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PROTECT

PROTECT logo

Exchanging good practices on restorative justice and promoting the victims’ rights protection

Project partners: Victim Support Europe (VSE), European Forum for Restorative Justice (EFRJ), Mediante (mediation service in Wallonia, Belgium), Universitat de Barcelona (Spain), APAV (support association for victims, Portugal), SPONDE (mediation association, Italy), WAAGE Institute (Germany), Comune de Viterbo, Provincia di Viterbo and Arnera cooperativa sociale. 

Coordinator: Welcome- European Projects

Duration: 1 Sept 2020- 31 Aug 2023

Funding: EU Erasmus+ (KA2) programme

Summary of the project: The EU Directive 2012/29 states this principle: "A crime is not only a wrong to society, but also a violation of the individual rights of victims" . The implementation of restorative justice paths can help both the victims and the offenders in rebuilding their social connections. However, restorative justice doesn’t represent yet a founding concept of the European justice system because Member States apply different approaches to its introduction. Thus, the EU Commission asks to increase cooperation among justice practitioners not only to better share tools, methodologies and good practices but also to joint search for effective solutions to common problems.

Goals of the project: PROTECT “Exchanging good practices on restorative justice and promoting the victims’ rights protection”, wants to improve the skills and competences of the trainers/operators of partners’ organizations working in the field of the restorative justice and of the support to the victims of crime. In doing so PROTECT wants to build an effective framework for the permanent exchange of European practices between these two systems.

Activities: 

  • Set up the "peer-learning community” where partners can actively exchange knowledge,
  • capitalise tools and good practices, develop common training methodologies, foster professional competences and discuss problematic issues;
  • Draft a capacity building programme for the professional empowerment of staff belonging to the partners’ organisations (60 training hours);
  • Organise 3 transnational training events for the staff partners following the peer-learning principle and the non-formal education approach;
  • Elaborate training tools supporting the definition of a European model for training of sector’s operators (as indicated by Directive 2012/29/EU).
PROTECT EFRJ team

Participants on behalf of the EFRJ

The EFRJ is one of the partners of the Erasmus+ project “PROTECT - Exchanging good practices on restorative justice and promoting the victims’ rights protection”.
In 2021, we launched a call for members willing to participate in the 3 full immersion trainings on victims and restorative justice organised within the framework of this project (Lisbon, Viterbo and Barcelona). The EFRJ is recruited 6 participants for this full immersion training programme. Among the 6 participants, 4 were selected within the EFRJ membership and 2 within the EFRJ Secretariat. For delivering the different tasks, our participants will work in 3 duos: 

  1. Claudia Christen-Schneider, President @ Swiss RJ Forum (Switzerland) & Olga Kiseleva, International Cooperation Coordinator, @ Public Center for Legal and Judicial Reform (Germany/ Russia)
  2. Laura Hein, Policy Officer @ EFRJ (Belgium/ Italy) & Hilde Vanlommel, Victim-Offender Mediator @ Moderator (Belgium)
  3. Júlia Barjau, Project Officer @ EFRJ (Belgium/ Spain) & Tereza Řeháková, Program Director @ Institut of Restorative Justice (Czech Republic)
Group photo Barcelona

Papers

After each training, each duo has been tasked to deliver a paper including practical guidelines on some topics discussed in the interactive sessions, i.e. on 1) key-questions for assessing victims’ needs, on 2) key-guiding principles for protecting victims engaging in restorative justice, and on 3) key-methods for training operators working (restoratively) with victims.

Here you can download the 1st paper:

For more information contact our project officer Emanuela Biffi: emanuela.biffi@euforumrj.org

Management team PROTECT project

Management team of the PROTECT project