What are restorative practices?
Restorative Mindset
Restorative practices require a mindset of doing things with kids, not to or for them. Educators with a restorative mindset place students at the center of their practice. Restorative practices encompass a variety of structures, activities, systems, and practices aimed at building community & belonging, supporting social & emotional development, and helping students understand their role as community members.
Community & Culture Building
Restorative practices build community and belonging through establishment of caring relationships among students and between students and teachers. Regular classroom practices like check-in circles develop relationships and help community members get to know and care for each other.
Restorative Justice
Restorative justice practices repair harm, rebuild relationships, and re-establish trust when conflicts and issues arise within a community. By honoring the thoughts, feelings, and hopes of all community members involved in incidents, restorative justice allows community members to work together to peacefully and actively resolve problems.
What are restorative practices?
Melissa Mouton, March 30, 2016
Defining restorative practices actually requires the defining of two terms: restorative practices and restorative justice. The term “restorative practices” was developed after the term “restorative justice” became popular, in order to widen the scope of activities deemed restorative, to include more than those previously considered under the context of restorative justice. Therefore, “restorative practices” is a broader term than “restorative justice.”
Restorative Justice
Restorative Justice (RJ) is a framework for dealing with conflict that emphasizes reparation of harm and the interconnectedness of humanity. In contrast to the criminal justice system, there is a de-emphasis on punishment, instead focusing on the needs of those involved—both offenders and victims. Needs not usually addressed by a system that emphasizes punishment include the following:
Needs of Victims Often Unmet by Traditional Justice Systems:
The need for information: why and how the offense happened, and what has happened since
The need for truth-telling: a chance for victims to tell their story and voice the impact the offense has had on their life
The need for empowerment: involvement in the process allows victims to regain control over things that may have been lost during the offense (their property, body, emotions, dreams, etc)
The need for restitution or vindication: reparation of the harm done can help victims heal and—even when the harm cannot be repaired—acknowledgement of responsibility by offenders can profoundly improve the healing process for victims
Needs of Offenders Often Unmet by Traditional Justice Systems:
The need for accountability: to address the harms done and encourage empathy and responsibility
The need for encouragement for personal transformation: receiving help for issues that contributed to their offending behavior (i.e. treatment for addictions, counseling, strategies for improved communication, treatment for childhood trauma, etc), and strengthening of positive personal characteristics
The need for encouragement and support for integration into the community: to promote reunification over isolation
In short, RJ attempts to address these needs rather than simply giving offenders “what they deserve” by assigning punishments. The overarching goals are to repair the harm done and build community.
Restorative justice is rooted in the understanding that a wrongdoing tears at the fabric of the community, straining relationships and damaging culture. More specifically, however, broken relationships are not only damaged as an effect of the crime, but often play a role in causing the offense as well. People are interrelated in layered, multidirectional ways, and a wrongdoing is typically both a cause and an effect of some other damaged relationship. For example, children who bully other kids often do so after being victims of bullying themselves. Therefore, in contrast to the one-sided approach of the traditional criminal justice system, the attention of any restorative effort must be to repair harm and restore community relationships. In order to do this, the parties involved in the process must include the victim, the offender, and the community that has been affected. Table 1 further delineates the difference in approach between RJ and the “legal” system.
The Three Pillars of Restorative Justice
RJ is based on three pillars. First, the emphasis is on harms and needs of all involved. The foremost concern is, of course, for the victim who has been harmed. But RJ also allows for consideration of the needs of the offender and the community itself, recognizing the role these may have played on the offender’s actions as well. The harms and needs of each party will differ based on the people involved and the circumstances, however it is a hallmark of RJ to frame the problems through this lens to promote healing and justice. The second pillar is that harms result in obligations. This means that those who cause harm must be held accountable for their actions. They must attempt to understand the impact of their behavior, and repair the harms done. Emphasis is to “make things right,” either concretely or symbolically. While offenders always have obligations, the community may also have obligations as well. Finally, the third pillar is to promote engagement and participation of anyone who has a stake in the offense and its resolution. This most likely means that anyone playing a significant role in the incident should be involved in the restoration process: victims, offenders, and community members. RJ conversations are often done face-to-face and structured by a facilitator who has adequately prepared and equipped all parties. These discussions allow victims, offenders, and community members to share their experience, hear from others, and come to a mutual consensus on how to make things right. In some cases, however, a face-to-face meeting is not ideal or appropriate and alternatives may be considered, such as intermediaries, videos, or letters.
A Final Definition of Restorative Justice
This page has taken an in-depth look into the basic principles of RJ and has touched on many of the major themes. As one might imagine at this point, defining RJ is difficult to do succinctly, but Howard Zehr has proposed the following adaptation of Tony Marshall’s widely-cited definition: “Restorative justice is an approach to achieving justice that involves, to the extent possible, those who have a stake in a specific offense or harm to collectively identify and address harms, needs, and obligations in order to heal and put things as right as possible.” Restorative justice balances concern for all and encourages outcomes that promote responsibility and healing. It is a lens through which one views conflict, and a framework for addressing it.
Definition of Restorative Practices (RP)
Moving from RJ to the related, but broader concept of restorative practices (RP) requires casting of a wider net. RP is similar to RJ in character and approach, but also includes practices that are preventative in nature and designed to build skills and capacity among those involved. While RJ tends to be focused on addressing events that have already taken place, restorative practices are more proactive to promote positive relationships and culture, in order to prevent negative conflict from happening in the first place (or lesson the chance of harm if it does happen). An excellent resource on RP, the International Institute for Restorative Practices (IIRP), distinguishes RP from RJ in the following excerpt from their website:
The IIRP distinguishes between the terms restorative practices and restorative justice. We view restorative justice practices as a subset of restorative practices. Restorative justice practices are reactive, consisting of formal or informal responses to crime and other wrongdoing after it occurs. The IIRP's definition of restorative practices also includes the use of informal and formal processes that precede wrongdoing, those that proactively build relationships and a sense of community to prevent conflict and wrongdoing.
RP, therefore, is a framework and approach to building culture and relationships within a community that establishes strong social networks and establishes norms for positive behavior. The fabric of a community built on a restorative foundation is a powerful driver of peace and effective conflict resolution. A figure commonly used to distinguish the restorative approach to other approaches to culture building is shown in Figure 2. Restorative practices are built on the foundation of high levels of control (accountability) coupled with high levels of support. This framework allows communities to build strong social networks and capital by meeting the needs of all parties involved and engaging all interested parties in the process. Some of the practices commonly used to promote peaceable environments are as follows: leaders modeling restorative mindsets and behaviors, a safe and inviting environment, emotions of care and concern, and empathy/kindness curriculum that is explicitly taught. These practices (and others) make up the day-to-day actions that build positive relationships and caring communities. Thus, organizations engaging in restorative practices build culture and community by implementing structures that ensure high levels of accountability and support for all members of the community. In summary, the goal of restorative practices is to actively build relationships among members of the community and promote positive culture to avoid (or lessen) conflict.
References:
IIRP website is an excellent source of information: http://www.iirp.edu
Howard Zehr, The Little Book of Restorative Justice, (Good Books, 2015), 20-27.