Restorative Justice as a Response to Sexual Offending – Addressing the Failings of Current Punitive Approaches

This article explores the use of restorative justice as a response to sexual crime. The management of high risk sex offenders, particularly in the community post-release, has been a key focus of contemporary popular and political debates on sexual offending. Many offenders fail to come to the attention of the criminal justice system. For those that do, there is the almost blanket application of recent control in the community measures such as sex offender registries and community notification which have failed to prevent reoffending. The response by the media and the public to the presence of sex offenders in the community may also impede offender rehabilitation. The use of punishment alone via formal criminal justice is, therefore, an inadequate deterrent for sexual crimes. Although controversial, this article advocates the use of restorative practices with sexual crime as a proactive, holistic response to the problem and ultimately as a more effective means of reducing the incidence of sexual offences and sex offender recidivism.

The L Pack: Addressing the Sexual Health Needs of Young Lesbians

Concerns about the sexual health of women who identify as other than heterosexual have been highlighted in numerous research reports, yet access to information, advice and services remains limited within Northern Ireland. In response to this, a group of young women have produced a sexual health resource (‘‘The L Pack’’) specifically for those who identify as lesbian or bisexual. This article discusses the issue of lesbian sexual health and the rationale for the production of The L Pack. Drawing upon discussions with the young women involved and the various partners, it outlines the participatory process of producing information for young women by young women, the meaning and value of this and the nature of learning for all involved. Illustrating feminist and related principles through practice examples, the article outlines how the project moved from a focus on individual learning to one where the young women involved gained the knowledge, skills and confidence to take their learning to their peers and others.

Sexual size dimorphism and reproductive investment by female spiders: A comparative analysis

We investigate the association between female reproductive investment, absolute size, and sexual size dimorphism in spiders to test the predictions of the fecundity-advantage hypothesis. The relationships between absolute size and sexual size dimorphism and aspects of female reproductive output are examined in comparative analyses using phylogenetically independent contrasts. We provide support for the idea that allometry for sexual dimorphism is the result of variation in female size more so than male size. Regression analyses suggest selection for increased fecundity in females. We argue that fecundity selection provides the only general explanation for the evolution of sexual size dimorphism in spiders.