ByJulia Fionda. Oxford, UK and Portland, OR: Hart Publishing,  2005 . 292 pp. ISBN-13:978-1-84113-374-4 (pbk)  £ 22 /US $44

For those wanting to understand British youth justice history and practice this book offers solid legal analysis and commentary on the workings of the youth service and courts in England and Wales.

Readers in the United Kingdom will easily understand the role of the Home Office, the multi-agency Youth Offending Teams (YOTs) and the day to day coordination of services between police, magistrates (tribunals)  and youth services as provided by the latest law or Act.

Readers from lands other than the UK will readily see that the dialogue or pendulum swinging between ‘custody’ and  ‘cautioning’  is exactly what is seen in other states and nations. Only the words are different. For example, in the United States law and practice shifts from zero tolerance and detention-adjudication to diversion, a prevention focus and net tightening.

The book is well annotated (fourteen pages of bibliography) and thought provoking. It is not unbiased. Early on Fionda expresses concerns over increased criminalization and use of the criminal courts for very young kids. In fact, the book starts with perhaps too much focus on the age of legal accountability or responsibility in various nations. Just what should the age be for deeming a kid  to be doli incapax or ‘incapable of evil?’

Throughout the reader must keep asking the question posed in the foreword:  whether or not “the criminal justice process is an appropriate context in which to deal with the young people’s problematic behaviors.” As implied in the title, some ‘demonize and fear’ (p. 27) children who misbehave. These persons will lean toward the ‘politics of fear,’ building more custodial facilities and the assertion of power over children. 

The author, on the other hand, favors the ‘welfare’ model which sees more of the angel in the child. The author clearly supports restorative justice, diversion and services which include or mandate parent involvement.

A few highlights are worthy of mention. Twenty five pages are devoted to addressing restorative justice in the middle of the book. The author commends the use of  a dispositional panel approach (with panels including two volunteer members of  the community and even a victim) rather than a sentencing magistrate/judge, as well as the 1998 Crime and Disorder Act which provided further opportunities for the implementation of restorative justice practices. She notes that the Justice Act of 2003 added restorative justice options and deleted some of the more punitive sentencing guidelines for magistrates in the 1991

Fionda describes use of VORP or victim-offender conferences and family group conferencing in some UK regions. She speaks favourably of the diversion practices of both Ireland and Scotland, although this is not a focus of the book. She offers important discussion in the chapters on Diversion and on Parents, School and Youth Crime.

Changes of philosophy and practice have occurred again and again since the 1906 Probation of Offenders Act and the 1908 Children’s Act which removed juveniles from adult criminal justice processes. In this case study from England and Wales, we benefit from an international phenomenon thoroughly described and analyzed.


Eric Assur
eassur@arlingtonva.us
May 2007