1st October 1999 - 30th September 2003
ESRC Studentship
The association between ‘youth’ and crime has captured public, political and media attention in Britain in recent years. The concern with youth crime is rooted in both statistical trends in offending by young people under the age of 25 and in the public and media demonisation of ‘youth,’ as a problem group as ‘Other.’ There is no doubt that young people have been deeply implicated in the rising tide of burglaries and vehicle crime that characterised the late 1980s and early 1990s, and that, even as crime rates begin to fall, young people (especially young males) are still over-represented amongst offenders. Although ‘youth’ has been socially constructed the links between young people and offending are socially and spatially specific.
Attempts at tackling youth crime reflect differing constructions of the root of the problem. Some have conceptualised crime as a product of the moral and social decay of society, whilst others have sought to focus on crime as an indicator of the social and spatial divisions produced through the re-structuring of the post-war capitalist economy. Recent initiatives, formulated in response to the Crime and Disorder Act, 1998, sensitively construct the consequences of economic and social exclusion by focusing on a multi-agency approach to reducing crime and disorder. Youth crime strategies display three key features;
Of interest is the ‘place-based’ focus of the partnerships and their emphasis on re-establishing connections between young people and their local neighbourhood. A locality/community focus to preventative strategies could encourage young people to re-define their sense of identity and belonging, and help bring about a reassessment of the meanings associated with particular localities and the social and cultural relationships played out within them.
The research aims to examine the dialectical relationship between young people and place within a context of social exclusion and crime. The youth initiatives of the Crime and Disorder Act operating within the Leeds/ Bradford area (West Yorkshire) will provide the framework for investigation. A structure and agency approach will be adopted to examine the relative importance of state intervention (central and local), partnership institutions and local people in the implementation of socially inclusive policies to reduce youth crime. The involvement of young people is deemed essential if preventative strategies are to be sustainable, and is inextricably linked to notions of social inclusion, citizenship and belonging. The quantitative research will draw on crime statistics and important contextual data on crime and social deprivation. The qualitative research will explore the lived experiences of marginalised young people and will include
This will provide an insight into the meanings attached to people, places and institutions with which young people interact. Special ethical and methodological considerations will be addressed.
The research is timely and will produce a situated understanding of the processes of social marginalisation of young people most at risk from offending, an evaluation of preventative strategies to reduce youth crime and a sensitive appreciation of the engagement of young people with local communities and places.