Source: (2006) Criminal Justice Studies. 19(4):397-422.
The promotion of restorative justice as a new ‘paradigm’ of criminal justice, while bringing
attention to its originality, has also resulted in some unfortunate consequences, including
the creation of unnecessary dichotomies.
Because restorative justice must retain reliance on the conventional system to achieve the
essential goals of criminal justice, however, restorative justice does not manifest the ‘incommensurability’
with the prevailing model that would qualify it as a genuine ‘paradigm’
consistent with Kuhnian analysis.
Understood as a new criminal justice goal rather than as a new paradigm, however,
restorative justice may fulfill its potential for significant change throughout the criminal
justice system. (author’s abstract)
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