Restorative and Therapeutic Reentry Rituals

Abstract

Parole, probation, and prison supervise people convicted of crimes until most are released back into the community. According to Braithwaite & Mugford, 1994, and Maruna 2011, reintegration rituals may be vital for the rehabilitation of people who engage in criminal behavior. Just as the rituals of criminal trials confirm the wrongfulness of behavior, rituals celebrating the success of good behavior confirm one’s positive endeavors, which may promote desistance and law abiding behavior. This chapter examines Hawai’i’s experiments with rituals celebrating people’s strengths and efforts in completing parole and incarcerated women who have completed a 12-week restorative justice prison program since 2010. The reintegration rituals are based on restorative justice and therapeutic jurisprudence, and apply elements of Collins’s interaction ritual theory.