This post is part of a three part-series based on Salzburg Global’s “Global Innovations on Youth Violence, Safety, and Justice Program.” Part two. Part three.
I’ve been working in the legal and criminal justice spaces for nearly 20 years. I’ve written about constitutional law, civil liberties, policing, guns, white collar crime, regulatory crimes, drug laws, and other issues. Many of these topics touched on youthful offenders, but my knowledge of youth-centric justice and safety issues was superficial. For that reason, I jumped at a chance to attend the final gathering of Salzburg Global’s “Global Innovations on Youth Violence, Safety, and Justice” this past December to learn more from people from around the world with different experiences in and around youth justice systems. This and the two posts that follow outline my key takeaways from that week in Salzburg and follow-up conversations I’ve had since then.
I’ve been to countless criminal justice confabs around D.C. and in other American cities. Salzburg was different, not only for the international aspect—which was enlightening and fascinating—but the general consensus about the problems facing youth around the world and, generally speaking, what sort of measures to take to fix those problems. This is not to say there were no disagreements, far from it. Particularly behind closed doors, Salzburg Fellows felt very strongly about their positions and were not shy about their disagreements with others. But despite the presence of former police officers, judges, victims, and people from countries across the planet with differing social views, there was a seemingly universal rejection of ‘tough on crime’ position that has resurfaced in American criminal justice debate.
One might assume attendees were a cherry-picked sample of progressives, but my experience does not support that. To be sure, self-selection almost certainly played a role, as I noticed the Fellows roster included American right-of-center wonks I’ve known for years that had attended previously but were not present at this gathering. But I also had some off-the-record conversations with attendees that made quite clear they were not culturally left of center. While American progressives might feel more at home at the conference than American conservatives would, the chasm between American policy and Salzburg consensus was not primarily a right versus left problem: it was a case of unfortunate American exceptionalism.
A prime example of this was featured in animated debate among the team dedicated to legal reform. Despite playing a role in its creation, the United States government failed to ratify the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), an international compact to protect young people from governmental abuses. At the time of its creation in 1989, the United States had not yet barred capital punishment for minors and some states still sentenced young people to life without parole for certain offenses. Even if only symbolic, the absence of the United States from an international commitment to basic principles of fairness for children remains a touchy subject, with good reason.
Of course, not all signatories live up to the stated commitments of the CRC, and separate juvenile justice systems are ubiquitous in the United States. The popular American reflex still tilts toward law enforcement and the tendency to overpenalize young offenders reflects a fundamental American misunderstanding of how to handle a problem that exists everywhere else too. One Fellow from Europe remarked that “Children are not threats to society; society threatens children when it fails to provide the proper meaningful support.” Too often, American policymakers miss this distinction.
The Salzburg debate around the CRC, though, highlighted a key problem in American criminal justice generally: will the most useful reforms in American criminal justice come primarily from changing law or policy? In D.C., where lobbyists and activists beseech legislators for attention, focus invariably lands on new laws. Particularly in resource allocation, new laws can provide help for those who need it. But on the streets, where vulnerable Americans and police interact on a daily basis, new criminal laws are unlikely to be the best answer to help the most at-risk. Unfortunately, in the American crime debate, new laws and resources tend toward the carceral.
Some of the more remarkable stories I heard in Salzburg came from parts of the world that may not have obvious direct parallels in American policy. Hearing Fellows from African countries with recent experience of war and genocide talk about building a fair justice system based on the rule of law and “restorative justice” principles was eye-opening. After passing the FIRST STEP Act in President Trump’s first administration, the political backlash against activists decrying longstanding injustices effectively killed bipartisan justice reform in the United States. Yet African leaders talk about community mediation and other non-carceral methods in a system which includes lawyers and policymakers who almost certainly participated in or were adjacent to genocidal actions. Hearing individuals with first-hand experience talk about overcoming such harrowing problems puts American political obstacles in perspective, but also makes objections to basic reforms at home all the more frustrating.
To be clear, this was not an America-bashing event. Roughly half the attendees were Americans and many attendees touted real successes in their communities, wherever they were from. Indeed, some Fellows were formerly incarcerated Americans making their communities better so young people don’t follow their paths into the justice system. But talking to experts and practitioners in other countries provides a perspective that things can be different and better in the states.
But a theme that kept re-emerging throughout the week was taking the vast amount of knowledge in that room and getting it to the people and institutions that need it. As one D.C.-based Fellow put it, policy folks are in the translation business, turning research and experience into action.
Each of the working groups in Salzburg were focused on getting information to people who need it, in some form or another. Most of them plan on developing products in the coming months and years that can speak for themselves, though I will highlight them if I can. The following posts take a different tack, exploring two aspects of applying policy: the first is a lesson from the U.K. showing how a government can harness the power of academic research and put it into practice; the second explores the institutional obstacles to reform that officers face from within a police department.