UK Youth Justice System - Report Example

UK Youth Justice System and Social exclusion is a systematic process through which the individuals, a community or people are blocked from accessing their rights, resources and opportunities (Agulnik, 2002). Common resources and opportunities foster social integration, and should be made available always to all members of the society without discrimination. The resources can either be healthcare, education, housing and even employment services (Pierson, 2009). There are many grounds on which a person or a group can be socially excluded including individual’s educational status, childhood relationships, social class and even age (Agulnik, 2002). Social exclusion concept applies to the minority members of the community such a, the youth, people with disability, and the elderly. Social exclusion of the youth is one of the major examples of social exclusion, and it refers to a situation where the youths are at a social disadvantage in accessing some of the resources within a community or state (Bryne, 2005). The youths are the future of a nation and should be involved in every aspect of the community and be integrated in the most important undertaking in the society. Social exclusion of the youth occurs when the youths are being blocked from accessing these social amenities, facilities, rights and opportunities enjoyed by the other members of that community or society (Sellers, 2012). The major form of social exclusion experienced by the youth is being sidelined when employment opportunities are being offered. This is actually the main reason for the riots that took place in the UK in 2011 (Strathdee, 2013). The participants were the youths who felt that they were being sidelined in the society, most of them were not gainfully employed. Social exclusion of the youths also, for instance, might be perpetrated when the elderly deny the youths the right to democratic participation e.g. by raising the voting years to a certain minimum that blocks a huge lot of the youth out of the democratic process. It may also occur when the elderly people, out of fear or stereotypical beliefs, refuse to employ the youths. The youths cannot social exclude themselves; that cannot be termed as social exclusion. The force of exclusion must be coming from without (Smith, 2013). In this sense, it is mostly the elderly business owners and the government policies that exclude the youths from fully enjoying their rights, fully participating in the society and being handed employment opportunities. Many social commentators have pointed out that the rate of criminal activities in a society is directly proportional to the level of social exclusion of the youths (Akers and Jensen, 2011). Recent research conducted by the Justice department has shown that many of the offenders are the youths. It has also shown a substantial increase in the youths in the criminal justice system. Material deprivation is an obvious motive to engage in criminal activities (Thurnberry, 2004). The youths have social needs just like other age groups in the society. Furthermore, most youths have a class that they want to maintain and many other fantasies from their childhood. When they do not get the resources to fulfill these needs then they take shortcuts which are often illegal. They might start pick pocketing, or succumb to social pressure and commit sex offences or bullying other youths (Hawkins, 1996). There are several theories that have been advanced by criminologists and psychologists to explain youth delinquency. The rational choice theory was advanced by criminologists and is the best theory that explains why a youth is likely to engage in crimes. It states that the causes of a crime emanate from the individual offender and not necessarily the environment. According to this theory people will more likely to commit a crime when it is rational for them to commit it. It states that prospective criminals do a cost-benefit analysis and if the benefits outweigh the costs then they commit the crimes. This theory advocates for minimizing the benefits and maximizing costs for the ‘would be’ criminals (Simon, 2012). There is also the social disorganization theory which states that a crime is more likely to occur in a society where the social institutions, such as churches, schools, families etc, are not in control of the society. An uncontrolled lot is likely to commit crimes (McCarthy, 1998). Another supporting theory is the labeling theory which states that the self identity of a youth is destroyed by negative labeling by the community (Muncie, 2009). For example, when a young person comes out of a juvenile prison, the surrounding community might label him or her a jail bird. In order to live with this name, the young person will start engaging in criminal activities. On this basis, the negative label has made him or her to commit a crime. Lastly, the differential theory offers an explanation about association by tracing the negative effects of group associations on an individual’s behavior (Simon, 2012). According to this theory, peer groups influence a young person to commit a criminal act. For example, if a young person joins a group that peddles drugs, there are chances he or she will also end up selling and or using those drugs. This is because of peer pressure. However, it is also true that there are some youths that are socially excluded who do not commit criminal activity while there are others who are socially included yet they commit crimes. There is no logical reason behind this phenomenon; however there are possible reasons advanced. One reason is the different family backgrounds of these young people, and the people they associate with (Pierson, 2009). The different family backgrounds of some young people will define their moral standards regardless of whether they are socially excluded or not. Also, young people who engage in crime yet are not socially excluded might be doing it for fun, or they lacked some moral training when they were children. On this basis, they were exposed to violence and a world of crime (Muncie, 2009). Currently in the UK there are several legislations and policies that govern the youth justice services. Some of them include; Children and Young Persons Act 1933 which expressly provide that the court have regard to the welfare of the youth in its operation. There is also the Crimes and Disorder Act 