Christopher Marshalls is convinced that restorative justice has to do with care for relational involvement. That view is intuitively convincing but not particularly clear. Recent psychological and philosophical research has recently devoted much attention to notions such as ‘collective intentionality’ (Searle, Tomasello) and ‘joint commitment’ (Gilbert). This kind of research is situated and discussed in this paper. We indicate how the restoration of mutual involvement can be reinterpreted from the perspective of this research. This exercise shows that caring for relationships should not be interpreted in a sentimental way. In law and in restorative justice, it does not have to be the intention to enter into more personal relationships with each other. Rather, it is the intention to make it possible once again to develop mutual understanding, respect and compassion from our common universal human commitment.

Conceptions of what ethics are about inform the expectations one has when consulting ethicians. To illustrate this Pattyn shows how two different conceptions of ethics generate two opposite expectations. One could either consider ethics as a specific disciplinary domain that can evaluate and judge decisively about a certain phenomenon on the basis of fundamental criteria, or see ethics as the study of the ways in which a phenomenon – such as restorative justice – can appear as a morally accountable praxis in a specific cultural setting or ‘situated understanding’. Pattyn argues that only the second view makes sense and discusses several types of settings and understandings in relation to various types of judicial settlement. The conclusion following from the analysis is that the ambitions of restorative justice amount to an everyday moral strategy to heal the damaged cohesion of social groups after a transgression and to offer offender and victim alike the opportunity to rehabilitate.