An excellent book analysing retributive and restorative justice and exploring the need for a paradigm shift. While it focuses largely on normal criminal justice, the basic principles are very relevant to my own interest in the resolution of conflicts in Sudan, Uganda and elsewhere. The contrast between retributive and restorative justice is clear in situations such as South Africa's Truth and reconciliation Commission, Rwanda's post-genocide justice system, and attempts to involve the International Criminal Court in the conflicts in Darfur and northern Uganda.

The main weakness of this book for me (which Zehr acknowledges himself in an appendix to the later edition which I read, and in e-mail correspondence which I subsequently had with him) is that it is very US- and Judaeo-Christian-centred, with a some European material and a nod to the Maoris and Native Americans. Material from Muslim and African traditions would have helped to develop his argument. ( )