1JUVENILE VICTIMS AND OFFENDERS

Few topics generate as much public concern, comment and often outrage as crime, and juvenile crime in particular. Indeed, juvenile crime appears to be a metaphor for societal concern over issues of social change, social threat and social decay. The last twenty years have witnessed substantial legislative, policy and practice changes in relation to how society deals with young people who offend. There are continual changes in the criminal law and penalties for juveniles. At the same time that these crime-focused changes have occurred, federal inquiries, such as the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission’s Inquiry into Youth Homelessness and the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody, have highlighted the difficult social circumstances of many young people. This recognition of the level of youth dislocation, youth disadvantage and youth marginalization has occurred at a time when there has been a substantial hardening of community attitudes towards youth crime. Youth are frequently characterised as offenders and predators. Their multiple identities as sometimes victim, sometimes offender, sometimes privileged, sometimes powerless, are ignored