Urban Youth: an analysis of meanings of deviant juvenile behaviour in public spaces (FWOAL614)

This research proposal focusses on the conflicts between urban youngsters and respresentatives of public order (mainly, but not only, police forces). The main goal of this research proposal is to gain insight in the difficult relation between youngsters in urban neighbourhoods and policing authorities. In this proposal we want explicitly to focus on the perspective of youngsters in the public urban space. Through an ethnographic approach of their everyday experience of transgressions and conflicts with social control interventions a comprehensive analysis will be possible. Thus, the general research question is: What are the (cultural) meanings young urban people attribute to and perform in their everyday life experience in public spaces with (their) transgressions (behaviour) and consequently their conflicts with public order forces?

This research will be limited to the case of Brussels as main Belgian/Flemish urban area. The empirical research is based on a two-phased design, combining different empirical methodological approaches: (1) an analysis, both quantitative and qualitative, of (Brussels) local police records concerning offenses against public order involving minors of age; and (2) participatory observation in Brussels'neighbourhoods focussing on a specific public space (plaza, metro station, etc ...) combined with interviews with youngsters of the selected neighbourhoods.

Keywords:Sentencing, Pre-Trial Detention, Community Policing, Restorative Justice, Criminal Policy, Criminal Law, Prison Systems, Juvenile Justice, Economic Criminality, Criminal Procedure, Public spaces

Disciplines:Law and legal studies