the criminology and criminal justice network Chapter One – Past
Perceptions of Young Offenders and the Demonisation of Youths by
Society as an Exacerbation of Youth Crime and Anti-Social
Behaviour. 1.1 - The History of Youth Crime, Previous Public
Perceptions of Young People and the Emergence and Development of
Youth Cultures in Post War Britain: Becker’s (1963), cited in,
Pietersen (1997: 346), labelling theory, describes how ‘social
groups create deviancy by developing rules, whose infraction
constitutes a ‘deviant’ label to be applied to the offender’. We
must ask ourselves, what influences society’s decisions to
create deviancy and apply deviant labels to offenders,
regardless of the harmful consequences? The public are often
exposed to periods of increased concern over certain aspects of
life; in this case, youth sub-cultures and their behaviours.
These periods of increased concern are known as ‘Moral panics’.
Cohen’s (1972) Folk Devils and Moral Panics ‘graphically
illustrated the way in which fears spr