Restorative Justice

This anthology of ten chapters revolves around new developments in the restorative justice movement as well as assessments and concern areas regarding the current state of the movement. A common thread throughout the chapters is the recognition that restorative justice can no longer be confined to the realm of programs that serve clients. Rather, it is becoming a social movement that promises significant social transformation on many levels of society, connecting both systemic change with frameworks for individual and relational heart-change. Chief among those unfolding changes are matters of race relations, movement leadership and community empowerment. The context for this anthology stems out of a three-year, grant-funded project conducted by the Zehr Institute for Restorative Justice. The first two years included a facilitated consultation of select restorative justice leaders who grappled with future scenarios of where the field may be headed (2015), as well as a larger conference (Restorative Justice in Motion: Building a Movement) that allowed diverse groups to articulate both new successes and new challenges (2016). Out of that event (in 2017), contributors for this anthology were invited to write about those new applications and about current barriers and challenges to movement integrity. The ultimate aim for this third year project was to get the message out to a larger audience connected to the restorative justice movement.