The research report and practical guidelines of the EU funded project ‘Desistance and Restorative Justice: mechanisms for desisting from crime within restorative justice practices‘ are available online. All research reports of projects coordinated by the EFRJ can be downloaded in a .pdf format from here.
The main objective of this 4-year project (2012 – 2016) is to develop alternative understandings of security and justice through restorative justice approaches in intercultural settings within democratic societies.The main objective of this 4-year project (2012 – 2016) is to develop alternative understandings of security and justice through restorative justice approaches in intercultural settings within democratic societies.
The International Restorative Justice Week 2014 will take place on November 16-23. Also this year, the theme will be INSPIRING INNOVATION. In 2013, the EFRJ joined this event by designing postcards which were sent across Europe in digital and printed versions.
This year the EFRJ encourages local teams across Europe and beyond to organize a “RJ Lunch on Inspiring Innovation” during the RJ Week 2014 around the sub-theme “The future of RJ”. If you want to know more and organize a RJ Lunch please read here! There is also a template to be translated in your local language, if needed, which can be used to invite people to attend your RJ Lunch: feel free to use it! The EFRJ will coordinate these series of RJ Lunches organized by local teams. It will also will provide them with a video-documentary to promote RJ (available online by November 13).
During the International RJ Week 2014, the EFRJ will also be a platform to share other local activities which will take place during that week all over Europe and beyond: feel free to share them with us and they will be givenvisibility on the EFRJ website and social media!
Some of our members already confirmed they will organize a RJ Lunch or other activities in their countries. See below the list of events taking place in different EU member states and beyond during the International RJ Week 2014 (sometimes also just before or after)! Information and pictures of these events will be available via social media during the RJ Week.
AUSTRALIA
BELGIUM
BULGARIA
CROATIA
HUNGARY
ITALY
LATVIA
SPAIN
SWEDEN
THE NETHERLANDS
UNITED KINGDOM
* Some of our members informed us about the impossibility to organize an activity during the RJ Week 2014 because they had planned other events immediately before or after the RJ Week 2014.
Enjoy your RJ Week 2014!
We are happy to announce the final conference of the KU Leuven coordinated Daphne Project ‘Developing integrated responses to sexual violence: an interdisciplinary research project on the potential of restorative justice’ (JUST/2011/DAP/3350), which will take place from 12 to 14 November 2014 at the University of Leuven (Belgium). You can find more information here.
The CJP will organize an international seminar with experts and policy makers in Brussels, on September 18, 2014, on the latest evidence for effectively work with victims and offenders.
The CJP was established in 2012 with the aim of addressing criminal justice issues in Europe. It brings together three organizations working in the fields of detention (EuroPris), Probation (CEP) and Restorative Justice (EFRJ).
The international seminar will bring together experts and policy makers interested in improving our current criminal justice systems for victims and offenders, as well as for all European citizens.
Please download the invitation and feel free to spread it to others interested in the topic!
Until new events are coming up, check the video made during the 8th International Conference of the EFRJ in Belfast in June 2014.
Fringe meeting in Belfast, Thursday 12 June (5-7pm)
Developing Restorative Approaches in Schools and other Educational Settings
Chairperson: Belinda Hopkins, European Circle for Restorative Educators
The EFRJ is happy to invite you to the fringe meeting “Developing Restorative Approaches in Schools and other Educational Settings”, chaired by Belinda Hopkins during the 8th international conference of the EFRJ in Belfast! Below, you can read a brief introduction on the fringe meeting and the plans of the European Circle for Restorative Educators:
“The European Circle for Restorative Educators is currently a loose-knit network of people from all over Europe working to introduce a restorative culture into educational settings. As an organisation it is still developing and we have lots to do. We currently have a LinkedIn page and a small website. We invite all who work restoratively in educational settings in Europe to join us for a Fringe meeting to help us move forward. We need volunteers to help form an initial Steering Group so we can take steps to develop on a more formal footing.
We need people who have experience of setting up not-for-profit organisations, developing constitutions, raising funds, building and maintaining websites, administrating small groups such as ours and using social media to spread the word across Europe. In this way we can offer maximum support to the many projects now emerging, as well as making links with related organisations in the fields of mediation, peace education, conflict resolution, citizenship, violence and bullying reduction, health and wellbeing etc.”
Feel free to join the fringe meeting and actively contibute to the challening and great plans of the European Circle for Restorative Educators! See you all in Belfast!
11th of June 2014, Belfast
During the Annual General Meeting of the EFRJ, the election of three new board members will take place! The EFRJ is happy to announce its 6 candidates: please read their short bios here and join the Annual General Meeting in Belfast on June 11, at 5pm.
