Small-scale, Community-Embedded Youth Justice Facilities: Lessons from Dutch Reforms and Recommendations for Cross-Jurisdictional Implementation

• Published date: 01 November 2023
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1177/00328855231200638
• Author: Fleur Souverein,Sanne Oostermeijer,Diana Johns,Stuart Ross,Lieke van Domburgh,Arne Popma,Eva Mulder
• Date: 01 November 2023
• Subject Matter: Articles

Small-scale,

Community-Embedded

Youth Justice Facilities:

Lessons from Dutch

Reforms and

Recommendations for

Cross-Jurisdictional

Implementation

Fleur Souverein

1,2,3

,

Sanne Oostermeijer

4

,

Diana Johns

4

, Stuart Ross

4

,

Lieke van Domburgh

1,2,3

,

Arne Popma

1,2,3

,

and Eva Mulder

1,2,3,5,6

Abstract

Youth justice settings should provide safe, therapeutic environments, tai-

lored to young people’s needs. Current custodial models rarely meet

these aims, mainly because a focus on security tends to outweigh an

1

Child and Adolescent Psychiatry & Psychosocial Care department, University Medical Center,

Amsterdam, The Netherlands

2

Amsterdam Public Health, Mental Health, Amsterdam, The Netherlands

3

Academische Werkplaats Risicojeugd, Nijmegen, The Netherlands

4

University of Melbourne, Melbourne, Australia

5

Child development and education, University of Amsterdam

6

LUMC Curium - Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Leiden University Medical Center

Corresponding Author:

Fleur Souverein, Child and Adolescent Psychiatry & Psychosocial Care Department, Amsterdam

UMC, location VUmc, Meibergdreef 5, 1105 AZ Amsterdam, The Netherlands.

Email: f.souverein@amsterdamumc.nl

Article

The Prison Journal

2023, Vol. 103(5) 679–701

© 2023 SAGE Publications

Article reuse guidelines:

sagepub.com/journals-permissions

DOI: 10.1177/00328855231200638

journals.sagepub.com/home/tpj

emphasis on care, diminishing rather than encouraging young people’s posi-

tive development. This article reports on a three-year evaluation of youth

justice reforms in the Netherlands, including small-scale, community-embed-

ded facilities with an emphasis on relational security. We outline key oper-

ational elements and conditions for implementation of these facilities to

provide guidance for youth justice professionals, and for managers and pol-

icymakers seeking to promote political and f‌inancial investments in effective

youth justice strategies.

Keywords

youth justice, community-embedded facility, relational security, youth

development

Introduction

The principle that children and young people should only ever be remanded or

sentenced to a custodial settingas a last resort is f‌irmly enshrinedin the United

Nations’Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC, 1989). Last-resort

custodial settings should be places where young people’s developmental

needs are met, strengths and protective factors are built upon, and positive com-

munity connections are forged (as we detail below). While differences between

jurisdictions are evident, conventional detention facilities are generally inconsis-

tent with the need to respond to children and young people in the justice system

through a therapeutic lens that promotes positive youth devel opment. Instead,

young people are frequently and routinely detained in punitive, large-scale insti-

tutions, far from their home and communities. The time for reform is long

overdue. Failing to provide children and young people with genuine opportuni-

ties to get their lives back on track has detrimental effects, not only for the child

and their family, but also for society at large.

There is a lack of evidence, however, about t he operational elements and

implementation of alternative custodial models. To address this gap, i n 2015,

the Dutch Ministry of Justice examined the feasibility and potential eff‌icacy of

implementing small-scale, community-embedded youth justice facilities. I n

2016, three pilot sites were opened, including an eight-bed remand facility in

Amsterdam(hereafter ‘the Amsterdam facility’).The general conclusion follow-

ing these pilots was that suchsmall-scale, community-embeddedfacilities could

support justice-involved young people to get their lives ‘back on track.’The facil-

ities provided tailored security and care, close to young people’s social environ-

ment and support, so that offence-related factors and young people’s

developmental needs could be more effectively addressed. In mid-2019, the

680 The Prison Journal 103(5)