.
For example, when a young Black man in largely impoverished West Philadelphia steals a bike from a professor at the University of Pennsylvania, also located in West Philly, restorative justice requires that the young person talk face-to-face with the professor, apologize and pay for the stolen item. This race- and class-blind model does little to address factors that often fuel crime.
Those who are prosecuted in cities such as Philadelphia overwhelmingly are Black and brown. They earn less pay. They often face housing, educational, employment and other forms of discrimination. Those disadvantages are amplified when such individuals come into contact with the justice system. Restorative justice does not address those broad realities, nor the reality that the vast majority of people arrested are prior victims of crime and, consequently, have been traumatized.
Why reparative justice works better
In other parts of the world, reparative justice has sought to repair large-scale harm, including human rights violations such as the war crime of widespread, systematic rape. The United States has its own human rights violations. They include, for many who wind up in the justice system, child abuse, mental illness, family instability, poverty and other adverse childhood experiences that researchers call the root causes of many juvenile crimes.
The links between poverty and crime are so clear that the Prison Policy Initiative’s “Arrest, Release, Repeat” report, released in 2019, concluded that “ ... law enforcement is called upon to respond punitively to medical and economic problems unrelated to public safety issues. As a result, local jails are filled with people who need medical care and social services, many of whom cycle in and out of jail without ever receiving the help they need.”
A December 2021 report by New York Academy of Medicine researchers, published in the Journal of Urban Health, concluded that the latest surges in joblessness and crime reaffirm that violent crimes fall when employment rates are higher. Along with employment, those with higher levels of education and stable housing are less likely to be re-arrested.
A suggested U.S. version of reparative justice
At its core, a new, U.S. reparative justice model would prioritize alleviating poverty, both to reduce violence and to address discrimination. That model of would provide criminal defendants with cash and access to other supports to help offset such harms. This approach would not disadvantage victims; rather, it will help to stabilize and heal offenders and prevent future crime.
One remedy is to pay defendants for time spent on court-mandated appearances and testing for drugs or alcohol; mental health and/or behavioral counseling; and training, such as driver’s education. That is a much better option than requiring defendants to cover such costs as transportation to check-in with probation officers; drug-testing; time off from work to attend mandated hearings in court; and caring for children or frail elders left at home.
Currently, few justice systems or community efforts connected to those systems intentionally prioritize poverty-reduction. In fact, many diversion programs aimed at keeping individuals in their communities, rather than behind bars, routinely require them to pay hundreds of dollars in fines and fees. A reparative model, by contrast, would financially and otherwise support defendants and those leaving prison by, as examples, subsidized housing; participation in such extracurricular efforts as “Arts for Justice,” which supports emerging and other artists; education, including GED programs; and job training through such programs as Hope Works, a project teaching computer-coding to 17- to 26-year-olds from high-poverty neighborhoods in South New Jersey and nearby Philadelphia.
A reparative approach’s menu of services also would include vocational training, personal and professional coaching and trauma-informed counseling. Those who need but cannot afford a phone, computer and reliable internet access would receive those essential tools. (In Philadelphia, several existing programs offer service plans and devices, but residents need assistance to utilize them.)
It would include free, state-issued photo identification; help accessing food, health care, cash and disability benefits; help paying utility bills; and help completing what, for many, are complicated applications for food stamps, cash and other benefits often requiring multiple forms of identification.
Prosecutors, judges, scholars must buy-in
Prosecutors and judges would utilize models created and delivered by service providers that are proven to improve defendants’ social, emotional and mental health. Further, those and other related programs would hire previously incarcerated and other previously justice-involved “credible messengers” to help ensure the success of such efforts and the individuals they enroll.
Requiring academic researchers — who often build careers by probing poor Black and brown neighborhoods — to compensate members of communities that they analyze also would help reduce poverty. An anti-racist approach would require that a portion of what often are lucrative research grants be allocated to communities and community members.
In such cases as robbery, aggravated assault and other individual-victim crimes, restorative justice and reparative justice can be melded, with the latter in the lead. After that, the focus could move to repairing harm to the victim — ideally, once the defendant no longer is under the threat of prosecution.
Along with healing communities and increasing public safety, a reparative justice approach tackles systemic racism and meets the holistic needs of defendants. It motivates with hope rather than fear, allowing people to productively engage with their families, communities and society at large.
Attorney Sangeeta Prasad is the Center for Children's Law and Policy’s executive director. Previously, as a Stoneleigh Fellow with the Philadelphia district attorney’s office, she focused on probation reform and diversion for young adult defendants.