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The Evolution of the Juvenile Court

Race, Politics, and the Criminalizing of Juvenile Justice

Bibliographic Data

ID4157516
AuthorsJames Schmidt (corresponding author), James D Schmidt (0009-0002-0085-7891)
Year2019
Volume106
Issue1
Pages199-200
Publication date2019-06-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournal of American History (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0021-8723 • E-ISSN: 1945-2314
PublisherOxford University Press (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1093/jahist/jaz243
OpenAlexW2947415404
LanguageEN
Citations received2

Barry C. Feld has been a longtime advocate for young people and a critic of the juvenile justice system. The Evolution of the Juvenile Court culminates his career, bringing together broad and deep knowledge across numerous fields to make a powerful argument for change. The book will be highly valuable for scholars in various disciplines and for policy makers across the United States and beyond. In the book's opening sections, Feld surveys the social and economic changes caused by industrialization that altered the social and cultural meaning of youth. Drawing on his training as a sociologist, he proposes a model that leans heavily on socioeconomic environment to explain youthful indiscretion and societal responses. The early chapters also trace legal developments, stressing the rehabilitative functions of the juvenile court in its inception before discussing the rights revolution of the Warren court. The book hits its stride in the middle chapters, where Feld traces the “get tough” era of juvenile justice that began in the 1970s. Responding to urban unrest, economic change, and political upheaval, and steeped in veiled racism and white privilege, policy makers across the United States cracked down on youth crime, lengthening sentences and turning away from rehabilitation toward punishment. Politicians duped unsuspecting white voters into supporting such policies by using coded language to activate racist ideologies. In the best chapters, Feld provides an excellent discussion of how such policies fell disproportionally on youth of color, how girls met differential treatment, and how lawmakers and jurists created a school-to-prison pipeline

Criminology · Economic Justice · Ideology · Juvenile court · Juvenile delinquency · Political science · Politics · Privilege (computing · Sociology · Criminal Justice and Corrections Analysis · Education Discipline and Inequality · Law · Law, Rights, and Freedoms

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    Open Access•Mark Magidson, Taylor Kidd•Criminal Justice and Behavior•2021

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    Michael Tonry•Crime and Justice•2023

Unique citing works2
Citations per year0,4
Citation span2021 - 2023 (3)
Citation velocityhistorical
Highly citedNo
Citation typesNeutral: 2
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