Families and Schools that are Restorative and Responsive

Abstract

This chapter seeks to normalise responsive regulation as a natural part of family life and identify restorative practice as an integral part of problem solving that makes responsive regulation work in family settings. Intuitive understanding of responsive regulation and restorative justice are more widespread in western culture than human service professionals recognise. For instance, the familiarity of these ideas in the child-rearing space has made it more natural to translate ideas of responsive regulation and restorative justice into the school setting to deal with bullying through whole-of-school approaches. Yet there are obstacles to expanding the reach of the approach, involving ideology, low trust in the community, state-led technocratic regulation and overly zealous political control.