ABSTRACT
From the beginning of the twentieth century, as a result of the Children’s Act 1912 (i.e. the law concerning juvenile justice), the underlying premise of the Belgian juvenile justice system has been that children do not need punishing but, rather, protecting and (re)educating. As a consequence, the approach to juvenile offending has been similar to the approach to the problem of neglect. In both cases Youth Court judges could resort to almost identical measures. Of all countries that have a judicial reaction to juvenile crime, Belgium has always had a strong tendency to rely on welfare programmes (Walgrave et al. 1998). Although there was early criticism of this approach 1 the tradition of rehabilitation was reaffirmed by the Youth Protection Act 1965. After the restructuring of Belgium as a federal state, however, efforts were made to address this problem. An Act was passed in 1994 intended to improve the legal safeguards of young people, and the co-ordinated decrees of the Flemish Community in 1990 aimed at making a clear distinction between social assistance for minors with educational needs and the judicial reaction to juvenile crime. However, the dominant philosophy of the juvenile system still remains one of protection and rehabilitation.
