Empathy has a profound ability to transform the way in which we resolve and understand conflicts. Empathy enables individuals to open their hearts and minds to not only see and understand the world from the perspective of others, but also to act in a way that is more likely to lead to a peaceful solution. In order to better understand empathy and its impact on conflict resolution, this paper will first address conflict, then empathy, how the two relate to one another, and finally, the essential nature of empathy in conflict resolution.
The value of “empathy” as the primary criterion for selecting judges must be eradicated, as should the practical application of that value, which usually means emphasizing race, sexual preference, gender, and political affiliation over basic qualifications and standards. So long as this subversive trend continues, President Obama’s judicial nominees should receive a heightened level of scrutiny from senators.
With the possibility of additional Supreme Court nominations in President Obama’s second term, he must square with the Senate and the American people about his view of a judge’s proper role.
Misleading and dangerous rhetoric from opposing camps skirt true goals of the continuing protests and the issue of policing practices and procedures
While Caribbean-Americans — formally and informally — are paying their respects to slain NYPD officers Rafael Ramos and Wenjian Liu, the city continues to wrestle with rhetoric that desperately needs some “equal empathy.”
The rhetoric continues to turn sour when PBA union president Pat Lynch, former New York Gov. George Pataki, former Mayor Rudy Giuliani and others repeatedly say the rallies are anti-police — ignoring some bad cops, ill-trained officers and some ineffective NYPD tactics.
We need “equal empathy.” This is a two-way street...
That’s on point. Moving forward into 2015 and beyond, there’s an urgent need for equal empathy — in this city, in this nation, in this world..
"Here we pay attention to you like human beings. ... Based on that information, it's safe to assume Norway's criminal justice system is doing something right. Few citizens there go to prison, and those who do usually go only once. So how does Norway accomplish this feat?
The country relies on a concept called "restorative justice," which aims to repair the harm caused by crime rather than punish people. This system focuses on rehabilitating prisoners.
This is certainly a contrast from the punishment and rehabilitation focus of US prisons. One could definitely see the positive aspects of the Norway approach to deal with such crimes as nonviolent offenses (property theft or white collar crime), but I can't agree with the same approach for a violent mass shooter like Breivik.
In conflict resolution empathy is a central tool and way of being. And yet I remember that when I started in my first mediation course I was unsure of what it was.
It even took a while to learn the difference between empathy and sympathy; (empathy being an intellectual and emotional awareness and understanding of another person’s thoughts and feelings; sympathy an actual sharing of another’s feelings especially in sorrow or trouble). In my search for a definition I encountered an old joke that I often now use to start a discussion on empathy.
These doses of judicial empathy, delivered in oral dissents from the bench, were inflected with personal experience: Justice Sotomayor spoke from the heart in reporting how “race matters”; Justice Ginsburg’s analysis came from a woman who faced sexism in her own career; and Justice Breyer’s father worked as a lawyer for the San Francisco public schools. And it’s not just the liberals who show signs of empathy in their decision-making.
Kate Johnson, BA, BSW, MDiv, RSW is a former prison chaplain and current chaplain at Queens University. After earning her BA and BSW with a focus on criminology, Kate practiced for several years as a social worker in adolescent correctional and mental health facilities.
Seeing the link between childhood victimization and adolescent offending, Kate went on to pursue a Masters of Divinity in Restorative Justice at Queen’s.
A chaplain at Pittsburgh Institution for five years, she introduced a victim empathy program to the Correctional Service of Canada. In 2013 she was appointed chaplain to Queen’s University
Kate also serves on the board of Kingston Community Chaplaincy- an organization that supports ex-prisoners to re-integrate to community after incarceration. She maintains an avid interest in the development of correctional policies that are healthier for staff and prisoners alike.
Actress Brooke Kinsella explores the use of restorative justice in Britain today.
Brooke Kinsella, former EastEnders star and anti-knife crime campaigner, explores the use of restorative justice in Britain today and finds out what happens when offenders and their victims are brought together face to face.
With the government now making millions available for restorative justice - across offences ranging from anti-social behaviour to murder - Brooke considers whether it's an effective way of dealing with offenders and whether it can meet the needs of victims
Kirthi Jayakumar argues that empathy and dialogue, not force, are the keys to ending the Boko Haram's campaign of violence and terror
A large part of building peace and living in a world of peace comes from cultivating and living in a state of empathy.
As Mother Teresa said, “if we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other.” This state of belonging to each other stems from the fact that we are not only individuals, but also a part of the whole that constitutes the universe. The font of all efforts in peacebuilding stems from the understanding of the significance of empathy: for it is only when we understand where the other comes from, that we are in a place to act accordingly in response to their actions..
Child custody mediation provides parents with a valuable alternative to an adversarial divorce. Through the process of mediation, parents have the opportunity to work together and create a parenting plan that honors each parent's unique contribution to their children's upbringing. Consider the following benefits of child custody mediation:
Andrea Brenneke, Williams’ lawyer, suggested arranging a restorative circle that would bring the family and police together to candidly discuss: the effects of the shooting; how to bridge the cultural gap between Native Americans and police; and ways to prevent unwarranted killings in the future.
