Adolescent violence—twentieth century madness: a critical review of theories of causation

On June 10, 1968, President Lyndon Johnson signed Executive order # 11412 establishing the National Commission on the Causes and Prevention of Violence. The assassination of President John F. Kennedy galvanized public interest and government action in interpersonal violence as an aspect of the human experience that had received scant attention previously. Establishment of the Commission spurred major research interest in the subject, not only among criminologists but also among social scientists and mental health experts. Up until that time, violence was rarely a theme on the agenda of a psychiatric meeting. A perusal of the literature would have turned up a few isolated papers on the subject.