ABSTRACT
Crime, Shame and Reintegration argues that, most of the time, most people do not seek to solve problems of daily living by committing crimes—like murdering the person who is causing them the problem—because murder is simply unthinkable to them. The theory argues that murder is constituted as unthinkable by social processes of shaming. The chapter shows that when shame does become an issue in criminal justice, it tends to be stigmatizing shame—shaming penalties. Shame acknowledgement seems to prevent wrongdoing, while displacing shame into anger seems to promote wrongdoing. Some restorative justice advocates argue that shame and shaming have no place in restorative justice because shaming is a kind of hurting and shame is a destructive kind of hurt that can make crime and injustice worse. Restorative justice is about the notion that because crime hurts, justice should heal. This is an alternative to the view that justice must be punitive—responding to hurt with hurt that is the wrongdoer's just deserts.
