Mainstreaming Restorative Justice and Therapeutic Jurisprudence through Higher Education

Abstract

Advocates of restorative justice and therapeutic jurisprudence increasingly seek to cross-fertilise their ideas and collaborate on research and practice. The time has also come for higher education professionals who teach these subjects to share learning regarding their curricular and andragogical development. This article represents an initial effort to promote such a partnership. It reflects on the challenges facing the mainstreaming of restorative justice and therapeutic jurisprudence, and contends that overcoming these obstacles requires a much greater focus on their place in university courses. This should incorporate working together to widen the reach of restorative and therapeutic teaching, to share and co-create teaching materials, to develop andragogies that express and reflect restorative and therapeutic values, to engage in public education, and to apply these concepts where needed in university settings. By collaborating across borders and disciplines on these and on other activities, we will stand a better chance of achieving our shared goal: a more humane and effective societal and institutional response to crime, harm and conflict.

Keywords: Restorative justice, therapeutic jurisprudence, mainstreaming, higher education, andragogy