"Offender rehabilitation" theory and practice have traditionally focused on curing "offenders" of their deviant tendencies by changing their habits, opportunities, personality and life outlook. Consequently, a number of interventions have been developed within the criminal justice system that are said to involve helping offenders. Success is measured by recidivism rates. Recently, the foundations of rehabilitation theory and practice have been shaken. Rehabilitation is now seen by many as a threat to offenders' rights and humanitarian principles. Some have even argued that rehabilitation practices are harmful to offenders' chances of going straight. Alongside these concerns, the entire paradigm on which our modern criminal justice systems are based has also been questioned.

Alternative visions of justice have been moved out of the shadows in the hope that more effective processes are developed for safer and more just societies. One of these visions is encapsulated in restorative justice, which is based on the foundation of promoting human goods in the pursuit of restoration of harm and the correction of deviant behaviour. Restorative justice practices, such as mediation, circles and conferencing bring to the fore states of affairs, activities and experiences that are strongly associated with well-being and higher level of personal satisfaction and social functioning. They aim to create empathy and remorse and through constructive and honest dialogue create a sense of responsibility in the "offender" and a feeling of empowerment and justice in the "victim". Within this framework the labels of "victim" and "offender" collapse.

A new approach to crime reduction and offender rehabilitation is thus needed. This ground-breaking edited volume aims to respond to this call by bringing together inter-disciplinary thinking.
 
Table of Contents: 
Foreword (Kay Pranis, Circle Keeper, MN Dept. of Corrections 1994 - 2003, Restorative Justice Planner, USA) 
Preface (Margaret Thorsborne, Vernon C. (Vick) Kelly, Managing Director of Margaret Thorsborne & Associates & Transformative Justice, Australia, and others) 
Introduction and Acknowledgments (Theo Gavrielides, Founder and Director of The IARS International Institute, UK, and others) 
 
Chapter 1 How I Became an Offender and What I Did to Remove this Label (James E. Mandelin, Ex-offender and now a youth mentor and the Treasurer of the Vancouver Association for Restorative Justice, Canada)
 
Part I: An Inter-Disciplinary Dialogue between Restorative Justice and Offender Rehabilitation 
Chapter 2 A Human Rights Vision of Restorative Justice: Moving Beyond Labels (Theo Gavrielides, Founder and Director of The IARS International Institute, UK, and others) 
Chapter 3 Restorative Justice and the Blurring Between Reparation and Rehabilitation (Fernanda Fonseca Rosenblatt, Assistant Professor at Catholic University of Pernambuco, Brazil) 
Chapter 4 How Restorative Justice can Enable an Interdisciplinary Response to the Perceived Needs of Victims and Children who Offend (Ashley Shearar, Team manager – Youth Policy, New Zealand Ministry of Social Development and research affiliate for the Restorative Justice Chair at New Zealand’s Victoria University in Wellington, New Zealand) 
Chapter 5 "Design for Empathy" – Exploring the Potential of Participatory Design for Fostering Restorative Values and Contributing to Restorative Process (Lorraine Gamman, Adam Thorpe, Design Director, Design Against Crime Research Centre, Central Saint Martins College of Arts and Design, University of the Arts London, UK, and others) 
Chapter 6 Empathy and Emotional Awareness: An Interdisciplinary Perspective (Alexandra Koufouli, Marieke S. Tollenaar, PhD Candidate, Department of Sociology, Panteion University of Social and Political Sciences, Greece; Institute of Psychology, Unit of Clinical Psychology, Leiden University, The Netherlands, and others) 
Chapter 7 Applying affect Script Psychology to Restorative Justice: How Can the Theory Inform the Practice? (Angeliki Kassari, Clinical Studies Officer, Research & Development department, North East London NHS Foundation Trust, London, UK) 

Part II: Case Studies Across Disciplines: Removing the Criminal Justice Labels 
Chapter 8 Restorative Justice and Student Development in Higher Education: Expanding 'Offender' Horizons Beyond Punishment and Rehabilitation to Community Engagement and Personal Growth (David Karp, Olivia Frank, Professor of Sociology, Skidmore College, New York, USA, and others) 
Chapter 9 A Local Volunteer Restorative Justice Model for Adolescents at Risk: Bridging the Court, Mental Health, and Public School Systems (Linda Harvey, Kay Hoffman, Erin Summers, Craig Borie, Director of Juvenile Restorative Justice, Inc. in Lexington, KY, USA, and others) 
Chapter 10 Shame Affect in Intimate Partner Violence: Implications for Restorative Justice (Anne Hayden, Research Associate of the Office of the Pro-Vice Chancellor, Auckland University of Technology, New Zealand, Winston Churchill Fellows Association member, Council of Elders, Restorative Justice Aotearoa member, New Zealand) 
Chapter 11 Breaking the Mould: Dealing with “Group Offenders” and Riots Through Restorative Justice (Theo Gavrielides, Founder and Director of The IARS International Institute, UK, and others) 
Chapter 12 Preventing School Bullying through the use of Empathy: Let’s Stop Bullying without Focusing on Offender Discipline and Treatment (Paula Kaldis, Larissa Abramiuk, Professor of Law, Assistant Dean, Massachusetts School of Law, USA, and others) 
Chapter 13 The Alternatives to Violence Project: Using Positive Criminology as a Framework for Understanding Rehabilitation and Reintegration (Damon Petrich, Brenda Morrison, Researcher, Simon Fraser University, Canada, and others) 
Chapter 14 Prospects of Family Group Conferencing with Youth Sex Offenders and their Victims in South Africa (Thulane Gxubane, Senior Lecturer University of Cape Town, South Africa) 
Chapter 15 Building the Restorative City (Marian Liebmann, ex Director of Mediation UK, restorative justice trainer and practitioner, UK) 
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