chapter one Flashcards
chapter one: the rise and fall delinquency
STUDENT LEARNING OBJECTIVES
After reading this chapter, students will have developed a historical frame- work that will provide a foundation for:
- Understanding the nature and level of youth involvement in crime throughout Canada’s history.
- Recognizing that concerns about youth crime are created as much by particular socio-historical circumstances as by actual levels of youth crime.
- Situating contemporary public issues about youth crime in a historical context.
- Appreciating the origin and nature of contemporary questions and issues about youth crime and justice.
what are public issues?
Matters of public concern that are debated in a variety of forums and usually involve demands for action
what are the three distinct periods in canadian history?
1) The pre-Confederation period, in which children and youth were treated the same as adults;
2) the Victorian period, in which the behaviour and well- being of children and youth became a subject of concern;
3) nd the post-Victorian period, in which youthful offenders were separated from adults in an attempt to prevent them from developing a criminal lifestyle that could last a lifetime.
(the public issue)
what is discourse?
How things are talked about and understood, both orally and in written form, including formal talk, such as theory; professional talk, such as reports, books, and media; and conversations.
Over the past two decades, youth crime has been the subject of considerable public concern and discourse. Across Canada, newspaper headlines continuously warn of a serious crime problem if appropriate steps are not taken to curb youth crime.
what was newspaper headlines like across Canada?
- Across Canada, newspaper headlines continuously warn of a serious crime problem if appropriate steps are not taken to curb youth crime.
- Beyond these headlines, newspaper articles painted horrific accounts of the criminal deeds of young Canadians.
- By the end of the 1990s, newspaper and magazine headlines and stories were fuelling public concerns about violent events involving girls
- As we moved into the 21st century, school violence was added to the list of horrors presented about youth behaviour.
(media and the politics of youth crime)
it is often said that “crime is ___”
It is often said that “crime is news,” and so we should not be surprised that the news media devotes as much time as it does to reporting crime events.
what is politics of youth crime?
The ways in which youth crime is understood and talked about, both formally and informally, and the actions, laws, and policies that derive from this discourse
what is the significance to those who study the politics of youth crime?
- the amount of coverage devoted to youth crime, particularly when, as we will see in later chapters, adult crimes far surpass youth crimes, both in quantity and severity.
- the amount of emphasis on youth violence is disproportionate to the amount of youth crime that actually involves violence of a serious nature.
what is the primary focus of stories about youth?
criminal activity and violent crimes
Reid- MacNevin (1996) found in her analysis of the Toronto Star, Toronto Sun, Guelph Mercury, and Kitchener-Waterloo Record from May to August in 1996 that almost two-thirds (56.7 percent) of the articles about youth were crime-related and 52 percent were about violent crime.
what’s the outcome of these newspaper headlines and stories?
Not surprisingly, newspaper headlines and stories, along with personal exper- ience in some cases, prompted many Canadians to voice their concerns about “today’s youth” and about the effectiveness of our youth justice system in curbing youth crime
federal party platforms on young offenders and youth jutice, 1993
see table on page 4
The general consensus seemed to be that youth justice under the Young Offenders Act (YOA) was a “slap on the wrist.” Politicians responded to these concerns by presenting youth crime and the YOA as a major election issue in the 1993 federal election campaign (see Table 1.1). Legislators, for their part, revised the YOA three times before finally proposing legislation to replace it.
what is the juvenile justice system?
- A system of laws, policies, and practices designed under the guiding philosophy that children and youth, because of their age and maturity, should not be subject to criminal law in the same manner as adults.
In 1995, while deliberating reforms for the third time, then–Justice Minister Allan Rock requested that the House of Commons Standing Committee on Justice and Legal Affairs undertake a comprehensive review of the juvenile justice system and that a Federal–Provincial–Territorial Task Force review the YOA and its application.
by 2001, which act was poised to replace the YOA?
when did It come into effect?
By the fall of 2001, the Youth Criminal Justice Act (YCJA), Bill C-3, was poised to replace the YOA, and after a lengthy consultative process and parliamentary discussion, the YCJA came into effect in April 2003.