As a member of the EFRJ, you are invited to vote for three out of the six candidates (pay attention: if you will indicate more than three candidates, your vote will not be valid). As a non-member of the EFRJ, you are invited to attend the Annual General Meeting although you will have no voting rights.
For those of you with full voting rights that are not able to attend the Annual General Meeting in Belfast there is the possibility to vote by proxy :
(1) give a proxy to another individual or organisational member with full membership status;
(2) any member with full membership status can only act as a proxy for a maximum of 5 other full members;
(3) the person/organisation to which you have given your proxy vote should bring the original or signed and scanned document to the General Meeting and hand it over to the staff of the EFRJ Secretariat;
(4) Please sign the document on which you have given your proxy vote. On the document of your proxy vote you state the following: “I, your full name, authorise full name of the person/organisation to which you give your proxy vote to vote on my behalf at the 2014 General Meeting to be held in Belfast (Northern Ireland) on 11th of June 2014. Date, your signature”
We hope to see many of you in Belfast!
On the 16th and 17th of January 2014, the first training of the “Accessibility and Initiation for Restorative Justice” project took place in Warsaw, Poland. The Polish Center of Mediation hosted 20 participants and 5 trainers in a 2-day training on best practices for granting access and stimulating initiation for restorative justice. Four themes were discussed during the training: cooperation, awareness, the invitation and face-to-face informational discussions. Participants, trainers and organizers were satisfied with the overall results. The EFRJ is looking forward to the next trainings in Ireland, Croatia (with Romania), The Netherlands and Belgium.
The project “Accessibility and Initiation for Restorative Justice” coordinated by Dr. Malini Laxminarayan held its first training in Poland last week. Twenty participants attended the two day training at the Polish Center of Mediation in Warsaw. Participants were mostly practitioners in family and business mediation, but valuable input was also given by experts in other fields, such as the media and social services. After a short introduction on the research project, the training was divided into four main sections during the two days. The sections were chosen according to four topics originating from the findings of Malini’s research: cooperation, awareness, the invitation and face-to-face informal discussions.. Trainers included Eleonore Lind (Sweden), Kjersti LilloeOlsen (Norway), Jerzy Książek (Poland), Malini Laxminarayan (Belgium) and Emanuela Biffi (Belgium).
The first section dealt with the topic of cooperation between referral bodies and restorative justice organizations. The second section concerned the theme of awareness: in order to grant further accessibility on restorative justice, more awareness should be raised. What is the message that must be delivered, who is the audience for such a message and who is responsible for spreading the voice about restorative justice? The third section allowed participants to think about best practices for writing the invitation to parties to participate in mediation. The fourth exercise was about the face to face discussions that are held with victims and offenders to invite them to restorative justice programmes. This is an important moment as many people will be unsure about what to do when faced with such a decision, possibly showing signs of uncertainty or anxiety.
The training in Poland was successful: participants engaged in the different discussions and trainers received constructive feedback to improve future trainings. Several people who helped make the training successful should be acknowledged: Ania Jaworska-Metzner for facilitating the contacts between the EFRJ and PCM during the overall organization of the 2-day training, and Agnieska for translating all the discussions between Polish and English. Undoubtedly, to the participation of the trainers and the trainees is also very much appreciated.
The “Accessibility and Initiation” project will hold other trainings during the following months: Ireland (February), The Netherlands, Croatia and Romania (March) and Belgium (May). For further information on the research project and/or the trainings, please contact Malini Laxminarayan (m[email protected]) or Emanuela Biffi ([email protected]).
Dear members, supporters, promoters, and friends of the European Forum for Restorative,
Before we all start our holidays I’d like to give you a short review of the Forum’s activities of 2013 and an outlook on 2014 which will pose new challenges. Thanks to the commitment and active contributions of many people, 2013 was a good year for the Forum with visibility and recognition further increased. This is a consequence of the activities of the Board, the secretariat with the former and the new executive officer, the research team, the editorial team of the Newsletter, the directors of the summer school program, our senior advisor and many other members and non-members (project partners and members of the projects’ steering committees in particular) who contributed in many ways to the progress. Annemieke, Aarne, Beata, Bruno, Eleonore, Vicky, Monique, Kris, Emanuela, Valery, Edit, Katrien, Malini, Tzeni, Kerry, Martin, Robert, Frauke, Niall and Ivo have to be named here explicitly, many others would deserve it as well.
