The Environment on our Doorsteps: Community Restorative Justice and the Roots of Sustainability

Abstract

The leading paradigms of sustainability are fraught with tremendous shortcomings and ambiguities in relation to both peace and justice, and lack any significant discourse on the necessity of radically transforming our political institutions to incorporate sustainability issues into the development agenda. In an effort to address these shortcomings, a new paradigm called just sustainability has emerged. Just sustainability is an approach that recognizes the inseparable nature of social and environmental justice and sustainability, and pushes for organizations and governmental institutions to become more aware of the relationships that exist between inequality, injustice and environmentally unsustainable practices (Agyeman 2005). This study provides a critical assessment of Community Restorative Justice (CRJ), a grassroots, community-based initiative in the north of Ireland dedicated to creating change through an empowering, participatory process to build a just community that is tolerant, responsive, and inclusive. Restorative justice is a response to crime and anti-social behavior that is “aimed at repairing the harm caused by a criminal act and restoring the balance in the community affected by the criminal act” (Government of British Columbia 2006); central to many restorative justice programs—CRJ included—is the idea that crimes are committed against individuals or communities as opposed to the state. Since its creation in 1996, CRJ has come to play an integral role in the continuing Irish peace process, as it provides alternatives to punishment violence through its conflict mediation and education services and stresses above all else that those most affected should have the opportunity to participate in the regenerative process. Until recently, few scholars have thought to emphasize the roles that peace and justice can play as strategies in a sustainable development framework, let alone the contributions that an organization such as CRJ can make to both the environmental justice movement and broader struggles for social and economic equality. This paper seeks to demonstrate how the work of CRJ and its place within the greater West Belfast community contribute to a more solid foundation for just sustainable development through efforts toward local decision-making, participation and empowerment, and the reclamation of community/sovereignty; the reconfiguration of relationships within communities and between different levels of government; and the connections between violence, inequality, quality of life, and community development. The assessment of CRJ and its place within the context of just sustainability will provide an alternative conceptualization of the connection between issues of human security, development, and environmental justice. The analysis of this integrated approach can be applied to both the current sustainability discourse, as well as current grassroots activist efforts to create more creative, proactive, and effective strategies that are holistic in nature and recognize the critical links between economic opportunity, social welfare, and quality of life.