Arzoo Osanloo
- Published in print:
- 2020
- Published Online:
- January 2021
- ISBN:
- 9780691172040
- eISBN:
- 9780691201535
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Princeton University Press
- DOI:
- 10.23943/princeton/9780691172040.003.0001
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Middle Eastern Studies
This introductory chapter provides an overview of the work of forbearance in Iran's criminal justice system. In Iran, the codification of forbearance emerges from a hybrid crimtort justice system, ...
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This introductory chapter provides an overview of the work of forbearance in Iran's criminal justice system. In Iran, the codification of forbearance emerges from a hybrid crimtort justice system, complete with its own conditions of possibility. Iran's criminal laws are clear in defining certain categories of punishment as a consequence of specific injuries. The laws also stipulate the conditions for forbearance. However, the penal code is silent with respect to how parties should arrive at reconciliation. That is, the state encourages settlement, but for all intents and purposes, leaves to the parties themselves to determine what the substance and process of that settlement might be. The conjuncture of a clear legal and moral duty to seek reconciliation alongside the absence of specific guidelines on how to do so has a generative quality and produces an arena outside of the state's judicial apparatus, yet still of it, for bringing about a settlement short of retribution or for forgiveness work. Thus, the manifest moral and legal compulsion to forgive without meaningful guidelines on how to do so has produced an informal cottage industry of advocacy, one that is populated by diverse actors and which produces numerous avenues for negotiating forbearance by forging reconciliation and settlement.Less
This introductory chapter provides an overview of the work of forbearance in Iran's criminal justice system. In Iran, the codification of forbearance emerges from a hybrid crimtort justice system, complete with its own conditions of possibility. Iran's criminal laws are clear in defining certain categories of punishment as a consequence of specific injuries. The laws also stipulate the conditions for forbearance. However, the penal code is silent with respect to how parties should arrive at reconciliation. That is, the state encourages settlement, but for all intents and purposes, leaves to the parties themselves to determine what the substance and process of that settlement might be. The conjuncture of a clear legal and moral duty to seek reconciliation alongside the absence of specific guidelines on how to do so has a generative quality and produces an arena outside of the state's judicial apparatus, yet still of it, for bringing about a settlement short of retribution or for forgiveness work. Thus, the manifest moral and legal compulsion to forgive without meaningful guidelines on how to do so has produced an informal cottage industry of advocacy, one that is populated by diverse actors and which produces numerous avenues for negotiating forbearance by forging reconciliation and settlement.
Arzoo Osanloo
- Published in print:
- 2020
- Published Online:
- January 2021
- ISBN:
- 9780691172040
- eISBN:
- 9780691201535
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Princeton University Press
- DOI:
- 10.23943/princeton/9780691172040.003.0002
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Middle Eastern Studies
This chapter discusses the foundational aspects of Iran's victim-centered justice system. Iran's criminal justice system allows a privileging of victims' rights over those of the state, even as the ...
More
This chapter discusses the foundational aspects of Iran's victim-centered justice system. Iran's criminal justice system allows a privileging of victims' rights over those of the state, even as the state's delegation of the right of life and death both legitimizes the system and makes the plaintiffs complicit in that system. It is, above all, a victim-centered system. The revised penal codes demand that judicial officials seek to reconcile and mediate between the parties, while also allowing them time to determine the conditions of their forbearance. One of the residual effects of customary practices on the codified system is the greater entrenchment of gender roles and the explicit concern with honor. Another trace of the orfi system, however, is that parties are not limited to seeking damages prescribed in the laws. The mechanisms for forging resolution are similarly unconstrained. In the context of resolving the dispute, there is a permeability of the border between judicial and extrajudicial remedies. The laws provide for, even prescribe, extrajudicial processes to unfold in the name of restorative justice, and directly charge judicial officials to seek as much through mediation and reconciliation.Less
This chapter discusses the foundational aspects of Iran's victim-centered justice system. Iran's criminal justice system allows a privileging of victims' rights over those of the state, even as the state's delegation of the right of life and death both legitimizes the system and makes the plaintiffs complicit in that system. It is, above all, a victim-centered system. The revised penal codes demand that judicial officials seek to reconcile and mediate between the parties, while also allowing them time to determine the conditions of their forbearance. One of the residual effects of customary practices on the codified system is the greater entrenchment of gender roles and the explicit concern with honor. Another trace of the orfi system, however, is that parties are not limited to seeking damages prescribed in the laws. The mechanisms for forging resolution are similarly unconstrained. In the context of resolving the dispute, there is a permeability of the border between judicial and extrajudicial remedies. The laws provide for, even prescribe, extrajudicial processes to unfold in the name of restorative justice, and directly charge judicial officials to seek as much through mediation and reconciliation.
Arzoo Osanloo
- Published in print:
- 2020
- Published Online:
- January 2021
- ISBN:
- 9780691172040
- eISBN:
- 9780691201535
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Princeton University Press
- DOI:
- 10.23943/princeton/9780691172040.001.0001
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Middle Eastern Studies
Iran's criminal courts are notorious for meting out severe sentences—according to Amnesty International, the country has the world's highest rate of capital punishment per capita. Less known to ...
More
Iran's criminal courts are notorious for meting out severe sentences—according to Amnesty International, the country has the world's highest rate of capital punishment per capita. Less known to outside observers, however, is the Iranian criminal code's recognition of forgiveness, where victims of violent crimes, or the families of murder victims, can request the state to forgo punishing the criminal. This book shows that in the Iranian justice system, forbearance is as much a right of victims as retribution. Drawing on extended interviews and first-hand observations of more than eighty murder trials, the book explores why some families of victims forgive perpetrators and how a wide array of individuals contribute to the fraught business of negotiating reconciliation. Based on Qur'anic principles, Iran's criminal codes encourage mercy and compel judicial officials to help parties reach a settlement. As no formal regulations exist to guide those involved, an informal cottage industry has grown around forgiveness advocacy. Interested parties—including attorneys, judges, social workers, the families of victims and perpetrators, and even performing artists—intervene in cases, drawing from such sources as scripture, ritual, and art to stir feelings of forgiveness. These actors forge new and sometimes conflicting strategies to secure forbearance, and some aim to reform social attitudes and laws on capital punishment. The book examines how an Islamic victim-centered approach to justice sheds light on the conditions of mercy.Less
Iran's criminal courts are notorious for meting out severe sentences—according to Amnesty International, the country has the world's highest rate of capital punishment per capita. Less known to outside observers, however, is the Iranian criminal code's recognition of forgiveness, where victims of violent crimes, or the families of murder victims, can request the state to forgo punishing the criminal. This book shows that in the Iranian justice system, forbearance is as much a right of victims as retribution. Drawing on extended interviews and first-hand observations of more than eighty murder trials, the book explores why some families of victims forgive perpetrators and how a wide array of individuals contribute to the fraught business of negotiating reconciliation. Based on Qur'anic principles, Iran's criminal codes encourage mercy and compel judicial officials to help parties reach a settlement. As no formal regulations exist to guide those involved, an informal cottage industry has grown around forgiveness advocacy. Interested parties—including attorneys, judges, social workers, the families of victims and perpetrators, and even performing artists—intervene in cases, drawing from such sources as scripture, ritual, and art to stir feelings of forgiveness. These actors forge new and sometimes conflicting strategies to secure forbearance, and some aim to reform social attitudes and laws on capital punishment. The book examines how an Islamic victim-centered approach to justice sheds light on the conditions of mercy.