Remorse and restoration. The role of remorse in constructing the ‘ideal offender’ of restorative justice

Expressing remorse is a basic condition for an ‘ offender ’ to enter a restorative justice process and then an element integral to their moral performance toward the ‘ victim ’ . In this chapter, I argue that remorse plays a further, implicit role within restorative justice in that it contributes to shaping both the offender ’ s identity and their relationships with the victim and the ‘ community ’ . I narrow the focus to consider only restorative justice as defined within law and policy in a specific geographical context (England and Wales). Official normative documents, in fact, represent a crucial dimension of the recent development of restorative justice. From this perspective, focusing on how legal and policy documents frame the relationships between remorse and the offender can help to question the taken-for-granted neutral effects of enshrining restorative justice values into law and policy, and to appreciate the direction of travel of this ‘ new ’ frontier of penality.