Throughout Latin America there are growing efforts to confront the social consequences of poverty and violence. Restorative practices provides an outlook that is appealing to many who are working to bring people together to resolve problems and transform the nature of society.  This two-part article discusses how individuals in Latin America are implementing restorative practices in their organizations, schools and communities. Part one discusses Nicaragua, Panama and Colombia. Part two talks about Mexico and Peru and references work in Brazil.

 

This is part of one of an article on how individuals in Latin America are implementing restorative practices in their organizations, schools and communities. Part one discusses Nicaragua, Panama and Colombia. Part two talks about Mexico and Peru and references work in Brazil.

There are now two IIRP affiliates in Latin America: the Central American Center for Restorative Practices (Centro de Prácticas Restaurativas para Centroamerica), headquartered in Costa Rica — website: www.iirp.edu, headed by Miguel Tello; and the Latin American Institute for Restorative Practices (Instituto Latino Americano de Prácticas Restaurativas), headquartered in Peru — website: www.iirp.edu, headed by Jean Schmitz. The IIRP is moving toward translating all of its trainings, films and books into Spanish and Portuguese.

Throughout Latin America, there are growing efforts to confront the social consequences of poverty and violence. Restorative practices provides an outlook that is appealing to many who are working to bring people together to resolve problems and transform the nature of society.

This is part of two of an article on how individuals in Latin America are implementing restorative practices in their organizations, schools and communities. There are now two IIRP affiliates Part one discusses Nicaragua, Panama and Colombia. Part two talks about Mexico and Peru and references work in Brazil.

There are now two IIRP affiliates in Latin America: the Central American Center for Restorative Practices (Centro de Prácticas Restaurativas para Centroamerica), headquartered in Costa Rica — website: www.iirp.edu, headed by Miguel Tello; and the Latin American Institute for Restorative Practices (Instituto Latino Americano de Prácticas Restaurativas), headquartered in Peru — website: www.iirp.edu, headed by Jean Schmitz. The IIRP is moving toward translating all of its trainings, films and books into Spanish and Portuguese.

Throughout Latin America, there are growing efforts to confront the social consequences of poverty and violence. Restorative practices provides an outlook that is appealing to many who are working to bring people together to resolve problems and transform the nature of society.

Este texto es la primera parte de un artículo que trata de cómo los individuos en América Latina están implementando las prácticas restaurativas dentro de sus organizaciones, escuelas y comunidades. La primera parte se enfoca en los esfuerzos que se están realizando en Nicaragua, Panamá y Colombia. La segunda parte [enlace] describe lo que está pasando en México y Perú y hace referencia al trabajo que se está haciendo en Brasil.

Ahora contamos con dos afiliados al IIRP en Latino América: el Centro de Prácticas Restaurativas para Centroamerica, ubicado en Costa Rica - página web: www.iirp.edu - dirigido por Miguel Tello; y el Instituto Latino Americano de Prácticas Restaurativas, ubicado en Perú - página web: www.iirp.edu - dirigido por Jean Schmitz. El IIRP está trabajando para traducir todos sus materiales de capacitación, vídeos y libros al español y portugués.

En toda América Latina, se están haciendo esfuerzos crecientes por hacer frente a las consecuencias sociales de la pobreza y la violencia. Las Prácticas Restaurativas proporcionan una perspectiva que atrae a muchos que buscan unir a las personas para resolver problemas y transformar la esencia de la sociedad.

Miguel Tello es originario de México, actualmente vive y trabaja en San José, Costa Rica. Inicialmente, el Sr. Tello se involucró con el IIRP cuando contactó al fundador del IIRP, Ted Wachtel, para obtener su permiso para traducir al español el artículo de su autoria “Justicia Restaurativa en la Vida Cotidiana” a fin de utilizarlo en una conferencia de la Confraternidad Carcelaria Internacional. Posteriormente, el Sr. Tello se capacitó con el IIRP y después se hizo capacitador de dicha organización.

Este texto es la segunda parte de un artículo sobre cómo los individuos en América Latina están implementando las prácticas restaurativas dentro de sus organizaciones, centros educativos y comunidades. Ahora contamos con dos afiliados al IIRP. La primera parte [enlace] se enfoca en los esfuerzos que se están realizando en Nicaragua, Panamá y Colombia. La segunda parte describe lo que está pasando en México y Perú y menciona el trabajo que se está haciendo en Brasil.

