RESTORATIVE JUSTICE: LIMITS AND POSSIBILITIES IN FACING MASS INCARCERATION

Abstract

Contextualization of the theme: The article addresses restorative justice as an alternative and possible means of facing mass incarceration.

Objectives: The possibility of expanding the space given to restorative justice will be verified, towards the construction of a new paradigm of justice that overcomes the merely punitive logic based on the culture of fear, which supports incarceration at all costs.

Methodology: The methodology used consists of literature review and document analysis. Initially, the conceptual, principled and teleological lines of restorative justice will be revisited, to later analyze its conformation as a public policy in Brazil. Then, the issue of mass incarceration that plagues our country and places it in the third place in the world ranking in terms of prison population will be addressed. Finally, the limits and possibilities of restorative justice will be addressed as a possible alternative to facing mass incarceration. Here, the starting point is the rational and extremely exceptional use of pre-trial detention and the containment of the hypertrophy of criminal law, which must be guided by a logic of ultima ratio.

Results: The rational and exceptional use of pre-trial detention, restorative measures such as decriminalization, alternative penalties to deprivation of liberty, effective reparation for the damage experienced by the victim and gradual decriminalization of conduct, seem to be solutions capable of re-establishing the criterion of ultima ratio that should guide all criminal law, towards the construction of the restorative paradigm and the desired culture of peace.