Structural Character of the “Rehabilitation” of Incarcerated Juveniles:

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Other Title
  • 少年院における「更生」の構造
  • 少年院における「更生」の構造--非行少年の語る「自己」と「社会」に着目して[含 英語文要旨]
  • ショウネンイン ニ オケル コウセイ ノ コウゾウ ヒコウ ショウネン ノ カタル ジコ ト シャカイ ニ チャクモク シテ ガン エイゴブン ヨウシ
  • ──非行少年の語る「自己」と「社会」に着目して──
  • An Essay on the Narrative Transfiguration of the Relationship between Self and Society

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Abstract

Recently, the effects of treatment in juvenile correctional institutions have begun to gain general attention. However, this attention seems to involve a “distrust” of these treatments and their effects. Can it be said that juveniles are “truly” rehabilitated? This feeling of “distrust” seems to stem from a lack and bias of information on treatment in juvenile correctional institutions. However, at a fundamental level, the distrust may relate to the concept of the “rehabilitation of a person.” In sum, we suppose that rehabilitation is a matter involving the individual's internal being. We suppose that it is impossible in general to approach an individual's mind, but that someone who has professional skills and knowledge relating to research into his internal being can (or may, or must) do so. Because of this understanding of the individual’s mind, we repeatedly ask the question: are juveniles “truly” rehabilitated? An individual’s transfiguration is fundamentally a public matter. So it is an observation or description by an other about an individual's behaviors. From this viewpoint, this paper examines some observable and structural transfiguration of narrative of a juvenile incarcerated in a juvenile correctional institution, and attempts to reconsider “rehabilitation” in the institution. The juvenile, whom we interviewed for our research during a period of about a year, said that the institution he lives in is not a futsu (usual) space compared to general society, because it has very strict and specific rules and norms. He reported they make temptations for disciplinary violence to imprisoned juveniles. In fact he took disciplinary violence before this interview, but he reconstruct himself as a reasonable subject by drawing comparison between “juvenile corrective institutions” and “general society” in the aspect of rule and norm. But some months later when he advanced to the last class, his view regarding the institution, general society, and his self, had changed dramatically. At that time, he told us that the institution and its residents were futsu (normal) compared to the society he had participated in before his incarceration, a delinquent group. This change can be seen as a reform of his self into a member of the general and public society, or a transformation of the relationship between society and self. During the interview, he used the term “juvenile correctional institution” to explain his identity as a member of the public society. Thus, the concept of “juvenile correctional institution” contributed to this change as a narrative-self resource. The paper concludes that this explanation can be reasonable for the juvenile as a story-teller, as he examined relevant and particular events about his life and experience in this institution and outside society. Therefore, the authors perceive “rehabilitation” as an accomplishment within a narrative work between the juvenile and interviewer. We can see this structural and conceptual transfiguration of society/self as a form of “rehabilitation” of juveniles incarcerated (and scheduled to be released) in juvenile correctional institutions.

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