Reading the report on Medway Secure Training Centre in the wake of allegations of abuse and mistreatment of young people, it was striking that the review board took a profoundly different “philosophical” view of the children living there, compared with the G4S management “culture of control and contract compliance” they found.
In the course of my career, I’ve observed five paradigms of childhood misbehaviour – five distinct ways of conceptualising what is happening when children break the rules and boundaries we set for them (including breaking the law). Each of the paradigms leads to different beliefs about the right ways to respond, both in policy and in practice. In reality, all five are widely deployed in very confused and conflicting ways right across our sectors.
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