This chapter presents an overview of the restorative justice movement in the twenty-first century. Restorative justice, on the other hand, offers a very different way of understanding and responding to crime. Instead of viewing the state as the primary victim of criminal acts and placing victims, offenders, and the community in passive roles, restorative justice recognizes crime as being directed against individual people. The values of restorative justice are also deeply rooted in the ancient principles of Judeo-Christian culture. A small and scattered group of community activists, justice system personnel, and a few scholars began to advocate, often independently of each other, for the implementation of restorative justice principles and a practice called victim-offender reconciliation (VORP) during the mid to late 1970s. Some proponents are hopeful that a restorative justice framework can be used to foster systemic change. Facilitation of restorative justice dialogues rests on the use of humanistic mediation.

This chapter describes some of the recent restorative justice innovations and research that substantiates their usefulness. It explores developments in the conceptualization of restorative justice based on emergence of new practices and reasons for the effectiveness of restorative justice as a movement and restorative dialogue as application. Chaos theory offers a better way to view the coincidental timeliness of the emergence of restorative justice as a deeper way of dealing with human conflict. The chapter reviews restorative justice practices that have opened up areas for future growth. Those practices include the use of restorative practices for student misconduct in institutions of higher education, the establishment of surrogate dialogue programs in prison settings between unrelated crime victims and offenders. They also include the creation of restorative justice initiatives for domestic violence and the development of methods for engagement between crime victims and members of defense teams who represent the accused offender.

This chapter examines the differences in facilitating a settlement-driven versus dialogue-driven mediation. It also examines the concept of introducing a humanistic approach to mediation and dialogue. The chapter presents the characteristics and qualities of an effective mediator in relation to the victim and offender, the facilitator’s responsibilities during preparation, the dialogue itself, and follow-up, including the significance of self-care. Nowhere else in the restorative justice process is the principle of respect and being non-judgmental more critical than in how the facilitator treats victim, offender, and other key stakeholders. Settlement-driven mediation is generally practiced within a conflict resolution context. In contrast, dialogue-driven mediation recognizes that most conflicts develop within a larger emotional and relational context characterized by powerful feelings of disrespect, betrayal, and abuse. Besides the governing values that define humanistic mediation, mediators must cultivate their emotional commitment to and connection with the highest principles they assign to the dialogue work.

This chapter distinguishes between spirituality and religiosity. It reports on a study that begins to deconstruct the elements in restorative justice that might be considered spiritual. Spirituality is defined as a reverence for life. Sacred reverence is defined as being in awe of and deep regard or veneration. Religious leaders are often strong promoters at the forefront of many rehabilitative justice practices including restorative justice. By delineating specific spiritual components, the concept of spirituality is made clearer and more usable by social workers and other mediators of restorative justice practice. Bender and Armour examined texts about restorative justice using a hermeneutic phenomenological approach. Nine components of spirituality emerged from the research on the restorative justice literature such as: internal transformation, connectedness, common human bond, repentance, forgiveness, making right a wrong, balance or harmony, rituals and the spirit or supernatural.

This chapter provides an introduction to the three basic dialogue practices like victim-offender mediation (VOM), family group conferencing (FGC) and peacemaking circles and the expansion of VOM to include severely violent crime. It describes the components of a restorative justice dialogue that are a part of all approaches. The chapter delineates the stages in developing a dialogue including referral, preparation, dialogue meeting, and follow-up. Again these stages demonstrate how restorative justice values, principles, and core concepts are actualized in the process. The chapter describes the conditions necessary for creating the context that enables change during the dialogue. Those conditions include a process orientation, safety establishment, respectful interaction, and the flow of positive energy. Besides embodying restorative justice values, these conditions represent spiritual components. The components include: personal accountability in response to the harm, inclusivity, voluntarism, preparation for the dialogue, and the telling of story as personal truth.

Throughout history, social work has played a significant role in the changing healthcare delivery system. This chapter highlights the history of healthcare and social work, including the roles social workers are engaged with diverse populations. It underscores the unique contributions and challenges that social workers are involved with in practice, policy, and research. Social workers have advocated for human rights and social justice throughout history. Social workers can help to change the healthcare delivery system that embraces collaboration with the individuals, families, communities, and other disciplines to insure good health for all members of society. Social workers recognize the dignity and worth of all people as well as the influence of the environment on human life. The recognition of healthcare disparities that continue to exist in society is a major concern of social workers responding to the needs of vulnerable populations.

This chapter focuses on assessing one’s mastery of the professional competencies in field placement. It helps to identify the nine social work professional competencies and the role they play in social work education and accreditation. The nine competencies are: demonstrate ethical and professional behavior; engage diversity and difference in practice; advance human rights and social, economic, and environmental justice; engage in practice-informed research and research-informed practice; engage in policy practice; engage with individuals, families, groups, organizations, and communities; assess individuals, families, groups, organizations, and communities; intervene with individuals, families, groups, organizations, and communities; and evaluate practice with individuals, families, groups, organizations, and, communities. It reviews the knowledge, behavioral, and metadimensions of holistic competency and their subdimensions—knowledge, values, skills, and cognitive and affective processes. The chapter also reviews field placement learning contract, role and purpose in helping to structure and guide field learning experiences.

This chapter focuses on Competency 3: Advance human rights and social, economic, and environmental justice within one’s field placement and beyond. It begins with a brief overview of the conceptual theories and frameworks for social justice. This is followed by an exploration of the types and sources of power, social locations, social constructions, social processes, social identities, conflicts, and the ways these concepts interact in relation to the field experience. The chapter then reviews visions and strategies for change. It explains Increased self-awareness; justice-informed engagement, assessment, and intervention; and justice-informed policy and systems advocacy. The chapter focuses on different concepts related to injustices at multiple levels. It describes how social justice calls for the fair and unbiased treatment of all individuals, eradication of discriminatory practices and institutionalized oppression, and establishment of equality for members of historically marginalized and oppressed groups.