Universal and targeted armies wage war

Those battle lines have attracted their generals and foot soldiers: Connexions and youth justice on one side, youth work and other youth services on the other. Youth justice has set out its stall on the basis of a range of targeted prevention programmes and, through the Aiming High youth strategy, we now have the emergence of something called targeted youth support. On account of these developments, the opposing camp appears to be losing ground with some of its members.

But do things have to be so polarised? It was, of course, the Connexions service that cleverly conjured up the memorable strapline "a universal service differentiated according to need". Others have talked of "progressive universalism". I favour the latter concept. It may often be no more than rhetoric, but it contains an important signpost for practice. Good open youth work has always worked in this way, though its capacity to continue doing so has become increasingly squeezed because of managerial and bureaucratic controls.