Download Doing Youth Justice

Doing Youth Justice
Dr Joanna Phoenix
Department of Social and Policy Sciences
University of Bath
We human beings are social world-makers, though we
do not make our social world in conditions of our
own choosing. Through symbols and languages, we
are able to reflect upon ourselves and others … all the
time we are telling stories about our pasts, our
presents and our futures … Everywhere we go, we are
charged with telling stories and making meaning. Socalled social science is not cut off from this activity
but is itself very much part of it: it is simply an
occasion of more systematic reflection and story
telling upon the world. (Plummer 1995:14)
Aims
1.
Describe and analyze how YJ workers:
a.
b.
c.
acquire knowledge about young offenders
use that knowledge in an assessment of
‘risk’ and ‘welfare need’
communicate that knowledge to other YJ
workers
Aims cont.d
2. Describe and analyze how YP
a. understand the demands placed upon
them to provide information
b. feel able to convey the information that
they feel is important
c. engage or not with the assessment of
their ‘risk’ and ‘welfare needs’
Key Preliminary Findings
1.
2.
There is little or no distinction between
‘welfare need’ and ‘risk of re-offending’.
Young people’s own understandings of their
lives are excluded DESPITE the emphasis on
engagement and inclusion.
Finding 1: Risk and Need



Empirical realities often the same (ASSET asks
about drug abuse, family relationships, housing
problems etc.)
Empirical realities of need are treated as
CAUSATION of offending
Risk factors are little more than a description of
a captive population
Finding 1: Risk and Need



Youth justice as in loco parentis for young people
in need of moral boundaries
‘Need’ is symbolically transformed into ‘risk’
which is then translated into ‘criminogenic risk’
to be dealt with via individual cognitive retraining.
Loci of intervention is almost exclusively
criminal justice
Engagement
(Excluding reprimands, final warnings)
 At the point of arrest
 First appearance in court
 In meetings with solicitor
 Meetings with YOT for PSR
 Panel meeting to agree contract
 Final panel meeting to review contract
 Sentencing stage of court process
 Meetings with YOT and/or staff in detention as part of
sentence
 Breach proceedings in court
Young People’s Narratives

Dominant story of lives torn apart by:
Familial conflict
 Abuse
 Parents’ or own alcoholism or drug problems
 Community and urban decline
 Educational practices of informal and formal
exclusion
 Local authority care in which no one cares
 Lack of employment or other purposive activity

Young People’s Narratives

Lawbreaking becomes:
Something to do
 Somewhere to go
 A buzz
 A means of getting and maintaining friends
 A means of resourcing themselves
 A means of getting a different sort of life

What happened to the
young people’s stories?
YJ Story telling



Magistrates role is adjudicator of the various
stories. This role is dominated by an appeal to
‘common sense’.
Solicitors role is interpreter between young
person’s story and magistrates. This role is
dominated by legal strictures and processes.
YOT role is expert interpreter between the
LIVES of young people and magistrates.
YOT Stories

Characterised by:
Recognition of anti-social effects of youth policies
 A sense of frustration
 A sense of achievement

YOT knowledge


Pseudo scientific knowledge of ‘risk factors’
Experts in
Compliance negotiation
 Holistic assessment

Legal Stories


Legal representation is RE-PACKAGING
young person in acceptable ways to the court
Legal stories are about explaining young person
as normal and typical – not in need or risky.
Legal Stories

Key claims to know
Taking instructions and re-presenting the client
 Stabilising influence
 Experience of children and childhood

Magistrates Stories


Partially excludes YOT knowledge on grounds
of being biased and excludes legal knowledge on
grounds of being technical
Three key claims to know:
Special knowledge of adult offenders
 Experience of childhood and children
 Everyone is unique (universal experience)

Police Stories



Policing as social welfare work
Police as in loco parentis
Claims to know
Unique overview of community
 Experience of childhood or children

Some concluding thoughts



Each role involved in telling stories
Aim of story is to re-present the young person
Each field of stories necessarily excludes other types of
stories


Young person’s narratives of disenfranchisement, boredom,
limited options, creating excitement and creative (if
inappropriate) responses to their wider lives
Stories which recognise the anti-social effects of particular
policies and political strategies at the national level (i.e.
education and the notion of a seamless transition)