What's at risk? The proliferation of risk across child and youth policy in England

Abstract

The concept of risk has found increasing prominence in social policy, human services management and front-line practice in recent years. This is particularly the case in relation to children and young people, who, in the UK, have been subject to a range of interventions based on the identification of population-based risk factors. Through the analysis of UK publications (primarily covering England) relating to children and young people during the Labour Government (1997–2010), this article identifies how risk has proliferated across a wide range of youth-related fields, becoming a social, political and moral entity in itself rather than a tool for primarily criminological prediction and intervention. The article concludes that this proliferation demands further empirical study and theoretical scrutiny beyond the criminal justice sphere in which it is often contained and also questions the extent to which the construction of youth both ‘at-risk’ and ‘as-risk’ is a useful and effective way of driving policy and practice interventions.

Keywords:

• youth
• youth policy
• risk
• youth work
• New Labour
• identity
• transition