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Devils and Angels: Youth Policy and Crime

2006; Oxford University Press; Volume: 47; Issue: 3 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1093/bjc/azm022

1464-3529

Monica Barry,

Impact of Education Environments

This book focuses on the increasing criminalization of young people in England and Wales and explores how young people have become the crime problem rather than the product of a social system, which fails the young (in education, employment and citizenship terms). The labelling of young people as fearsome and troublesome is a result of an adult-centric society: ‘devils’ do not live up to adult expectations of acceptability (quiet, innocent, healthy and dependable), whereas ‘angels’ willingly and naturally embrace adult values. The Bulger murder of 1993, however, required a re-think of this dichotomous labelling in favour of considering most young people as devils and, since then, policy makers have become increasingly intolerant of young people's behaviour, denying them their childhood and assigning them adult-like traits of rationality and responsibility. Criminal justice has thereby blindly targeted young ‘criminals’ with a view to reforming them. However, this book argues that this process...