Source: (2011) Annual Review of Interdisciplinary Justice Research. 2:211-232.
Restorative justices facilitate mutual healing of the victims and survivors of atrocities; access to social, financial, material, and emotional needs; rehabilitation and restoration of impaired social relationships between the victims and the
perpetrators; and renewed dignity, respect, and reintegration of both the victims and the perpetrators into the community (Zehr and Mika, 1998). Restorative justice provides public spaces for active participation of both the victims and the perpetrators in finding truth through dialogue thereby facilitating informed understanding of the root causes of past atrocities and creating opportunities to break the cycle of violence and facilitate mutual healing (Hutchison and Wray,
2003). Victims’ testimonies facilitate recognition, empowerment, humanization, respect, and dignity while the offenders acknowledge responsibilities for the harms they committed and bridge the gap through agreed upon reparations, apologies, seeking forgiveness towards renewed social relationships (Marshall and Gurr, 2003). Truth telling exposes structural injustices that cause structural and physical violence thereby enabling informed intervention and sustainable reconciliation and peacebuilding (Hutchison and Wray, 2003). To facilitate effective transitional justice in Kenya, it is important to understand the root causes of ethnopolitical violence
in the country. This is discussed in the following section.(excerpt)
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