Christianne Paras, Executive Director
Christianne Paras is Ilokano and Kapangpangan, originally from the Ilocos region of the Philippines. She currently resides as an uninvited guest, an immigrant settler, on the unceded, ancestral and traditional lands of the Kwikwetlem peoples in BC, Canada.
With over 20 years’ experience in the restorative justice field, she is an accomplished facilitator with expertise in a variety of practice models including victim offender dialogue, family group conferencing, and peacemaking circles.
She is currently the Executive Director of Restorative Justice Association of BC. She is a co-founder of ROOTS – Reclaiming Out Own Truths & Stories, an organization dedicated to anti-racism work in restorative justice and community spaces. She is also an instructor at Simon Fraser University, and a long time anti-oppression /anti-racism facilitator providing workshops in schools and organizations across British Columbia Lower Mainland. Over the years, she has helped establish a variety of social justice-related community initiatives including the Building Vibrant Communities Workshops, Community Dialogue Series, Speak Out Series, and the Widening the Lens Symposium.
She is a published researcher and author, and has been involved in a wide variety of research projects on topics such as safety in seniors’ living spaces, online gambling, race and the criminal justice system, and restorative justice. Most recently, she is one of the authors of the newly published book ‘Colorizing Restorative Justice: Voicing Our Realities’.
Quote: “Excluding social justice from the restorative justice process centers the criminal justice system that benefits Whites: whiteness, white power, and white privilege and the structural and systemic hierarchy that these create.”