From Rhetoric to Reality: Participation in Practice Within Youth Justice Systems

Abstract

Since 2015, the authors of this chapter have been working together through a formal partnership between Manchester Metropolitan University and the 10 youth offending teams (YOTs) in the Greater Manchester region of north west England. ¹ This partnership, termed the Greater Manchester Youth Justice University Partnership (GMYJUP), is the first of its kind in a youth justice context. GMYJUP has predominately focused on strengthening justice-involved children's participation in decision-making processes and embedding meaningful participation in youth justice service delivery and practice (Smithson et al., 2020; Smithson & Gray, 2021; Smithson & Jones, 2021). In this chapter, the authors outline the Child-First narrative that is becoming increasingly apparent in the youth justice system in England and Wales, before describing our own body of participatory work which has resulted in the co-creation (with justice-involved children) of a transformative framework of practice that we term Participatory Youth Practice (hereafter referred to as PYP). The chapter goes on to provide a candid account of the facilitators and barriers that youth justice practitioners have encountered when endeavouring to embed PYP into existing youth justice processes. The authors conclude with a consideration of the value of child-centred practice for children and practitioners.

Citation

Smithson, H., Lang, T. and Gray, P. (2022), "From Rhetoric to Reality: Participation in Practice Within Youth Justice Systems", Frankel, S. (Ed.) Establishing Child Centred Practice in a Changing World, Part A (Emerald Studies in Child Centred Practice), Emerald Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 111-122. https://doi.org/10.1108/978-1-80117-406-020221008