Assessing alternative forms of localised justice in post-conflict societies – youth justice in Northern Ireland and South Africa

Restorative justice is currently subject to a lively debate among practitioners, politicians and academics, focusing on its effectiveness as a method of crime reduction, its benefits to both victims and offenders, and its effect upon procedural rights of arrestees. Most recently, the debate has extended to the development of restorative justice in post-conflict societies, aided by the high profile nature of ‘restorative’ models such as the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission. This paper seeks to extend the debate to include less obvious, but equally important, issues. Northern Ireland has recently passed the Justice (Northern Ireland) Act 2002, which transforms the old, adversarial system of youth justice with one based on restorative conferencing. In contrast, South Africa has no formal youth justice system; however, proposals for a ‘restorative’ child justice system contained in the Child Justice Bill (Bill 49 of 2002) are currently before parliament. By conducting a comparative analysis of Northern Ireland and South Africa, the success and potential pitfalls of each of the systems is explored by drawing on findings from research conducted in each of these jurisdictions. In doing this, a number of questions emerge from this investigation: Why has the progress of policies in this area of justice differed so drastically; Will the adoption of this alternative form of justice legitimise the youth justice system in the eyes of all groups within these jurisdictions; and, finally, Will this approach legitimise the post-conflict settlement in both jurisdictions