Abstract
Written in the shadow of devolution and the Criminal Justice (and Licensing) Bill, 2009 this edited volume aims to provide an account of the contemporary youth justice practices and policies in Scotland and to consider their effectiveness in the context of a fast-moving and expanding youth justice system. Across seven chapters the various contributors reflect on recent developments to assess the extent to which Scotland has retained its distinctive welfarist youth justice culture.
The first two chapters provide an informative overview of the approach to youth justice in Scotland which is essential reading for those unfamiliar with the ethos and workings of the Scottish Children’s Hearings System (CHS). In Chapter 1, Jenny Johnson provides an accessible outline of the overarching youth justice structures, processes and practices, with a useful illustrative flowchart (pp. 2−3), while in Chapter 2, Susan Batchelor and Michelle Burman contribute a more detailed and nuanced historical account of the CHS and its traditionally welfarist approach to youth justice. Both chapters highlight the fact that for over 30 years the CHS has retained its commitment to the Kilbrandon principles whereby generally all children under 16 years of age deemed to be truants, offenders, out of parental control or lacking in parental care, are held to have a common need for special measures adjudicated on the basis of their needs and best interests. Notwithstanding the national pride and international interest elicited by the CHS, since devolution it has been subject to substantive challenge and change. It is argued that developments regarding the shift to greater formalization and legalization of CHS procedures; an increased emphasis on criminogenic tendencies as opposed to welfare needs; the development of more punitive and correctional responses to young offenders and the perceived need to make youth justice more accountable to public safety and public interest concerns, have combined to pose a serious threat to the future of the CHS.
A consideration of the research and evidence context in which these challenges to the traditional welfarism of Scottish youth justice have emerged is provided by Michelle Burman in Chapter 3 and by Fergus McNeill in Chapter 4. Drawing on a range of official data sources and research materials, Burman highlights that young people (particularly young men) are responsible for 40 per cent of crime in Scotland and, as is the case for the UK as a whole, youth crime is generally in decline. Moreover the data available reveals that young people are more likely to be victims rather than perpetrators of crime. Notwithstanding these truths, Burman highlights the disproportionately high levels of public concern regarding youth crime. McNeill also considers the influence of public concern, but in relation to the evidence available on the effectiveness of the welfarist CHS and more recent correctional developments such as the Youth Courts. Concerns are evident for the former with regard to the timeliness of decision-making; the variance in services available in different localities and resources more generally, and for the latter in relation to due process; children’s rights; netwidening; uptariffing and increased use of detention. McNeill concludes that there is a ‘troubled relationship between evidence, policy and practice in youth justice in Scotland’ where ‘what works in responding to public concern and media hype’ outweighs ‘what works’ […] in tackling youth crime and delivering justice for young people’ (pp. 58−59).
In Chapter 5, Jenny Johnson provides an overview of the disposals available for young offenders and an assessment of their relative effectiveness. She notes a dramatic increase in the use of community sentences and sentencers’ propensity to utilize the developing range of sentence options including electronic monitoring; restriction of liberty orders and intensive support and monitoring. However, this chapter also reveals some interesting resistance to the punitive drift evident in Scottish youth justice in relation to the issue of anti-social behaviour (ASB) which is explored in more detail by Mike Nellis, Susan Wiltshire and Kevin Pilkington in Chapter 6. Nellis et al. observe that despite the best efforts of the Scottish Executive to promote ASB measures it has met spirited and successful resistance from social workers and civil liberty groups, to the extent that only four ASBOs for young people aged 12−15 years and no parenting orders were imposed in 2005/6. However, they suggest this resistance has done a disservice to the realities of ASB experiences at the local level and suggest that the emerging concept of ‘community justice’ might offer a ‘genuinely constructive rapprochement between those who champion the primacy of young people’s welfare and those who, for no less progressive reasons, insist that the immediate safety needs of people in disadvantaged communities have been neglected for too long and must be met’ (p. 73).
The final chapter, by the editors Burman and Johnson, reflects on the impacts of the developments addressed throughout the volume and the likely future of Scottish youth justice in light of the Criminal Justice (and Licensing ) Bill 2009. They welcome the fact that the CHS has retained its place at the heart of the Scottish youth justice system and the prospect of restrictions on the prosecution of children under 12 years of age. However, they suggest that the punitiveness apparent in the increased emphasis on risk assessment and management; responsibilization; anti-social behaviour measures; tougher community sentences; community safety; and victim perspectives have served to locate ‘the interests of society above the interests of the child’ (p. 87). They conclude that the new complex set of rationales emerging in Scottish youth justice have served to markedly diminish the dominance of welfarism.
While there is a degree of overlap and repetition across the various chapters in this edited collection, it provides interesting and engaging historical and contemporary insights into the development of Scottish youth justice. Moreover, with the Criminal Justice and Licensing (Scotland) Act 2010 receiving Royal assent in August 2010 the analysis presented will prove an important and timely resource which will enable academics, students and the policy community to critically engage with the emergent Scottish youth justice landscape.