BOCYF Projects

Juvenile Crime: Prevention, Treatment, and Control

Publications: Education and Delinquency: Summary of a Workshop (2000); Juvenile Crime, Juvenile Justice (2001)

Although overall crime rates are falling, criminologists, demographers, policy makers, and the public are increasingly concerned about juvenile crime. If current crime trends continue, it is expected that some 30,000 additional serious crimes will be committed by the nation's youth by the year 2000. Many policy officials believe that this grim forecast requires tougher laws and enforcement strategies, while others believe that the development of research-based early intervention strategies represents the most promising opportunity for juvenile crime prevention. Conflicting federal legislative proposals now being considered reflect this policy conundrum. However, policy officials on both sides of the debate agree that the apparent failures of past practices, in concert with the increasing aggressiveness and seeming randomness of delinquent conduct and the ever younger ages at which some youths are committing these acts, make the development of effective responses to juvenile crime one of the most pressing policy concerns facing the nation.

With these considerations in mind, the Board on Children, Youth, and Families and the Committee on Law and Justice of the National Research Council convened a Panel on Juvenile Crime: Prevention, Treatment, and Control. Over the course of 24 months, the panel will examine the causes and pathways to juvenile crime and violence; assess the literature and data on the strengths and weaknesses of the juvenile justice system as an intervention and control process; examine the nature of the youth population within the juvenile justice system; and assess the literature on the short- and long-term effects of waiving juvenile cases to adult court, focusing on what is known about the deterrent effects of harsher dispositions on youthful criminality. The panel will consider both juvenile offending patterns and intervention options from a developmental perspective, meeting six times, holding at least three workshops, and visiting facilities and programs for juvenile offenders.

The study was requested by the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, U.S. Department of Justice. Additional support is being provided by the Safe and Drug-Free Schools Program of the U.S. Department of Education and the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.

For further information, contact the Board on Children, Youth, and Families, at 202-334-1935.