ABSTRACT
Juvenile delinquency and drug abuse are compelling social problems in the United States. They often coincide. Nearly half of serious juvenile offenders are also abusers of multiple illicit drugs. In spite of the years of activity, the many research projects, and a cloying moralism, the human service professions offer no reliable way to rehabilitate or to prevent juvenile delinquency. Social rehabilitation and prevention have been the typical promise of juvenile delinquency programs, even those run with the principal goal of "incapacitation", that is, prisons of one sort or another. As described by the community treatment program itself, community-based treatment was designed as standard but intensive social casework provided by a parole agent who could also make referrals to a variety of backup services. G. D. Gottfredson reevaluated a class of treatment and prevention programs that employed Guided Group Interaction, a sometimes highly confrontational technique.
