Alternative Justice: Implications of Racial Diversification and the Closing Gender Gap on Public Policy

Background and Purpose: Dissatisfaction with present day justice system solutions in the United States has created an opening for a shift in crime response after a decades-long focus on punitive sentencing and incarceration. This shift is evidenced by a wave of decarceration policies, rehabilitation programs, and an increased focus on reintegration and community corrections. In the past two decades, 32 states have enacted some form of legislation supporting the use of restorative justice – a form of alternative justice focused on human relationships and making amends – as crime response.

The purpose of this study is to explore the contexts in which restorative justice is now being used as a policy solution for juveniles and adults. The following questions are answered: (1) Are internal characteristics of American states are correlated with recent adoption of restorative justice legislation? (2) Which factors are driving adoptions of restorative justice legislation? (3) What are the implications for policymakers and practitioners working on alternative justice solutions and nascent public policy initiatives? This study tests hypotheses which are informed by gaps in prior research on criminal justice policymaking and grounded in social and political theories.

Methods. This study employs a quantitative cross-sectional analysis of secondary data from all 50 states, using ordinal regression to test whether hypothesized variables – including the percentage of female legislators, the percentage of black Americans, the size of American Indian and Alaskan Native populations, incarceration rates, crime rates, past policy preferences, and state fiscal capacity – predict more supportive adoptions of restorative justice legislation at the state level.

Results: Results indicate that social factors are more useful than economic or overt political factors in explaining the adoption of legislation to support restorative justice. More supportive restorative justice legislation in a state was predicted by a higher percentage of female legislators, a higher proportion of Black Americans, and a higher state incarceration rate. Higher crime rates slightly decreased the likelihood of more supportive adoptions. Party affiliation, state fiscal capacity, tribal populations, and victims’ rights policy preferences were not predictive of more or less supportive adoptions.

Conclusions and Implications: With the highest documented incarceration rate in the world and prisons that showcase systemic race and class disparities, the United States is at a critical junction in policymaking. This study helps decode current legislative trends and identifies pressure points that are now leading states to consider alternative forms of justice. Chief among these is the positive influence of rising minority populations and the growing percentage of female legislators on the consideration of alternative justice policies. Within 30 years, the U.S. is expected to become a “plurality nation,” and the legislative gender gap continues to close. This session addresses the implications of these national trends for shifting the tide of not only justice policy, but other public policy arenas such as healthcare, welfare, and education. This session suggests ways to empower marginalized voices in advocacy efforts and assists social workers in knowledgeably offering innovative policy solutions that best serve communities.