1998 which requires that the paramount objectives of the several agencies involved in the youth justice system be that of prevention of offending by the young people. It advocates for proactive rather than reactive measures. Lastly, there is that code of crown prosecutors which require the crown prosecutor to have the best interest of a youth at heart when deciding on whether a crime should be prosecuted or not (Akers and Jensen, 2011). In the UK the agencies that are directly involved with the Youth Justice System are the police, Crown Prosecution Service, Youth and Crown courts and the various institutions of correction and children’s homes (Sellers, 2012). Currently, the UK justice system on youths employs the welfare and the actuarial models (Duckley and Loader, 2012). This is as opposed to the justice model which is used for the adults. The welfare model perceives the presence of criminal activities in a society as symptomatic of the rot in that society. It views the offender as independent of the offence committed and blames the society. This model responds to individual needs in order to solve criminal activities in a society. Offenders are not brought before the court but are placed under youth experts and the measures are implemented until the objective of change is achieved (Smandych, 2001). The welfare model is almost similar to the actuarial model. This model relates the crimes to risk factors and tries to remove these risks. The point of focus is on risks. Judicial officers are the ones to handle the delinquents and the duration of intervention lasts for as long the risks exists (Winfried and Abadinsky, 2009). These two models are supported by the parties in power, that is, the Liberal Democratic Party and the Conservative Party. These models were put in place to replace the justice model which the justice department found it unsuitable to administer to the youths. This model focuses on retribution and deterrence. Its perception of criminality is that the law was breached and that the offender committed the crime by choice, of course this might not always be the truth. Its focus is also on the restoration of the law rather than the risks or the offender like the previous two models. It does not take into consideration whether the offender reformed or not, it is more focused on whether the offender served the time stipulated in custody. This justice system was not seen as appropriate for the youths in UK and hence the adoption of the actuarial and the welfare models (McCarthy, 1998). There is extensive discrimination and oppression in the youth justice system. The law expressly provides that all juvenile delinquents should be treated fairly and with dignity since the whole essence of the justice system is to ‘save’ them from the wrongdoing society. In this sense there are less discrimination and oppression instances in the system. But the devil lies in the details. Negative labeling could be termed as oppression that the youths face in the criminal justice system (Thurnberry, 2004). The Crown Prosecutor has the prerogative of determining which crimes will be tried under the main system and which ones will be charged under the youth justice system since the models are different. When young offenders are charged under the main system for adults may be because of the gravity of the situation then they are offered no more protection from the society and are referred to as criminals, convicts, or even jail birds to denote their status, this is discrimination and causes psychological damage. The oppression part is that these ex-cons are not being offered employment opportunities ones they are out and this leads them to commit more crimes hence creating a self-perpetuating cycle of crime. The 2008 Criminal and Immigration Act in trying to identify a persistent offender gives them a negative label (Darrell and Elaine, 2013). According to this act this is an individual who continually engages in a crime. The youth under consideration might be affected psychologically, and as a result, he or she might continue engaging in these criminal activities. Oppression is also manifested when the justice system establishes a surveillance system to monitor the youths who have been through the system. According to the youth rehabilitation order, the state has a right to monitor any youth who had previously been prosecuted for a crime (Duckley and Loader, 2012). This surveillance, must take at least three years. This surveillance system normally erodes the privacy of the person concerned. Discrimination is depicted in the manner of issuing judgments. The youths who are not citizens in the UK, for instance, asylum seekers and migrants usually have to wait for longer periods for their criminal cases to be determined (Darrell and Elaine, 2013. They are also more likely to be thrown into the main system even if they are barely out of their youth because their not being citizens deplete them some of their rights enjoyed by the UK youths. This too is a major manifestation of social exclusion experienced by foreigner youths. References Agulnik, P., 2002. Understanding Social Exclusion. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Akers, R., and Jensen, G., 2011. Social Learning and Explanation of Crime. London: Transaction Publishers. Bryne, D., 2005. Social Exclusion. New York: McGraw Hill. Darrell, F., and Elaine, A., 2013. Social Work in the Youth Justice System: A multidisciplinary perspective. New York: McGraw Hill. Duckley, A., and Loader, I., 2012. The Penal Landscape: The Howard League Guide to Criminal Justice in England and Wales. London: Routledge. Hawkins, D., 1996. Delinquency and Crime: Current Theories. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. McCarthy, B., 1998. Mean Streets: Youth Crime and Homelessness. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Muncie, J., 2009. Youth and Crime. New York: SAGE. Pierson, J., 2009. Tackling Social Exclusion. New York: Routledge. Smandych, R., 2001. Youth Crime: Varieties, Theories and Prevention. Ontario: Harcourt. Sellers, C., 2012. Social Learning Theories of Crime. Farnham, Surrey, England: Ashgate. Simon, D., 2012. Elite Deviance. Boston: Pearson. Smith, R., 2013. Doing Justice to Young People: Youth Crime and Social Justice. London: Routledge. Strandee, R., 2013. Social Exxclusion and the Remaking of Social Networks. Wellington: Ashgate Publishing. Read More