SafeGround Management -innovation in Victim-Offender Mediation

SafeGround is a "Reboot Britain" project funded by the National Endowment for Science Technology and the Arts (NESTA).

SafeGround provides a platform to support a facilitated mediation process between victim and offender, and was the winning project at the 2010 Social Innovation Camp (www.jailbrake.org). The judges who awarded the SafeGround team top prize were from the Youth Justice Board, the Prison Reform Trust, the Police Improvement Agency and the Foyer Housing Foundation.

NESTA, funding our work through "Restorative Technology Ltd", has also produced the 'Radical Efficiency' report  in which they acknowledge the work of a friend in Brazil who is innovating, clarifying and offering  Restorative Justice to great effect:

'A great example of a new entrant to an issue bringing passion, naive intelligence and insights from elsewhere is Dominic Barter, who founded restorative circles,"

(I have paraphrased p11 of the report here; see p42-43 for much more about RJ in Brazil)

To see any of the Interviews 1-6 with Dominic about his Restorative Justice work, about Radical Efficiency and SafeGround, please go to my YouTube Channel:
Toothpaste007

SafeGround1 and SafeGround2
On April 2nd 2010, following a meeting between Aleksi Knuutila and  Paul Crosland, Aleksi published to the SafeGround group that "Paul will pursue building up a Safe Ground that would work outside of the youth justice system, sharing the same technology behind it, and would appreciate any help with that. This will be called SafeGround2 for now."
Update: SafeGround2 (as it was called) will be launched by November 5th 2010 at the website www.peoplesjustice.org.uk 

Piloting SafeGround1 in Devon is progressing, and the first report back to NESTA (primary funders for Restorative Technology Ltd's work) in due in the last week of November 2010.

Radical Efficiency = Saving Public Money eg Restorative Justice

I've worked in restorative justice, and more specifically victim-offender mediation, since the 20th Century, as evidenced on the CV parts of this blog. I've worked in many different roles within a movement that seeks:

• to get harms repaired 
• to get this done with respect
• to learn from each other's suffering
• to leave people empowered to lead law-abiding lives.

What we surely all want from Restorative Justice in the wake of a crime is for action to be taken; actions that work for victims, offenders, communities and the criminal justice system. Actions that generate a healthier future for us all, having 'sucked the marrow' out of the conflicts and pains we've been through.

A justice system that respects all, restores dignity, heals social rifts and can easily win public confidence is 'The Holy Grail'. 

In relation to this holy grail, I no know one better than Dominic Barter to talk to; the guy who is (to me) the most inspiring restorative practioner in the world, Dom's work has been summarised in the report entitled 'Radical Efficiency',p42-45, 2010,NESTA -London.
http://www.nesta.org.uk/news_events/events/assets/events/radical_efficiency_launch
(NB NESTA is the National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts ).

Please note that NESTA has funded the first stages of setting up the 'Safeground team' in which I work. Safeground -and Restorative Technology Ltd- has produced software (under wraps) for a facilitated web communication tool for restorative justice.
NESTA has also chosen Safeground as one of their 10 case studies of digital disruption:
http://www.nesta.org.uk/areas_of_work/public_services_lab/reboot_britain/assets/features/safe_ground
All 10 Case studies and some valuable introduction about Digital Disruption is at:
http://www.nesta.org.uk/library/documents/DD_CaseStudies.pdf

Further updates will follow in relation to:

• Safeground1 (facilitated by a number of youth offending teams) 
• Safeground2 (restorative approaches for the wider general population).