The Restorative Justice Values & Standards Committee is dedicated to defining and promoting the core values, ethical principles and quality standards that guide restorative justice practice. Its work contributes to the development of policies, best practice guidelines and self-assessment tools to help organisations and practitioners meet restorative justice standards.
The aim of the Restorative Justice Values & Standards Committee is to determine quality and ethical standards for practice in the field of restorative justice. As the European Forum for Restorative Justice (EFRJ) becomes more proactive in promoting public and government support for restorative justice in general and, more specifically, positive initiatives such as the EU Victims Directive 2012, which calls for good quality and safe restorative justice services, it is critically important that we can clearly define what we mean by restorative justice and which values support best practice in an increasing range of contexts. This Committee contributes to recognise the needs of our restorative justice community to identify the values and minimum standards for providing quality restorative justice services in Europe, collect information on the efficiency and effectiveness of restorative justice, and finally create practice guidelines and self-assessment tools for restorative justice organisations.
In 2025, the Restorative Justice Values & Standards Committee will focus on finalising and publishing a new guideline on participation in restorative justice processes. This document will outline key principles and practical considerations to ensure meaningful, safe and voluntary participation for all parties. In parallel, the Committee will begin work on a second guideline focusing on inclusion. Given its broad scope - including considerations for under-represented groups, minorities and other specific needs of participants - this guideline may take a different form and require deeper exploration. In addition to the publication and development of guidelines, we plan to hold at least one public webinar (“Living our values”) to discuss the themes and applications of our work and to engage the wider restorative justice community. A dedicated focus group will also be held with probation services involved in the delivery of restorative justice to better understand their experiences, challenges and approaches to applying the values and standards in practice. Finally, each committee meeting will include space to explore emerging areas, such as the role of technology in RJ processes or the integration of values and standards into restorative justice training. For 2026 the Committee plans to finalise the series of practice guides working on the topics of inclusion and commitment.
The Restorative Justice Values & Standards Committee is born out of a Working Group: originally, this initiative was planned to last 2 years, but finally the Board agreed this is a crucial topic for our field and transformed the temporary Working Group into a long-lasting Committee. The Working Group was chaired by Tim Chapman and composed by:
1. Belinda Hopkins, director, trainer and consultant of Transforming Conflict (UK)
2. Gian Luigi Lepri, psychologist and coordinator of the restorative city project at Sassari University (Italy)
3. Virginia Domingo de la Fuente, professor and restorative justice practitioner at the Scientific Society of Restorative Justice (Spain)
4. Diana Ziedina, head of the mediation division of the State Probation Service (Latvia)
5. Monique Anderson, PhD researcher at KU Leuven (Belgium)
6. Claudia Christen-Schneider, Justice Program Manager & RJ Advocate Prison Fellowship Switzerland & Swiss RJ Forum (Switzerland)
7. Patrizia Patrizi, representative of the EFRJ Board
8. Edit Törzs, representative of the EFRJ Secretariat
Members of the committee 2022-2024
Members of the committee 2020-2022
European Forum for Restorative Justice vzw
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This page has been created with the financial support of the Justice Programme of the European Union