The conceptualisation of children within the juvenile criminal justice system.

Introduction

In 2006 to 2007, statistics have shown that there were approximately 3,500 crimes per 100,000 individual’s conducted by juveniles in Australia, almost double the number carried out by adults (Australian Institute of Criminology, 2009).

Before the 19^th century, there was no category that separated juvenile offenders from adult offenders in Australia’s legal systems and children as young as six were sent to prison (Cunneen & White 2007; Carrington & Pereira 2009). In modern Australia however, it is widely accepted and acknowledged that juveniles should be treated differently within the criminal legal system so that their inexperience and immaturity can be considered (Richards, 2011). Consequently, juveniles are not dealt with as adults within the judicial system as they are treated more leniently than their adult counterparts.

In Australia, the use of detention as a criminal punishment for youths is used as a last resort, after methods such as police cautioning and restorative youth programmes (Richards, 2011). Richards (2011a) suggests that youths are uniquely different to adults and as such this makes them incredibly receptive to rehabilitation in preventing them from further criminal acts. Richards (2011a, np.) argues that a‘range of factors, including juveniles’ lack of maturity, propensity to take risks and susceptibility to peer influence, as well as intellectual disability, mental illness and victimisation, increase juveniles’ risks of contact with the criminal justice system’.

This essay will attempt to examine how children are positioned and conceptualised within Australia’s criminal justice system in contrast to the UK criminal system, examining in particular the concept of ‘childhood’ and ‘child’ discourses as well as considering the potential abuse of the juvenile criminal justice system.

Discourses of childhood

Historically, three key dominant discourses have been conceptualised around childhood and the child, which influences the ways in which children’s behaviour, capabilities and inherent