Block spends time in his book suggesting ways to bring about this shift. These methods include gathering and asking powerful questions. These questions engage, confront and invite people to co-create new possibilities. The importance of radical hospitality and the gift of invitation is highlighted as opening up a space for something new. And, finally, Block concludes with the simple, yet profound, need for defining space and the importance of removing power symbols and barriers to community and inviting a level playing field.
Block intersperses his book with many short story examples of pockets of practice that follow his principles. These include from human service agencies that avoid a deficiency model of support to a health care professional who treats patients as valued and capable partners in health planning for life. It is unclear if these principles have been tested, studied, or researched in a quantitative or qualitative way. It is also not shown what the applications are beyond smaller groups of citizens practicing these ideas or what a larger scale model would look like. The restorative model has been explored in a wider application as outlined in Green, Johnson and Lambert’s (2013) work from Hull England reporting Hull’s attempt to incorporate Restorative Practice across a wide swath of the community and the intersections of education, law and government. Block leaves the reader to imagine creating “space for something new”(p. 116). Organizations, schools and faith-based groups seem to fear relational space and the unknown possibilities as they remove barriers, systems, and architectures of power. But the possibilities are evident as Block describes small groups of citizens applying these principles in their context. Block affirms that there is a place for the dissenter, as we ask the hard questions, and a place for doubts and reservations, but there is also a place for the promise of another way, one that values the gifts of all and helps us unlock each other’s unexpressed potential and commitments and that together may bring about a new and hope filled future.
What do you think it would take to move towards a Restorative Community like the Hull UK model in our city?
What do you think it would take as a starting point to form community based on gifts rather than deficiencies? Can service provider agencies even operate on this model? What would this look like?
Block, P. (2008). Community: the structure of belonging. San Francisco: Bennet-
Koehler Publications.
Green, Simon; Johnstone, Gerry; Lambert, Craig. City of hull restorative questions
Contemporary Justice Review. Dec2013, Vol. 16 Issue 4, p445-460. 16p.
Wachtel, T. (2013) Defining Restorative. Paper presented at The 15th World
Conference of the International Institute for Restorative Practices: Building a Worldwide Restorative
Practices Learning Network, Bethlehem PA, USA.