YCJA and the media
Unfortunately, this lengthy process and new legislation did little to curb the flow of the media’s litany of horrors about youth and their criminal activities, nor the rhetoric of political parties. The party positions on youth justice did not change in the 2006 federal election, and we were still being told that youth violence was out of control
A final new, but also old, ingredient is that the legislation once again came under attack in the media
see textbook for examples p 5
conclusions about the YCJA from newspaper stories and headlines
In spite of the federal government’s efforts at reform, if one were to draw a conclusion about the YCJA from newspaper stories and headlines that began even before it was implemented, it would surely be that nothing had changed, that youth justice was still “a slap on the wrist.”
what did Reader’s Digest say about the YCJA in 2002?
Even Reader’s Digest jumped into the fray with a headline in February 2002 that stated the YCJA is an “Easier Time for Youth Crime.”
After explaining to its readership that “there are a lot of things wrong with the new Act . . . ,” the article concluded that the act is “pretty scary. At a time when Canadians are demanding tougher sentences for violent crime, the federal government is SHORTENING SENTENCES for young offenders” (pp. 113–114)
(two opposing sides)
part of the liberal federal government’s 1995 YOA reforms involved a ??
Part of the Liberal federal government’s 1995 YOA reforms involved a Strategy for Reform of the entire youth justice system, an important part of which involved consultations with the public and special-interest groups
As a result, public forums were held in various communities across the country to discuss youth crime and propose solutions or make recommendations to the House of Commons Standing Committee on Justice and Legal Affairs. At the heart of the public issue were questions about whether the YOA effectively controlled youth crime.
what were youth advocates were primarily concerned about?
Youth advocates were primarily concerned with the problems experienced by young people rather than with youth crime. It was their view that youth crime had been exaggerated and misrepresented in most public accounts, particularly by the media.
concerns and statistics
- At the Halifax public forum, youth advocates presented statistics from the Department of Justice showing that crime in Nova Scotia had dropped in all categories since 1986 and that recent increases in violent crime had “flattened out.”
- Other statistics indicated that youth were being treated far more harshly under the YOA than they ever were under the former legislation, the Juvenile Delinquents Act (JDA)
- Further, with the exception of the most serious offences of murder and manslaughter, youth were treated at least as harshly as adults who had committed the same offences
youth advocates preferred what rather than focusing on punitive justice reforms?
Among other things, youth advocates preferred policies that would address poverty and high youth unemployment rather than focus on punitive justice reforms.
what other perspective was presented at the Halifax public forum?
proponents of this view saw youth as what?
- The other perspective presented at the Halifax public forum was the one most often seen in the media. This “law-and-order” group viewed children and youth accused of crimes as an enemy from whom adults needed protection
- Proponents of this view saw youth as “out of control” and favoured a law-and-order approach to youth crime.
Included in this group were what one police officer described as the “old buffalo police officers,” store security personnel, small-business owners, and homeowners associations.
From their perspectives, both youth and the YOA were problems. Youth were a problem because they were said to??
(1) lack respect for anyone or anything, as was often reflected in foul language and “no fear of using it”;
(2) lack a sense of responsibility for their criminal behaviour; and
(3) be increasingly involved in violent criminal behaviour.
The YOA was viewed as a problem because it was believed that?
(1) youth could not be identified;
(2) youth were not punished for their crimes;
(3) youth had more rights than their victims; and
(4) youth were too protected by the YOA.
the law-and-order view advocates a ___ approach to young offenders?
The law-and-order view advocates a “get-tough” approach to young offenders.
Law-and-order proponents at the Halifax forum cited a Statistics Canada release reporting an 8 percent increase in youth involvement in violent crime. They were further armed with information about incidences of particularly violent youth crime, readily supplied from news media. These stories usually portrayed the young offender in such cases as remorseless and lacking feeling—the “superpredator”
what is the meaning of problematize?
A process whereby something, someone, or some group is defined as a problem.
But in contrast to 10 years earlier, in this case, from a law-and-order perspective, youth involvement in car theft and joyriding was problematized, and the youth himself was described as a “serial car thief,” “a frequent flyer,” someone who was on a “car theft rampage.”
as for the legislation itself, law and order views were that the YCJA …
s for the legislation itself, law-and-order views were that the YCJA “goes over- board in reducing custody,” that “there is too much reliance on community punish- ment,” that “kids are getting too many chances,” that “judges can’t jail youth who need it,” that there are “no threats to motivate youth,” and that some kids are “spiralling out of control” and judges “need the ability to lock up kids.”
on the other hand other peoples views are …
On the other hand are the views that there is “nothing wrong with the act,” that “at-risk kids need more social supports,” that the problem is “not enough resources from the province to do the job,” and that the problems lie “in communities and schools.”
so what is the theme of this book? what should we do to try and understand youth crime?
