ABSTRACT
The aim of this chapter is to examine the role of punishment for juveniles who are arrested for crimes, with a specific focus on the United States. We discuss how a contemporary understanding of youth and punishment is shaped by prior research on the origin and continuing legacy of the juvenile court, contemporary policies that serve to question legal distinctions between childhood and adulthood, and the future of research for juvenile court practices and policies. Due to the enormous variations in how young people are punished across nations, we focus only on American juvenile justice, though it is important to note that some of the trends we discuss have also been observed in other Western European nations as well (Tonry and Doob 2004).
