Wider than the sky: The brave mind and kind heart of Gerlinda Smaus On the 1st of June I reached out to my friend Johannes Feest, giving him the good news that we had a publisher interested in the translation and publication of Gerlinda Smaus’ work in English. The process of finding a publisher had been a difficult, long and…
Forging epistemic encounters and friendships between Belgium and South Africa I land in Cape Town on a Monday morning, on the 25 May, after an eventful and rescheduled flight. Despite the disruption, I am thankful it was rescheduled, especially since the brakes of my plane were not working! The travel takes place in the framework of a Multistakeholder Grant project…
Precious encounters[1] I first met Nils in 2005 in Tirana. I was working at the Albanian Foundation for Conflict Resolution, which was at the time organising an international conference on restorative justice where Nils was invited to give a plenary speech. The head of the organisation, Rasim Gjoka, was visibly excited and tried to convey to me how special this visit…
Restorative justice as a response to blood feuds: an idea whose time has come Talking about the phenomenon of blood feuds in Albania has never been easy. Depending on a speaker’s situatedness, the subject is likely to raise outrage, curiosity, or denial. Embodying complexity, as a Northern Albanian, as a woman, as a social scientist, and as a peace…
Restorative responses to environmental harm In April 2019, the Leuven Institute of Criminology (LINC) KU Leuven KU Leuven celebrated its 90 years of existence. On that occasion, John Braithwaite, who is an honorary doctor of KU Leuven, joined LINC. With Ivo Aertsen, we took this wonderful opportunity and decided to organise an international seminar on restorative responses to environmental harm….
The crime of punishment In 1931, Margaret Wilson writes The Crime of Punishment, a fierce and informed critique of the whole catalogue of punishment invented by humans, a critique of man-inflicted pain on earth. An American novelist with little interest on the matter of punishment, she married in 1923 George Douglas Turner, a Scotsman who served as prison governor of…
‘Socializing’ restorative justice: Reading Judge and Punish: The penal state on trial from and for a restorative perspective In Judge and Punish: The Penal state on trial, Geoffroy de Lagasnerie, makes a compelling social critique of the criminal justice system[i]. An entirely legitimate undertaking according to de Lagasnerie, given that the state (and the law) are not immutable substances which…
RESTORATIVE UTOPIAS IN DYSTOPIAN TIMES? After more than 10 years of working on various aspects of restorative justice, I am embarking on a new and exciting research journey. The Research Foundation-Flanders (FWO) has granted me a 3 years research grant to continue working on a project that explores in-depth the shaping of restorative justice in European penal systems and policies….