Local Configurations of Restorative Justice: Notes from a Program for Adolescents in a City in the State of São Paulo, Brazil

• In Event: Public Schools, Restorative Justice, and Delinquency

Abstract

This paper examines some of the ways the alternative model of conflict resolution called restorative justice have been used in Brazil. It is presented data from fieldwork conducted in the city of São Caetano do Sul (SP), a place where a program for the resolution of conflicts involving school children and adolescents runs. I try to explore the existing relationship between the representations that those involved with the program have on the model and what is really put on practice. I argue that despite all the discourses of innovation carried by restorative justice, it currently presents characteristics that have been observed for researches that studied official justice for minors. It is and alternative model, but strongly affected by practices and discourses that are not provided by the theoretical principles that initially underlie it. Thus, before being an alternative form of conflict management, the restorative justice has been practiced as a procedure or a step inside the classic form of judicial management of conflicts turned to the punishment of the offender.

Author

• Juliana Tonche, University of Sao Paulo