‘It is Not as Easy as ABC’: Examining Practitioners' Views on Using Behavioural Contracts to Encourage Young People to Accept Responsibility for Their Anti-Social Behaviour
| Author | Kevin J. Brown |
| Date | 01 February 2012 |
| DOI | 10.1350/jcla.2012.76.1.750 |
| Published date | 01 February 2012 |
| Subject Matter | Article |
‘It Is Not as Easy as ABC’:
Examining Practitioners’ Views
on Using Behavioural Contracts
to Encourage Young People to
Accept Responsibility for their
Anti-Social Behaviour
Kevin J. Brown*
Abstract This article examines the use of acceptable behavioural contracts
as a tool for engendering the voluntary acceptance of responsibility in
children and young people perceived to be engaging in anti-social behav-
iour and low-level criminality. Based on the results of a qualitative empir-
ical analysis with local government and social housing anti-social
behaviour teams, the article explores the attitudes of practitioners to the
use of this unregulated but commonly utilised intervention. Practitioners’
views are contrasted with the ideals of voluntary responsibilisation upon
which the contracts are supposedly based. It is argued that there is a
spectrum of differing approaches among practitioners, with some using
the contracts more to encourage the voluntary acceptance of responsibil-
ity, whilst others use them more coercively to hold individuals responsible
for their behaviour. The implications of these differing approaches are
examined.
Keywords Anti-social behaviour; Acceptable behaviour contracts;
Responsibilisation; Youth justice; Diversionary measures
Tackling anti-social behaviour has been a policy priority of British
governments since 1997. Parties from across the political spectrum have
sought when in government to demonstrate their eagerness to tackle
behaviour, which they argue ‘ruins lives, damages our communities
and, at its worst, can have tragic consequences’.1Through a combina-
tion of national and local policy innovation, a tool-kit of interventions
has been developed and reformed which local practitioners are called
upon to utilise in the name of protecting our communities. When it
comes to the governance of anti-social behaviour, the most high-profile
intervention to date has undoubtedly been the anti-social behaviour
* Lecturer, Newcastle Law School, Newcastle University; e-mail: kevin.j.brown@
newcastle.ac.uk. Thanks are due to Chris Chipchase, Richard Collier, Kathryn
Hollingsworth, Colin Murray and Toby Seddon for comments on earlier drafts.
Thanks are also due to all the practitioners who agreed to be interviewed for this
study.
1 Conservative Home Office Minister, James Brokenshire, from a press release
entitled ‘New Help for Anti-Social Behaviour Victims’, 4 January 2011, available at
www.homeoffice.gov.uk/media-centre/news/asb-victims, accessed 27 November 2011.
53The Journal of Criminal Law (2012) 76 JCL 53–70
doi:10.1350/jcla.2012.76.1.750
order (ASBO).2However, in terms of frequency of use, it is the behav-
ioural contract, and in particular the acceptable behaviour contract
(ABC) which has been significantly more popular with practitioners.
Whilst between, January 2003 and December 2009, the Ministry of
Justice records courts issuing 17,652 ASBOs,3Home Office data record
that between April 2003 and March 2009 there were 49,586 ABCs
agreed across England and Wales.4This article examines through the use
of empirical data the approach of practitioners to the more commonly
used intervention.
The ABC was the creation of a local anti-social behaviour team in the
London Borough of Islington in around the year 2000 wherefrom it
quickly gained popularity with central government and practitioners
across the country.5At their most straightforward ABCs are written
agreements between a public agency and an individual, stipulating
standards of behaviour to which the latter party is expected to adhere.
The impetus for the drawing up of a contract is usually alleged engage-
ment in anti-social behaviour by the individual. The purpose of the
contract is to prevent further similar behaviour. The contents of the
contract are tailored to individuals and their behaviour. Aside from the
conditions stating an individual will not engage in further acts of anti-
social behaviour, a contract may stipulate significant restrictions on a
signatory’s freedom such as association restrictions where it is agreed
that he or she will not associate with certain people; curfews; or restric-
tions on being present in particular locations.6
ABCs are informal contracts in the sense that they do not give rise to
enforceable rights or obligations in law, although they commonly in-
clude within the terms a threat of legal action (such as an ASBO or
eviction) by the agency against the signatory/ies if breached. An in-
dividual is in theory entitled to refuse to sign an ABC and he or she has
the right to sign initially and then withdraw from the contract at a later
stage. As the contracts are informal, there is no restriction on who may
make use of them, unlike statutory interventions such as ASBOs.7There
is evidence of their use or a variation of them by social housing pro-
viders, local authorities, police forces, schools, youth offending teams
2 Under the Coalition government’s 2011 Consultation Paper, it is proposed that the
ASBO and other civil interventions be repackaged and rebranded: Home Office,
More Effective Responses to Anti-Social Behaviour: A Consultation (Home Office: London,
2011).
3 Ministry of Justice, Anti-Social Behaviour Order Statistics—England and Wales 2009,
available at http//:www.homeoffice.gov.uk/publications/science-research-statistics/research-
statistics/crime-research/asbo-stats-england-wales-2009, accessed 27 November 2011.
4 Home Office, CDRP Survey Data 2004–2008 [Archived Content], available at http://
webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20091207102415/asb.homeoffice.gov.uk/cdrp/default.
aspx?id=12794, accessed 27 November 2011.
5 K. Bullock and B. Jones, Acceptable Behaviour Contracts: Addressing Anti-Social
Behaviour in the London Borough of Islington, Home Office Online Report (2004),
available at http://library.npia.police.uk/docs/hordsolr0204.pdf, accessed 27 November
2011.
6 Home Office, Acceptable Behaviour Contracts and Agreements (Home Office: London,
2007).
7 Crime and Disorder Act 1998, s. 1.
The Journal of Criminal Law
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