Reelika Sinha, Sapna S
ABSTRACT
Intimate partner violence (IPV) has been a worldwide problem that has been quite hard to handle with traditional justice systems that lack the capacity to address the intricate needs of victims. The present paper aims to discuss how using restorative justice (RJ) based on feminist theory and driven by digital innovations, a different route to justice other than the traditional courts can be pursued. The research involves integrative qualitative method of synthesizing the results of peer-reviewed literature, policy reports on the assessment of such programs as Project Restore (New Zealand), NYC Blueprint (USA), and Open Circle (Australia), and online interventions, such as AR storytelling and digital mediation sites. This review shows that feminist models of RJ are based on the safety and empowerment of the survivor providing results that criminal courts can hardly provide. Nonetheless, these models do not have an easy time scaling because of resource limitations. Digital technologies, nevertheless, make RJ more accessible and anonymous, but at the same time they have ethical risks, including questions of privacy and algorithmic bias. The paper argues that such problems may be solved through the combination of feminist ethics and responsible digital design to create survivor-led and technology-enabling RJ systems. The results can be used in theory and policy formulation through the suggested model that will combine feminist and digital methods to make justice innovative, but ethically sound. This is an interdisciplinary approach that holds transformative prospects in the context of dealing with IPV worldwide.
