From Restorative Justice to Restorative Culture

In its original conception Restorative Justice was an innovative process adopted to address criminal behaviour in such a way as to reduce re-offending and, subsequently, to increase victim satisfaction. In the past 20 years the philosophy, values, principles, skills and applications of restorative justice have been applied in all manner of hitherto unforeseen ways. This paper reflects on the benefits to staff teams themselves of adopting a restorative culture in their own workplaces and the role of their senior managers and leaders in modelling this new way of thinking and behaving. Reference is made to developments in schools, the author’s main area of experience and expertise, and a major source of international inspiration for the growth of other restorative milieus. The lessons learnt in implementing culture change in school settings is being applied more widely as an increasing number of public sector employees in particular learn about what restorative practice can do not only for their daily interactions with clients and service users but also in-house, for themselves as a team.

Keywords: Restorative Justice, Restorative Practice, culture transformation