Enforcing French Law and Imprisonment or Implementing Aboriginal Justice in French Polynesia?

This paper explores present day violence on women in French Polynesia and the current institutional mechanisms and responses to prevent and sanction criminal offences. Based on alarming statistics of Polynesians overrepresented in the prison of Papeete as well as recurrence of criminal activities such a sexual abuse, my paper will focus on establishing the correlation between local cultural practices, enforcement of « imported » penal institutions and the gap of resolving intrafamily violence in small polynesian communities. I will discuss what are the current discourses of gender-based violence in French Polynesia and consider if the cultural gap between French and Polynesian cultures can be filled/replaced through the introduction of aboriginal justice as it is experienced in New Zealand or Canada. While widespread aboriginal preference tends for "peacemaker justice", can violence towards women be lowered thanks to following community healing based on traditional teachings ? Can aboriginal justice help perpetrators to take and develop reponsibility for their own lives ?