Youth and Crime
Understanding Criminology
Dan Ellingworth
Monday, 13 April 2015
Lecture Outline
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Youth Culture
Patterns of Youth Offending
Formal Responses to Juvenile Crime
Deconstructing the Youth / Crime link
We will never get reasonable behaviour among the young until we bring back National Service.
Without decent standards to guide them, the young have become lawless. Before the war there
was little lawlessness. We need to return to those days
Over the past 20 years or so, there has been a revulsion from authority and discipline
The adolescent has learned no definite moral standards from his parents, is contemptuous of the
law, easily bored
The passing of parental authority, defiance of pre-war conventions, the absence of restraint, the
wildness of extremes, the wholesale drift away from the churches are but a few characteristics of
after-war conditions
Our young people have no idea of discipline or subordination
The manners of children are deteriorating… the child of today is coarser, more vulgar, less
refined than his parents were
They (young people) are the links that have fallen off the chain of society which are going to
decay and obstruct the whole machine
I believe that youth should sleep out the years between the age of 10 and 23; there is nothing in
between but getting women pregnant, wronging the elderly, stealing, fighting
We will never get reasonable behaviour among the young until we bring back
National Service. Without decent standards to guide them, the young have
become lawless. Before the war there was little lawlessness. We need to return
to those days
1985
Over the past 20 years or so, there has been a revulsion from authority and
discipline
1981
The adolescent has learned no definite moral standards from his parents, is
contemptuous of the law, easily bored
1961
The passing of parental authority, defiance of pre-war conventions, the absence
of restraint, the wildness of extremes, the wholesale drift away from the
churches are but a few characteristics of after-war conditions
1932
Our young people have no idea of discipline or subordination
1904
The manners of children are deteriorating… the child of today is coarser, more
vulgar, less refined than his parents were
1898
They (young people) are the links that have fallen off the chain of society
which are going to decay and obstruct the whole machine
1788
I would there were no age between 10 and three-and-twenty, or that youth
would sleep out the rest; for there is nothing in the between but getting wenches
with child, wronging the ancientry, stealing, fighting
1610
Youth as a Perpetual Problem
• Geoffrey Pearson “Hooligan: a history of
respectable fears”
• Common complaint is that young people’s
behaviour is worse than 20 or 30 years ago
• Reality: complaints of irresponsible youth is
ever present throughout history
Construction of “Youth” as
Problematic - example
• Jamie Bulger (1993)
– Moral outrage expressed
– Widespread sensationalist coverage
– Demonisation of two 10 year olds
• 8 years increased to 15 years by Home Secretary
– Symbolic of a general ‘crisis’ in childhood
– Used to justify a range of increasingly punitive
responses to youth offending e.g. reduction of
age of criminal responsibility to 10
Youth:
a social problem in its own right?
• Is the link between youth and crime a new
thing?
• Youth culture: inherently rebellious?
• Evolutionary psychology: rebellion as rites
of passage
• Youth, Subculture and identity
“Revolt into Style”: Recent
subcultural forms of rebellion
• 1950-70s: Teddy boys, Mods, Rockers,
Skinheads, Hippies, Rastas
• 1970s-80s: Punk, Heavy Metal; New
Romantics
• 1990s onward: Acid House, Hip hop, Rap
Each with a specific style, formed around
music, fashion and drug use
Patterns of Youth Offending
• A strong relationship between age and
offending in a variety of statistical sources
– Around ¼ of all crime committed by those aged
10-17
– Over 2/5 of all crime committed by those aged
under 21
– By the age of 28, around 30% of men have a
criminal conviction
Proportion of 10- to 25-year-olds offending in the last 12 months (2005 OCJS)
45
40
35
Percentage
30
25
20
Male
15
Female
10
5
0
11
13
15
17
19
21
23
25
Age
• Young men offend at higher rates than young
women
• Evidence, though, that gender differential
narrowing
• “Peak age of offending” lower for women
Peak age of offending by offence
type
14 years old: “expressive property offences”
16 years old: Violent Offences
17 years old: Serious Property Offences
20 years old: Drug Offences
Recent trends in Youth Offending
• Self-report offending (OCJS 2003 -> 2005)
– Proportion of young people reported
committing an offence stable (at 22%)
– Holds true for different offence types, and for
men (around 28%) and women (16%)
– Levels of serious (10%) and frequent offenders
(7%) also stable
Recent Trends in Youth Justice
Recent trends in Youth Justice
Use of Custody
Use of custody has increased by 90% between 1992 and 2004
Long term detention increased by 438%
Use of custodial sentences for girls up by 450%, boys 150%
Recent trends in Youth Justice
Youth justice trends summarised
• No evidence of increased offending or
victimisation
• Fewer people coming to the attention of the
YJS
• Greater use of detention, both in terms of
number and of severity
Formal Responses to Juvenile
Justice
• 1854 – Youthful Offenders Act
– First recognition that youth and adult offenders
should be considered separately
• 20th cen: responses fluctuated between
– Reform and welfare on one hand, and harsher
punishment on the other
Current Government Policies
• Crime and Disorder Act 1998
– “explicitly correctionalist”
– Local authorities have a statutory duty to
establish youth justice services
– Youth Offending Teams: a “one stop-shop for
all young offenders”
– Youth Justice Board established
Youth Justice and Criminal
Evidence Act 1999
• Youth Offender
Panels
• Restorative Justice
• Child Curfew Orders
• Child Safety Orders
• Anti-social
Behaviour Orders
• Police powers to
tackle truancy
• Reparation Orders
• Action Plan Orders
• Parenting Orders
Audit Commission Report into
Youth Justice 2004
• Young offenders dealt with more quickly
• Young Offenders more likely to be involved in
reparation of some kind
• Youth Justice Board seen as effective
However
• Black and mixed race young offenders increasingly
likely to receive custodial sentences
• Schools, social services, health, substance misuse
services and housing agencies should be more
directly involved with young offenders and in
preventing them from offending in the first place.
Anti-social Behaviour Agenda
• Majority of ASBOs made against under 18s (many more
with Acceptable Behaviour Contracts): an expanding youth
justice net
• A final warning, or a chance to “crank up the use of
custody”
– Conditions set unrealistically high
– Breaches expected
– Custody resulting in around ½ breaches (2003)
• Folk devils “Hoodies” / “Yobs” / “Feral Children”
– dehumanised and social isolated
– justifies a growing punitive response
Summary: Deconstructing the
Youth / Crime Link
• Youth crime is highly visible
– Street crime
– More easily detected
• Youth (crime) is demonized: a history of moral
panics
• Youth as victims of crime
– Much youth victimisation is hidden in home,
mineralized, or dealt with outside the CJS
– High levels of reported victimisation
• Youth as a problematic stage in life