The Framework of KRKB: Governing Consent in Indonesia's New Criminal Procedure

Abstract

This article examined how five consensus-related mechanisms in Indonesia’s reformed criminal process—guilty pleas, courtroom settlements, restorative case disposition, deferred prosecution agreements for corporations, and judicial pardon—should be distinguished and governed. The study employed doctrinal legal research supported by conceptual analysis of criminal law theory and a limited functional comparison with international scholarship on plea bargaining, restorative processes, and corporate settlements. It developed the framework of Keadilan Restoratif Konsensual Berketuhanan (KRKB) as a consent-accountability architecture grounded in Pancasila values. The article found that these mechanisms could not be treated as interchangeable forms of restorative justice because they produced different legal consequences and therefore required distinct standards of proof, voluntariness, restoration, proportionality, and judicial oversight. Its novelty lay in translating KRKB into four sequential decision gates: legal availability; informed consent and non-domination; proportionate restoration or individualization; and auditable completion. The framework provided a doctrinally disciplined approach to preventing a guilty plea from replacing proof, a settlement from concealing coercion, a corporate agreement from resulting in impunity, or a judicial pardon from becoming unreasoned leniency. It also proposed a data and audit agenda to support accountable implementation.