NCJ Number
117893
Editor(s)
A Pearl,
D Grant,
E Wenk
Date Published
1978
Length
320 pages
Annotation
The increasing number of alienated and disaffected youth constitutes an internal social danger that national policymakers should take seriously.
Abstract
With the exception of public schools, government policymakers seldom focus attention on youth unless their behavior or status is defined as a problem. Eligibility for public services or program participation generally requires a prior label of deviance. Although there seems to be wide recognition that adolescents and youth experience stress in the transition to adulthood, this recognition has not been translated into a general policy of developmental support. Contemporary problems among youth are coming to be viewed as understandable adaptations to social arrangements that impede a healthy transition to adulthood rather than as individual maladjustments to a basically well-ordered society. Improved youth development policy should be based on three premises: (1) government's stake in the successful transition of youth to adult status is significant; (2) all youth experience stress in their developmental period, thus policies focused exclusively on problem youth are self-defeating; and (3) institutional barriers to constructive participation by young people must be overcome. Twenty articles specifically cover such topics as youth employment dilemmas, delinquency, deviation, discipline, suicide, socialization, alienation, career education, and the disadvantaged. References, tables, illustrations.