Young Offenders

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-x

   PDF

2. Introduction

   • Mark Halsey, Simone Deegan

   Pages 1-10

3. Setting the Scene

   • Mark Halsey, Simone Deegan

   Pages 11-25

4. Approach to the Field — Data

   • Mark Halsey, Simone Deegan

   Pages 26-34

5. On Track

   • Mark Halsey, Simone Deegan

   Pages 35-61

6. Recurring Breakdown

   • Mark Halsey, Simone Deegan

   Pages 62-103

7. Major Derailment

   • Mark Halsey, Simone Deegan

   Pages 104-126

8. Catastrophic Turn

   • Mark Halsey, Simone Deegan

   Pages 127-176

9. Points of Unrest

   • Mark Halsey, Simone Deegan

   Pages 177-209

10. Points of Light

    • Mark Halsey, Simone Deegan

    Pages 210-226

11. Concluding Remarks

    • Mark Halsey, Simone Deegan

    Pages 227-232

12. Back Matter

    Pages 233-263

    PDF

Young Offenders provides one of the most in-depth studies of young males seeking, if often failing, to find a life beyond crime and punishment. Through rich interview data of young offenders over a ten year period, this book explores the complex personal and situational factors that promote and derail the desistance process.

• Youth
• crime
• prison
• repeat offending
• desistance
• men
• complex
• interview
• punishment

“It goes some way to filling the significant gap in qualitative in-depth research on young people attempting to stop offending, and it brings their voices, experiences and the challenges they have faced, and continue to face, to light. … this book set out the issues in a very clear and thoughtful way, but in turn also sets out tangible solutions. This is an essential read for criminologists and anyone working in criminal justice who wants to make a difference.” (Briege Nugent, Rutgers University, clcjbooks.rutgers.edu, March, 2017)

"An outstanding example of longitudinal qualitative analysis, Halsey and Deegan's Young Offenders allows for a deep, long-term immersion into the lives of a group of young people who have been demonised and dismissed by wider society. The rich complexity of their often tragic lives vividly emerges across the chapters in an example of genuine social science, as it ought to be." - Shadd Maruna, Dean, Rutgers School of Criminal Justice, USA

"Halsey and Deegan provide offender accounts that are at once frustrating and heart-wrenching, yet illuminating and refreshing in their complexity. They reveal how the joining of disadvantaged backgrounds and unfair post-incarceration policies create barriers for young offenders wanting to desist. More important, they show how desistance can take surprisingly varied forms, which is a key contribution and challenge to previous criminal life course studies." - Randol Contreras, Sociology Department, University of Toronto, Canada

• Centre for Crime Policy and Research, Flinders University, Australia

  Mark Halsey

• Flinders University, Australia

  Simone Deegan

Mark Halsey is a Professor of Criminal Justice at Flinders University, Australia. Previous to this he taught criminology at the University of Melbourne. In 2012 he was awarded a four-year Australian Research Council Future Fellowship for the study of the causes, experiences and consequences of intergenerational incarceration.

Simone Deegan was Project Officer for the Generativity in Young Male (Ex)Prisoners Project at Flinders University, Australia. Prior to this she worked as a criminal defence solicitor with the Legal Services Commission in the Magistrates and Youth Courts of South Australia. She has an ongoing interest in prisons and prison officer culture.

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