The Correctional Advisors in Juvenile Restorative Justice: Normative Ambiguity and Overlapping Authority

This study aims to examine the role of Correctional Advisors (Pembimbing Kemasyarakatan / PK) in juvenile restorative justice, to identify the forms of normative ambiguity in the regulation of their position and the binding force of their recommendations, and to analyze the overlapping authority among the institutions involved. The research method was normative legal research using statutory and conceptual approaches. The legal materials consisted of primary, secondary, and tertiary materials collected through library research, and were analyzed qualitatively and descriptively through a cross analysis of Law Number 11 of 2012 concerning the Juvenile Criminal Justice System, Government Regulation Number 65 of 2015, and Supreme Court Regulation Number 1 of 2024. The novelty of this research lies in the simultaneous use of two analytical lenses, namely normative ambiguity and overlapping authority, and in the systematic mapping of functional overlaps among Correctional Advisors, professional social workers, and law enforcement officials through a tabular comparison. Based on the research, it was concluded that Correctional Advisors play a central role in realizing restorative justice through community research reports, diversion facilitation, and post-adjudication guidance. However, normative ambiguity arises from the absence of operational standards for assessing community research reports and from the unclear legal force of PK recommendations in diversion, while functional overlaps occur between PKs and professional social workers. This study recommends harmonizing the implementing regulations of the Juvenile Criminal Justice System Law by formulating an operational definition of the phrase "taken into consideration," establishing a mandatory consideration mechanism that requires reasoned justification for any departure from community research reports, creating technical guidelines that distinguish the functions of PKs from those of professional social workers, and implementing structured inter-agency coordination.