Restorative Justice: Moving Beyond the Silos

Abstract

In a conventional modus operandi of justice, the system defines laws and devises solutions when such legal norms are violated. In this rather formalistic paradigm of justice, the state occupies center-stage, and in some ways, owns the laws and the justice system. But if this notion of the state is essentialized with ideals of democracy, participation, or actual justice, one arrives at certain incongruities that undergird the conventional understanding of the functioning of the state and the justice system as a whole. The purpose of this paper is to discuss these incongruities through the perspective of restorative justice, and to emphasize the need for a more processual and dialogic framework of justice. The first part of this paper lays the foundations for and discusses various aspects of restorative justice. The second half of the paper outlines the current legal provisions in Nepal vis-à-vis restorative justice, and calls for a need to incorporate restorative justice in discursive and practical levels in the Nepali context.

Keywords: restorative justice; Nepal; transformative justice; peacebuilding