And that is the theme of this book. To try to understand youth crime with a view to developing more effective responses to youth behaviour before it spirals out of control. An important way of understanding the current situation with regard to youth crime and justice is to know the foundation upon which it is built. Is youth crime worse today than in the past, and how did Canadians understand youth crime and respond to it in earlier centuries?
(“the good old days’)
Perhaps the most basic assumption underlying many public views about youth crime, particularly the law-and-order perspective, is the notion that today’s youth are worse than youth in “the good old days.”
Interestingly, every generation of adults seems to remember a time when things were “better” and not what they are “today.” Yet, available crime statistics do not indicate any such period in Canadian history. Canadian crime statistics, as far back as 1885 (see Table 1.2), indicate that young people have always been involved in criminal activity, some of it serious violent crime.
Moreover, young people have always been responsible for a considerably smaller amount of criminal activity than adults, and most of their offences have involved petty property crime.
penitentiary
A 19th-century term
for prisons based on a philosophy of penitence and punishment to atone for wrongs.
in the early years of European settlement, crime information was recoreded by?
Unfortunately, historical data on youth crime and public responses are not readily available, since youth crime statistics were not always kept in the manner that they are today
In the early years of European settlement, crime information was recorded in the reports of colonial administrators.
historical data on youth crime
problem with prison records before
there was no consistent records until?
Some statistics are available for Upper and Lower Canada (Ontario and Quebec) after Confederation, and slightly more detailed information is available in general reports from city administrators.
Prison records provide a source of information on youth crime, but the ages of prisoners were not always recorded.
There are no consistent prison records until 1835, the year in which Kingston Penitentiary, the first Canadian prison, opened.
primary data and secondary data
primary data: Research information gathered directly from the original source.
secondary data: Research information or data that was originally collected for another purpose.
academic analyses of youth crime = data
Beyond these primary data sources, there are a few academic analyses of youth crime that provide secondary data. These analyses are scant because contemporary Canadian scholars and researchers seem to have been far more interested in the justice system than in the actual behaviour of children and youth in Canada’s history
lawless and disobedient youth: the 17th and 18th centuries
Information on youth involvement in crime in Canada during the 17th and 18th centuries is sketchy. Although we can never know the actual incidence of law- breaking among youth during this period, what information is available indicates that concerns were expressed about youth as a problem in the North American colonies as early as the late 17th century.
Carrigan (1991, pp. 203, 205) examined the historical records of crime and punishment from the earliest European records and reported that the majority of documented cases were of ?
petty nature.
They involved vandalism, petty theft, brawling, swearing, immorality, violations of local ordinances, and the abandonment of indentured service contracts.
true or false
Throughout recorded history, children in European society have had a different legal status than adults.
what does this mean?
Throughout recorded history, children in European society have had a different legal status than adults. Mostly, this meant they had no rights and were at the mercy of their parents and the state. Infanticide, child slavery, and child labour were common.
The idea that children had rights as individuals independent of their parents, or that they had a right to protection from adults, did not gain popularity until the 19th century
youth crime in the 11th century
children under seven were considered to lack what?
With regard to crime, from about the 11th century, English common law recognized that a child’s capacity to understand the wrongful- ness of crime was limited. Hence, children under seven were considered to lack the “capacity to commit a crime” (doli incapax)
> the colonial public issue
what is the issue for colonial administrators in the territories of Canada?
The issue for colonial administrators in the territories of Canada was the freedom and independence that young people had relative to their counterparts in the Old World
> “causes” and solutions: an era of control and punishment
From historical documents of the colonial period, two factors emerge as perceived “causes” of youth crime—parents and the fur trade. Overindulgent parents were often cited by administrators as a reason for youth problems:
(a questions of immorality: the 19th century)
urban problems associated with ____ and ___ continued and worsened
Urban problems associated with immigration and poverty continued and worsened throughout the 19th century.
1800s ; britain’s orphanded, poor, and destitute children
By the mid-1800s, British and Canadian authorities had developed policies to send Britain’s orphaned, poor, and destitute children to Canada as indentured ser- vants.
- Between 1873 and 1903, more than 95,000 children came to Canada under the sponsorship of child immigration agencies
- While the migra- tion scheme was seen as a means of providing a better life for the children of Britain’s poor and destitute families, many of these children found only a life of misery and harsh working conditions in Canada.