Both Police Chief John Diaz and Williams agreed to the restorative circle. Having no previous experience in conducting them, Brenneke started researching restorative circles and how to get the best results. About two weeks after the shooting, they met.
Whipped into a predictable but regrettable frenzy, the NYPD blamed the mayor for showing empathy with protestors, declared themselves a “wartime police department,” and promised that they would “act accordingly.”
In the midst of understandable grief and perhaps fear, the NYPD and those who support them uncritically have chosen to engage in the kind of dishonest, incendiary rhetoric that only inflames an already volatile situation.
Let us not forget that the same police who claim protestors have gone to war against them antagonized demonstrators by wearing shirts proclaiming, “I can breathe” in the midst of demonstrations last week. Police also held #BlueLivesMatter rallies. Their callous disregard for Eric Garner’s life should be set alongside their demand for our automatic grief and empathy for these slain officers.
To be clear, I am deeply disheartened by the pain and grief that the families of Officers Liu and Ramos must now endure. Those officers did not deserve to lose their lives.
But the families of Eric Garner, Michael Brown, Akai Gurley, John Crawford and Tamir Rice are worthy of equal empathy.
But, what about the police? Do they also deserve our empathy?
There is so much demonization of police going on right now, that we can forget that behind the uniform is a human being. Surely the unjust deaths of civilians at the hands of police are absolutely enraging, but if we want to awaken the police to be more humane and to create systemic change, will hating them advance our cause?
What’s it like for the police when they are beating on people, or killing innocents? What drew them to that kind of “work”? What kind of system of dehumanization did THEY have to go through before they were ready to brutalize others?
The overarching theme is to explore what is state of the art in Restorative Justice (RJ), today and what are future ambitions for engagement with other disciplines.
The workshop will provide the opportunity to bring together academic researchers from the RJ, Theatre and Design professions who are concerned in their existing practice with building empathy. How empathy is built by each profession and the methods they use are likely to be the subject of lively discipline exchange. ' http://www.designagainstcrime.com/files/events/extending_empathy_workshop1.pdf
Global Picture of Empathy and Restorative Justice by Theo Gavriellides
European Picture of Empathy and Restorative Justice by Tim Chapman
Workshop: How Can Three Disciplines Learn from One Another to Better Measure and Communicate Cultural Value and Impact? Lorraine Gamman,
Dahlia Lithwick has recently complained that the Supreme Court is made up of elites. Hers is not the usual complaint of conservatives that the justices are writing their elite values into the Constitution rather than following the law. It is rather that the justices evince selective empathy—only for elites. According to Lithwick, we need justices who will decide in favor of non-elites on empathetic grounds.
If justices were to follow Lithwick’s advice, the rule of law would disappear. Particularly in disputes that rise to the level of the Court, both parties may deserve empathy.
For example, Lithwick praises Sonia Sotomayor’s defense of preferences in Schuette v. Coalition to Defend Affirmative Action. And surely minorities striving for success who may gain admission to elite colleges because of such programs deserve our empathy. But why don’t those who are denied a place because of their race deserve our empathy as well? Feeling provides no plausible rule of decision.
There was a debate all semester about the root cause of violence in our society. Guns. Video games. But I took the class somewhere else. We talked about empathy.
Many of these kids had horror stories for biographies. A couple of them expressed a concern to me in private that they didn't feel empathy for others. That they were cold-hearted. Dead....
Then, the teen I had spoken with said, "There's no empathy.
The villain in the movies is always out for revenge. It's no different with kids who shoot up their schools. Those kids are out for justice, to right a wrong. That's how they see it."
This lack of empathy sounds a lot like the kids that have loving middle class or above homes that are enrolled in therapeutic boarding schools and wilderness therapy programs. This lack of empathy is not limited to the poor. All social classes need more empathy. -Lon
This Article challenges the assumption and aspiration of neutrality in judging and proposes an approach in line with emerging research from cognitive science.
Judicial empathy — the cognitive capacity to imagine the perspective of another person — is a tool that can mitigate the inevitable implicit biases each judge brings to the bench.
By exploring the influence of implicit biases on decisions that demand a finding of “reasonableness,” such as in Fourth Amendment, discrimination, criminal, and Establishment Clause cases, this Article argues that judicial empathy is necessary to move judges away from their own biased vantage point.
In the wake of recent tragedies, Charles Eisenstein and Dominic Barter explain why restorative justice is the answer. Explore how compassion and empathy lead to healing and reconciliation.
"There's something really unique about empathy, that it clears the things that are blocking action, and that it connects both inside and to other people in a way that is transformative." - Dominic Barter
With the wave of tragedies hitting the news lately -- Gaza, Malaysia Airlines Flight 17, and countless others -- it feels both relevant and necessary to bring restorative justice into the fold. In the wake of these disasters, Charles Eisenstein (known for Occupy Love and promoting a gift economy) penned apoignant essay on viewing major conflicts through the lens of empathy and compassion.
Advocates for restorative justice say the concept is often misunderstood as being “soft” on crime.
But in a prison setting that does not usually challenge offenders to take personal responsibility — and where some even convince themselves they did nothing wrong — the approach offers a marked contrast.
In interviews with the incarcerated men and in the dialogue circles, a common theme was how their focus when they entered prison was on survival, not reflecting on the actions that had brought them here.By DINA KRAFT
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