Samenvatting

This article gives a complete and detailed overview of research evaluations and outcomes of restorative justice projects in the Netherlands over the past decades. It involves developments where clearly restorative justice inspiration was visible. The author describes restorative practices with juveniles and the so-called project ‘Herstelbemiddeling’ (restorative mediation) that started in the nineties. Most evaluations had positive outcomes, but nevertheless there was no continuation from the political side. The author also examines the introduction of the country wide ‘victim-offender conversations’ which are carried out by the national victim support organization. Although this choice is justified because of the vulnerability of some victims and the chance of revictimisation, the author questions if victim organizations can really - in the best interests of the victims – turn away from problems related to the (hardened) treatment of offenders. Victim-offender conversations are to be respected and to be continued, but they cannot be seen as a restorative justice practice.