The indecent demands of accountability: trauma, marginalisation, and moral agency in youth restorative conferencing

Abstract

In this article I explore the concept of accountability for young people in youth restorative conferencing. Definitions of accountability in research and programme literature demonstrate significant variation between expectations of young people to admit harms, make amends, address the causes of their offending, and desist from future offending. Such variation is problematic in terms of aligning conferencing goals with accountability expectations. I first draw from research that suggests appeals to normative frameworks such as accountability may not be useful for some young people with significant histories of victimisation, abuse, neglect, and trauma. I then examine problems in accountability for young people that are highly marginalised or 'redundant' in terms of systemic exclusion from economic and social forms of capital. These two issues-trauma on the micro level and social marginalisation on the macro level-suggest problems of getting to accountability for some young people. I also argue trauma and social marginalisation present specific problems for thinking about young offenders as 'moral subjects' and conferencing as an effective mechanism of moralising social control. I conclude by suggesting a clear distinction between accountability and responsibility is necessary to disentangle the conflation of misdeeds from the acute social, psychological, and developmental needs of some young offenders.

Predicting Future Recidivism From Changes in School Grades and Moral Agency

“…According to the results of the current investigation, efforts to increase moral agency may also be effective in reducing the odds of recidivism in low-to-moderate risk justice-involved youth. Among the types of interventions that could be effective in enhancing youth moral agency are restorative justice conferences (Wood, 2020) and youth empowerment programs (Ruhr & Fowler, 2022); first, by emphasizing responsibility and accountability in the former, and second, by developing competencies and other life skills in the latter. Another benefit of a reciprocal model is that it provides additional targets for intervention, so that if pursuing one target (school grades) proves unsuccessful, treatment can shift to an alternate but interrelated second target (moral agency).…”

Challenges in the Future of Restorative Youth Justice in Ireland: Minimising Intervention, Maximising Participation

“…Furthermore, children who have language or learning impairments or are from lower social classes could be disadvantaged in a process that is contingent on expression (Hayes and Snow, 2013; Riley and Hayes, 2018) and favours middle-class forms of communication (Willis, 2020). Wood (2020) asks whether the accountability demanded of young people in restorative justice is redundant among those with a history of trauma and exclusion from economic and social capital. Children might struggle to express and reflect on their needs when confused and inclined ‘to do or say whatever [they think] needs to be said and done’ (Wood and Suzuki, 2020: 913).…”

Twintig jaar reflectie op herstelrecht

“…Jonge daders slagen er lang niet altijd in daaraan te voldoen. Niet omdat sorry zeggen een strategisch doel dient, maar omdat de sociaal-emotionele lat van het gesprek (te) hoog ligt (zie ook Johnstone, 2020;Wood, 2020).…”