Criminal Justice Vs Restorative Justice

According to Shapland (2011) Justice is defined as the quality of being righteous, fair; equitableness or moral correctness. Justice is a term that can be very tricky and many people have often and easily confused with or used interchangeably with the term fairness. In most circumstances, whether at your workplace, your school, your local pub, or in the courtroom, people want to believe that they always want to feel that they deserve and are owed to be treated fairly after being wronged. There are two different types of justice such as Restorative Justice and Retributive Justice. Restorative justice has recently become a very popular yet controversial topic. With it being such a controversial topic there have been a few key elements of the restorative justice program that have been at a longstanding debate. They key elements consist of weather restorative justice should be defined as a result or a process, whether the approach should contain some type of form of punishment, and lastly, whether the approach should contain some type or form of punishment, and lastly whether or not it should be considered as a replacement to the traditional criminal justice system or be integrated into it.

This paper will show the common elements involved with restorative justice, as well as comparing of restorative justice with reparative justice and emphasizing on the uniqueness of this specific approach.