Better Understanding Youth and Crime
Better Understanding Youth and Crime
Merely being youths have never been so exasperating until now, at the close of the twentieth century – almost reaching an impasse when it comes to separating them and the crime predicament. The latter situation however, is mostly socially or culturally produced, gradually turning into a massive obsession of society at large. Brown attempts to draw attention to other feasible methods of seeing the ‘youth crime problem’ in this book, amidst the fixation with the youthful wrongdoer and his punishment.
She does this by addressing different spheres of influence, starting with the concept of age, or rather the expectations attached to it being largely social, culturally produced elements. Brown also makes it a point to stress on the fact that the notion of childhood innocence and dependency is a projection of an image constructed by ‘adult nostalgia and fears’ as opposed to children’s real lives. When children actually deviate from the conventional, adults are left in a state of incredulity and horror – Brown cites Douglas (1994) on her discussion of how this particular disorder symbolizes both power and danger. The latter poses a threat to society, hence resulting in the marginalization of young people—this being the concept of constructing the ‘other’, which Brown so strongly reiterates in her book. Brown also seeks to contrast Douglas’ structuralist perspective with the psychoanalytic tradition of advocating social exclusion to the maintenance of individuality, aiming to present a more equalized argument on the issue.
Brown’s empathetic stand for young people in trouble is evident throughout her book – the domains explored ranging from academia, media representation, policies adopted by the government, children and youth as sheer victims of oppression in ‘care’ and ‘control’ of social workers and gender were argued in such a way, advocating a more humanitarian youth justice system which safeguards both children’s rights and interests fully. Brown however, failed to appear impartial due to her overemphasis on the subjugation of the young, her pre-occupation perhaps a little too obvious – there were almost no arguments against youth in general. In this sense, she lacks the objectivity that most criminologists strive to achieve –though of course, objectivity is still questioned of its desirability in the field of social sciences.
Where typical books on criminology might dwell on the inexhaustible theories and studies of crime by respective sociologists/criminologists and such, Brown explores the evolvement of the study of...