Why and how mediated contact between victims and offenders (and members from their networks) leads to positive outcomes, remains a difficult question to answer. Not surprisingly therefore, this topic has been the focus of attention of multiple articles in the past twenty years of this journal. In this contribution, the inspiring article of Borbala Fellegi (2008), titled ‘Explaining the impact of restorative justice. The “4-way interaction” of morality, neutralisation, shame and bonds’ is celebrated. Fellegi presents a theoretical framework in which the added value of restorative, mediated victim-offender meetings for the re-integration of offenders is outlined compared to other judicial responses to crime. Central to her argument is that the mediation process affects in particular the four criminogenic factors mentioned in the title. In this contribution two innovative, working mechanisms of the mediation process that she proposes, are highlighted. First, the preparation phase in which the neutral mediator initiates and facilitates discussion of the crime and its consequences for the victim(s) with the offender. Fellegi proposes that this mechanism can (start to) lift the criminogenic factor moral reasoning of the offender. Second, the restorative focus of the encounter itself between the victim and offender, in which both parties can express how they were affected, express their emotions (such as shame feelings of the offender) and discuss jointly how restoration and reparation might be achieved. This should reduce the criminogenic factor neutralisation, increase moral reasoning, and might contribute to integrative social bonds between the parties and their networks. Thus, Fellegi’s work has made innovative suggestions about the working mechanisms of victim-offender mediation – these suggestions offer useful hypotheses that can be tested empirically.

Compared to victims, relatively little is known about the role of offenders’ emotions, needs and intentions in their (voluntary) decision to participate in victim-offender mediation (VOM). Insight into this decision process among offenders is important, as it may explain (part of) the positive outcomes participation in VOM can have for them, as well as for victims. Based on the work of Shnabel and Nadler (2008; 2015), we predicted that the need to restore their moral image is an important, underlying explanation for why offenders participate in VOM. To test this, we sampled 91 victim-offender mediation cases from the Dutch mediation agency Perpectief Herstelbemiddeling based on pre-defined characteristics. We approached the mediators who handled these cases and asked them to indicate the emotions, need to restore the moral image and intentions of the offenders in these cases. Consequently, we examined how these variables predicted offenders’ actual willingness to participate (or not) in these cases. Results indicated that the need to restore the moral image is indeed an important underlying factor in offenders’ decision to participate in VOM: according to mediators’ answers, offenders who felt more remorse about their crime, felt a stronger need to restore their moral image, which in turn predicted a stronger intention to apologize and help the victim. This intention to apologize and help emerged as the strongest, direct predictor of offenders’ willingness to participate. The relevance of Shnabel and Nadler’s needs-based model of reconciliation for VOM is discussed as well as important future research questions that remain.

De vraag of de franchiseformule door de franchisegever gewijzigd zou mogen worden, en in hoeverre, kan een bron van conflicten zijn. Bij de beoordeling gaat het om de formulering van het wijzigingsbeding, de wijziging zelf en overige omstandigheden. Tegen deze achtergrond wordt in deze bijdrage bezien welke factoren van belang kunnen zijn bij een toelaatbaar beroep van een franchisegever op een beding in een franchiseovereenkomst tot eenzijdige wijziging van de franchiseformule.

In deze kroniek worden door Nederlandse civiele rechters in 2011 gewezen uitspraken waarin het Nederlandse en/of Europese mededingingsrecht aan de orde kwam, besproken. Net als in de kronieken van vorige jaren wordt ook kort aandacht besteed aan fiscale aspecten. Bovendien werd vorig jaar aandacht gevraagd voor enkele belangwekkende uitspraken met betrekking tot schadevergoedingsvorderingen op basis van mededingingsrechtelijke overtredingen. Het betrof vooral buitenlandse uitspraken, die de auteurs niettemin relevant achtten voor de Nederlandse rechtsontwikkeling. In 2011 zijn ook in Nederland een aantal (tussen-)vonnissen in schadevergoedingszaken gewezen, die in het laatste hoofdstuk van deze kroniek zullen worden besproken.