Are Restorative Justice Conferences More Fair Than Criminal Courts? Comparing Levels of Observed Procedural Justice in the Reintegrative Shaming Experiments (RISE)

The reintegrative shaming experiments (RISE) were conducted in Canberra, Australia, between 1995 and 2000. RISE compared the effects of standard court proceedings to restorative justice (RJ)–focused diversionary conferences (DCs) with juvenile, young adult, and adult offenders who had been arrested for personal property, shoplifting, violent, or drunk driving offenses. We evaluated, using observational data, the effect of RJ conferences on objective procedural justice. We find that the DCs produced significantly higher levels of offender engagement within the adjudicative process and higher levels of ethical treatment, and that, when compared with standard trials, conduct within the conferences was attuned to the reintegrative shaming (RIS) process. These results reinforce the previous RISE findings by providing evidence that the conferencing process, as delivered, was in keeping with the overall goals of RJ and supports the prior attribution of RISE’s effectiveness to the RJ process.