When Chen Sheng-rong, proprietor of a well-known baozi (steamed buns) restaurant in the Nantou Public Market, was facing drunk driving charges, local prosecutors felt neither a fine nor jail sentence would make amends for the menace he had posed to the public order.

Instead, they dropped charges in exchange for community service, in the form of free lessons at a local community center, teaching how to make baozi and the secrets of running a successful food service business.

Chen, who would previously get together with drinking buddies to knock a few back after selling out of baozi by late morning, was now forced to prepare flour and fillings and punctually report to class at the community center.

His all-out efforts attracted numerous people in mid-life looking to start their own businesses. Local job-placement groups soon began seeking him out to form new classes.

What was originally part of "labor services" soon became the most popular class at the community center. The drunk driving offender soon became "Teacher Chen."

"I did wrong, but I was fortunate to have the opportunity to give back to the community," Chen candidly told the media. Laying aside the label of criminal offender, he has been re-embraced in the community as a popular master baozi maker.

Education as a means of righting wrongs began to replace retributive punishment in 2009 when "restorative justice" became a focal point of Ministry of Justice policy. Currently, eight District Prosecutor's Offices across Taiwan are concurrently pushing prioritization of this sort of alternative sentencing in adjudicating minor crimes that would previously have been subject to a jail term of three years or less.

"When even the rigid world of criminal justice can be this flexible, why is the educational establishment being so obstinate?" asks Chen Tai-hua, a teacher at Tainan Municipal Anshun Jr. High School, which instituted the "restorative justice" disciplinary method on campus more than four years ago, offering alternatives to the demerit system in disciplining students.

In June of this year, the Tainan City Government's Department of Education initiated a collaborative project with the Tainan District Prosecutor's Office, the "Experimental Program for Use of Restorative Justice to Resolve Campus Conflicts and Bullying." Anshun Jr. High School, where Chen Tai-hua works, and Yu Feng Elementary School in Tainan's Baihe District were selected as trial schools for the program.

Amends, Not Punishment

Since Taiwan passed legislation banning corporal punishment from school campuses, more than a few teachers have fretted over how they would be able to discipline unruly students without the option of the rod.

To allay these concerns, Yu Feng Elementary School English teacher Hsieh Hui-you applied to the Ministry of Education for public funding of a four-month tour of the United States to observe "campus discipline" there.

She found that "restorative justice" methods had been applied in youth corrections and in education in the U.S. since the 1970s.

In 1999 the world's first organization dedicated to the incorporation of restorative justice methodology into school campus operations, the International Institute for Restorative Practices (IIRP), was established in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. Approved by the Pennsylvania Department of Education in 2006, the IIRP gained full accreditation this year.

"That was tantamount to an official recognition of the legitimacy of restorative justice as a new method of resolving disciplinary problems on campus," the neatly coiffured Hsieh says, her voice soft yet resolute.

What makes restorative justice different from traditional punishment-based discipline is its emphasis on "amending the harm caused" rather than "punishing wrongdoing."

"If tardiness, missing class and fighting all earn demerits, students are simply unclear what they've done wrong," says Chen Tai-hua. Feeling unsatisfied with his own counseling methods, he enrolled in National Chung Cheng University's Graduate Institute of Criminology. His master's thesis centered on the application of restorative justice on school campuses.

Chen Tai-hua believes the handling of errant students must focus on making amends for the harm the errant behavior has created.

For example, when he took over as student affairs chief at Anshun Jr. High, he found that students seldom greeted teachers while on campus. He felt that when students fail to greet their teachers, it not only is impolite on the surface, but also harmful to teacher-student relations, making the campus less friendly.

So Chen designed an "etiquette improvement form," to be employed when he found students turning a blind eye to their teachers on campus. Students issued such a "ticket" would be required to seek out teachers during after-class hours to inquire after them and have them sign the form. Regulations required completion of the drill with 20 teachers over a specified period of time.

Chen recalls the reaction when he first instituted the policy.

"Most of the students who got ticketed felt a little disgruntled, but took it with a sense of humor," he says. "Some of the signing teachers were fully supportive and encouraging while some had a gripe or two," he continues, adding that the policy provided an avenue of communication between many teachers and students who had previously not been terribly interactive.

And just like that, in concert with announcements at the weekly assembly and routine compliance patrols, each time the bell rang signaling the interval between classes, Anshun's hallways were filled with the sounds of students greeting their teachers. Some were merely carrying out their mandated "fine" while others simply feared being cited for the infraction, but for most it had just become a matter of course.

Emphasizing Respect and Tolerance

Restorative justice begins with an emphasis on respect and tolerance when dealing with conflicts between students.

Previously, when confronted with a conflict between students, most teachers had assumed the role of judge, determining guilt and passing sentence as to the form of punishment.

"A lot of kids would go through the motions of apologizing to each other, but in reality they continued to harbor feelings of ill will," Hsieh observes, "because we weren't letting them clearly express how they truly felt."

George Joseph was principal of Colonial Hills Elementary School in Worthington, Ohio when Hsieh was making her observational tour of the U.S. One afternoon during her visit to the school, two sour-faced boys appeared at the door of the principal's office.

Their teacher needed the principal to mediate between the two boys, who had just been fighting. Principal Joseph rose from his desk as if greeting honored guests and motioned with his arm for the two boys to sit. His eyes were sharp and focused, his voice calm and measured as he leaned forward slightly to ask: "What happened?"

"How did you feel about that?" the principal asked further, sounding more like a conference moderator. The boys each had their turn to speak while the principal listened to each, getting an understanding of the feelings of each boy. He refrained from judging and did not express any opinion.

"What do you want him to do?" Principal Joseph asked the aggrieved boy, soliciting what the boy thought would be adequate redress.

"Do you have anything to say to him?" the principal asked, turning to the offending boy immediately and expertly analyzing how his behavior had wronged the other boy. "You're a good kid. You have a lot of fine qualities. But this time you made a bad decision."

Finally, Principal Joseph shook each boy's hand and thanked them for courageously elucidating their thoughts and feelings and telling them he trusted that in the future they'd both do much better.

"If the principal uses a blame-and-shame approach from the start, I think kids are less likely to admit fault on their own," Hsieh says, still amazed at the encounter. "I realized anew just what ‘respect for others' means."

Restorative justice demands that the onus of responsibility be placed on the interested parties. In fact, it is a more profound and difficult process than merely being subjected to demerits.

Translated from the Chinese by Brian Kennedy