The Little Book of Family Group Conferences: New Zealand Style

by Allan Macrae, Howard Zehr

          Family Group Conferences (FGCs) are the primary forum in New Zealand for dealing with juvenile crime as well as child welfare issues. This third volume in The Little Books of Justice and Peacebuilding Series is about the juvenile justice system that is built around these conferences.           Since their introduction in New Zealand, Family Group Conferences have been adopted and adapted in many places throughout the world. They have been applied in many arenas including child welfare, school discipline, and criminal justice, both juvenile and adult. In fact, FGCs have emerged as one of the most promising models of restorative justice.           This Little Book describes the basics and rationale for this approach to juvenile justice, as well as how an FGC is conducted.           A title in The Little Books of Justice and Peacebuilding Series.

Genres: Psychology

80 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2004

Reviews

[Drick]

This book in the Little Book series describes the restorative justice practice of Family Group Conferencing (FGC) which was started in New Zealand in conjunction with the Maori Peoples who wanted to address the youth crime problem by bringing their youth before the elders and the community of which they ware a part. This then opened a whole new way of dealing with youth crime, family disputes, families separated by divorce, addiction, violence, and the like. While not describing all the variations FGC has taken since being enshrined in New Zealand law in 1989, this book helps us see the power of bringing youth and families together to give them a chance to start over and really be the kind of families that help young people grow into productive citizens

[Karan]

All of this 'Little Book of..." is very well done.

[Sherri]

ts a pretty well known fact if you are in the field at all that juvenile is going terribly wrong in this country. Being sent to the youth center will a) put kids behind in school, b) expose them to much BETTER criminals who will teach them the skills to themselves be better criminals and c) likely make them harder, more bitter kids when they come home. This book talks about New Zealand's attempts to try something new. Using this process, juvenile's learn to admit to their wrongs, make restitution, and rejoin society, rather than deny it, get sent to the youth center and stew in their anger for months. Youth crime, thanks to this program, has dropped TREMENDOUSLY. Great ideas and I hope we study them more in this country!