What were the most important activities and achievements of the year? As always, intense work was done in the various research projects. All four studies on (1) Training of the Judiciary, (2) Accessibility and Initiation of RJ Programmes, (3) Desistance and (4) Alternative (FP7) made very good progress. It is the policy of the Forum to give insight into the projects and their findings as widely as possible, thus going beyond ‘just’ writing reports and editing books. If possible, public events are being linked to the projects and the topics addressed. A prime example is the 2013 summer school in Vienna titled ‘Restorative Justice in intercultural settings: business as usual?’ which was closely linked to the ‘Alternative’ project. Strongly supported by the local organizer IRKS, Niall Kearney, Frauke Petzold and Edit Törzs prepared a program that was very well received by the participants who attended from 13 different countries. Next Year’s international conference will be strongly connected to topics and perspectives related to the ‘Desistance’ project.
A further field of ongoing activity is the policy-related work of the Forum. Based on the fact that the European Union nowadays is the key actor in many areas of criminal legislation, we have undertaken a number of efforts to strengthen the legal basis of restorative justice in the Union. With the 2012 Directive establishing minimum standards on the rights, support and protection of victims of crime, restorative justice has got such a basis. We will be aware that the scope for application will become as wide as possible during the implementation phase of the Directive. The general recognition of restorative justice as an inherent or regular component of post-crime (and post-conflict) related measures has also been reflected by the fact that our Forum is part of the Criminal Justice Platform Europe. With this joint initiative the EFRJ, Victim Support Europe (VSE), the Confederation of European Probation CEP and the European Organisation of Prison and Correctional Services (EuroPris) work together on criminal justice related issues of common interest. These four NGOs represent the entire chain of intervention post-crime (and post-conflict) and comprise an important contribution for the development of a more practice-oriented and effective criminal justice system. Through this joint initiative, the work of the participating organisations will become more visible and its impact increased. In addition, the political attention for the different practical aspects of European criminal policy, including restorative justice, will be strengthened. The vision is to reach a better treatment for all parties affected by crime.
All such activities, however, require stable funding. This brings me to the prospects for 2014 which is not as positive as we would have hoped. Until now, the budget of the EFRJ has always been dependent to a significant portion of subsidies by the European Union. Besides the research-related income covered by action grants our budget further depends on additional funding provided by annual operating grants. As a consequence of the long budgetary conflict between EU Parliament and EU Commission, it is not clear whether we can rely again on such an operation grant for 2014. The board will of course continue the efforts, in close cooperation with the Criminal Justice Platform partners. However, this situation means that the Forum has to find at least one sustainable additional funding stream that is independent from European policies.
Generating such funds, however, is much more complicated for the EFRJ than for many other NGOs. We do not have national ‘branches’ that could deliver parts of their income gained from national sources to their umbrella organization. Moreover, fundraising with national enterprises has failed so far since such donors always have their focus on national NGOs. The same is true for public resources provided by states. Therefore I would like to draw your attention on the new ‘donate’ functionality of our website old.euforumrj.org. Please support us by promoting the important role of the EFRJ and its urgent financial need.
In addition, any suggestion about possible donators in your countries is highly appreciated. And please, help us to promote the advantages of membership in the Forum by approaching all interested persons you know, and also those you will meet in the near future. Lastly perhaps, you may even consider yourself to increase your membership fee for 2014 by an additional voluntary surplus. We will do our very best to keep the secretariat functioning, but it might happen that the proven membership services will have to be reduced for a certain time span in 2014.
The good news is that 2014 will also bring the bi-annual international conference which has become the Forum’s most attractive event. The conference with the general theme “Beyond crime: Pathways to desistance, social justice, and peace building” will take place from the 11th-14th of June and will showcase the work of a variety of esteemed speakers. Belfast, the host city, is highly attractive from the perspective of restorative justice as many of you will already know. In addition to the traditional plenary speeches and presentations, the board and the local organization team have the interest to promote new and innovative workshop formats and performances. All details can be drawn very soon from our website where you will also be finding the call for papers. Please do already note the dates, not lastly also with regard to the AGM which will have to elect three new board members. An additional attraction will be the ceremony of the presentation of the European Restorative Justice Award. Like Ivo Aertsen and Martin Wright, who received the prestigious Award in 2010 and 2012 respectively, the third laureate will again be a person with outstanding merits for the development restorative justice. I am happy that the Board has received more proposals than ever before and came to a convincing and unanimous decision.
With this prospect I’d like to thank everybody for their contributions to the Forum’s successful performance in 2013. Neither chair, vice-chair and Board, nor the executive officer and the secretariat can bring forward the vision of restorative justice alone. Active contributions by the members are of the same if not even of more significance. In the name of the Board of the EFRJ I wish all of us a peaceful and hopefully also relaxing Christmas time, and a happy 2014.
Michael Kilchling
Chair
[email protected]
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