Ahora contamos con dos afiliados al IIRP en Latino América: el Centro de Prácticas Restaurativas para Centroamérica, ubicado en Costa Rica - página web: www.iirp.edu - dirigido por Miguel Tello; y el Instituto Latino Americano de Prácticas Restaurativas, ubicado en Perú - página web: www.iirp.edu - dirigido por Jean Schmitz. El IIRP está trabajando para traducir todos sus materiales de capacitación, vídeos y libros al español y portugués.

Many people face a transition in their lives when promoted to a supervisor 

Reflective Questions:

  • What type of supervisor do I want to be and how do you want to lead others?
  • Do I want to give honest feedback even if it can be difficult to deliver?
  • When I have questions, how will I gain support from other leaders?
  • How would I want to describe the culture of our workplace…how do I create that?
  • How can I teach, direct, empower and develop the people I work with?
  • How can I hold the people accountable to the employment expectations while providing ample support simultaneously?
  • How is change created in our setting and how can I help that go better?
  • When I think of the leaders I respect most in my life, what where those characteristics?
 

but are ill-equipped to handle the nuances and social ramifications of this process. A restorative perspective, by making this transition more transparent, can help deal directly with the emotional and social change.

Before becoming a supervisor, many times people get to know their jobs and become quite good at the tasks and knowledge required to excel in their work. That’s usually why they get chosen to lead others.

Unfortunately, knowing how to do your job doesn’t necessary translate to knowing how to manage others. Too many times supervisors are picked because of seniority or expertise in their position rather than for their management strength. But supervising requires another skill set besides knowing the tasks.

In my opinion, a new supervisor is responsible to create a healthy workplace environment through participatory and empowering processes. This can be difficult at times depending on the structure of the workplace and the amount of support you receive from other leaders. Gaining an understanding of one’s own worldview as it relates to authority and power may help guide a supervisor’s decisions.

Supervisors can pose self-reflective questions that explore their guiding principles and perspective. These questions can be used as a newer supervisor, when transitioning to another position or as a veteran supervisor.

By Laura Mirsky
The fourth commencement of the International Institute for Restorative Practices (IIRP) Graduate School, on June 25th, 2011, in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, USA, was a little different from the past three. At 35 graduates, the number of students had grown progressively larger than those in the preceding years, as had the overflow crowd of 230-plus family and friends. More significant, perhaps, just two days before, on June 23rd, the Middle States Commission on Higher Education1 granted the IIRP official accreditation status.

 The fourth class of master’s degree recipients of the IIRP Graduate School.“In doing so,” said IIRP president Ted Wachtel in his welcoming remarks, “the Commission affirmed the quality of all of the degrees of all of the students who gambled their time and effort on a new institution and a new field of study that has the goal of positively influencing human behavior and strengthening civil society throughout the world.”

“Not only did the Middle States Commission accredit the IIRP Graduate School,” he continued, “it also proclaimed to the world that restorative practices is a field worthy of study at the highest level. This group of students is about to become graduates of the first accredited higher-education institution in the world that is wholly dedicated to restorative practices.”

There's now a page on the IIRP web site listing all the presentations from the recent world conference. We'll be presenting a weekly series here focusing on papers that have been submitted and linked to this page. In this first installment, it's John Braithwaite's keynote, in which he spoke in general terms about restorative justice, restorative practices, restorative living and related issues.

Braithwaite says that Restorative Justice is about dialogue, active responsibility, healing, building relationships, building human capabilities and prevention of future injustices. However, he argues that while RJ is reluctant "To put a blamed individual and not the problem in the centre" and "To punish," that "Responsive regulation is about the idea that these are things we do resort to when nurturing active responsibility and restorative justice fail and fail again." These ideas are expanded on in Braithwaite's book, Restorative Justice and Responsive Regulation (2002).

From the IIRP's self-study for accreditation of its master program by the Middle States Commission on Higher Education:

"The emerging field of restorative practices is the study of restoring and developing social capital, social discipline, emotional well-being, and civic participation through participatory learning and decision making."

Please feel free to comment below to discuss how you, in your field, can relate to this definition.

View the conference schedule and presentation materials (where provided).

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