ABSTRACT
Why do we have age of consent laws, and how should the legal age for sexual behaviour be determined? This chapter addresses these questions, developing a historical critique of past rationales for age of consent laws in the United Kingdom in order to reconceptualise how we should think about these laws in the future. It illuminates the origins of the present legal age of 16 which applies to most sexual behaviour, and hence puts it in question. The particular analytical focus is the historical influence of biomedical and psychological knowledge-claims upon debates over age of consent laws, particularly their changing conceptions of young people’s decision-making competence. The chapter also discusses how sociological theory suggests better ways to conceptualise age of consent laws in the future. The analysis draws upon and develops previous work which has examined the changing rationale for age of consent laws in the UK.
