NCJ Number
227572
Journal
Journal of Scandinavian Studies in Criminology and Crime Prevention Volume: 10 Issue: 1 Dated: 2009 Pages: 18-36
Date Published
2009
Length
19 pages
Annotation
This article assesses how the theme of interpersonal conflicts or 'quarrels' is treated in studies about institutional youth control.
Abstract
This article relates various approaches and examines relatively unexplored potential for research on conflicts in institutional youth control. The five research approaches assessed in explaining quarrels include: (1) quarrels as personality disorders; (2) quarrels as deviant subcultures; (3) quarrels as objects of social control; (4) quarrels and the micro-politics of trouble; and (5) quarrels and the sociology of youth and children. It is argued that an empirically open interactionism within and across the latter four approaches should be sharpened in order to better grasp the social nature and shifting emergence of quarrels in institutional treatment. The tense relationship between troublesome youth and conventional society does not end with incarceration or institutional treatment. Rather it is transformed into an abundance of interpersonal conflicts within incarceration and treatment. This article uses an interactionist perspective to critically assess five research approaches that account for these phenomena in various ways. References