Guest editorial
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/JCS-09-2022-087 |
| Published date | 30 August 2022 |
| Date | 30 August 2022 |
| Pages | 153-157 |
| Subject Matter | Health & social care,Vulnerable groups,Children's services,Sociology,Sociology of the family,Children/youth,Parents,Education,Early childhood education,Home culture,Social/physical development |
| Author | Carlene Firmin,Kristine Hickle,Susan Rayment-McHugh |
Guest editorial
Carlene Firmin, Kristine Hickle and Susan Rayment-McHugh
From recognition to response: the challenging journey to developing contextual
responses to violence impacting children and young people
Setting the scene: a contextual evidence-base, underapplied
The idea that “contextmatters” to our wellbeing, safety and development is nothingnew. As a
person develops, a range of social contexts shape their experiences (Bourdieu and
Wacquant, 1992;Bronfrenbrenner, 1979), and numerous structural forces shape those
contexts (Bourdieu and Wacquant, 1992;Crenshaw, 2017). Far from being one-way traffic,
individuals alsoshape the contexts that shape them. Working in academiafor over a decade,
contextual opportunities and limitations in the sector have influenced our career trajectories
(and the impact of our work); and the actions we have taken have also shaped the teams,
departments and institutions of which we have been a part. When it come to the issue of
violence and abuse, when a young person is physically assaulted on their way to school, by
other young people who they see on a regular basis, their peer and community contexts
shape how they make sense of their experience and move forward. How they behave from
that point on will alsoshape those same peer and community contexts.
From Bronfenbrenner’s ecological theory of human development (Bronfrenbrenner, 1979),
through to Bourdieu’s theory of socialfield (Bourdieu and Wacquant, 1992) and Crenshaw’s
theory of intersectionality (Crenshaw, 2017), we have been offered a range of frameworksto
make sense of this reality. Through Bronfrenbrenner’s (1979) ecological systems theory we
begin to understand how an individual is situated within different environments that are
directly or indirectly influential, illuminating the complex ways that individuals are influenced
by, and reciprocally influence the contexts in which they are embedded (Payne, 2005). In
turn, Bourdieu’s theory of social field details how individuals embody the rules of the social
fields of which they are a part, and draw upon their capital (social, cultural, economic and
symbolic) to play the rules of those social fieldsand achieve status. Crenshaw’s work draws
attention to the intersectional structural barriers and opportunities that are reinforced/
challenged within those systems/fields; highlights how the same contexts may be
experienced by individuals differently dependent on a range of characteristics including
gender, race and sexuality. For all these theorists it is impossible to understand an
individual’s experiences,choices, behaviours or feelings without understanding the nature of
the contexts inwhich those experiences, choices, behavioursor feelings develop.
These frameworks help us to see that the norms/rules within a given context inform human
behaviour. In turn, research evidence from disciplines as diverse as environmental
criminology shows us how attending to contextual factors can reduce problem behaviours
and enhance safety (Clarke and Eck, 2005). Likewise, proponents of social and structural
models of social work centre the environmental and structural sources of harm, such as
poverty and inequality (Featherstone et al.,2018). A range of interventions have been built,
and evaluated, on the evidencebase that contextual safety impacts individual behaviours.A
range of interventions in schools for example, have sought to create changes in peer and
school cultures, to reduce individualyoung people’s experiences of partner violence during
adolescence (Fagan and Catalano,2013;Foshee et al., 2014;Miller, 2013). Efforts have also
been made to reduce individual experiences of harm by building protective communities,
Carlene Firmin is based at
the Department of
Sociology, Durham
University, Durham, UK.
Kristine Hickle is based at
the Department of Social
Work and Social Care,
University of Sussex,
Brighton, UK.
Susan Rayment-McHugh is
based at the University of
the Sunshine Coast,
Sunshine Coast, Australia.
DOI 10.1108/JCS-09-2022-087 VOL. 17 NO. 3 2022, pp. 153-157, ©Emerald Publishing Limited, ISSN 1746-6660 jJOURNAL OF CHILDREN’S SERVICES jPAGE 153
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