This paper examines the evolving social identities of young adolescents in regard to alcohol and drinking culture in Norway. Detailed analysis of 29 focus group interviews and 32 individual interviews with 12-13-year-olds reveal a thorough negative attitude towards alcohol, especially when enjoyed by young people. Young adolescents found young people to be too irresponsible and immature to drink, while adults were portrayed as capable of enjoying alcohol without losing control or experiencing other negative effects. Through symbolic boundary work, they distanced themselves from adolescents who drank. The young adolescents rejected the idea that drinking alcohol was a sign of maturity; instead, they exhibited maturity by distancing themselves from drunk adolescents. We discuss how these findings reflect the participants' socio-cognitive development, and how symbolic boundaries are often drawn against those closest in social distance. We conclude that boundaries between 'adolescents' and 'adults' are fundamental when understanding emerging adolescent social identities, especially when it comes to drinking and drinking culture.

While much research on desistance addresses processes of change for repeat offenders during and after imprisonment, this article applies insights from desistance studies to novice offenders outside the traditional justice system. In Norway, increasing numbers of adolescent drug-law offenders have been diverted to alternative justice systems over the last decade. Based on in-depth interviews with youth enrolled in programmes to help them refrain from drug use, the article seeks to identify how the early-stage desistance process is understood by would-be desisters. Rather than ascribing the rehabilitative programmes' direct impact on their behaviour and thinking, the adolescents emphasised the importance of restoring relationships with parents and overcoming legal barriers. Accordingly, the analysis shows how concerns with personal reform were outweighed by (i) social and (ii) legal concerns. While the precedence of external concerns over personal reform may reflect the participants' age and level of criminal involvement, it also reflects a particular culture of intervention.

Based Drug SceneAims: Street-based drug scenes are typically portrayed as lacking in solidarity. Studies frequently cast camaraderie as solely instrumental, highly conditional, and temporary. The aim of this paper is to explore social dynamics and group solidarity in a seemingly hostile drug scene, and demonstrate the importance of this milieu for a group of immigrant men.Methods: Data was drawn from ethnographic fieldwork in the street-based drug scene in the downtown parts of Oslo, Norway. The fieldwork included participant observation, informal conversations, and 17 interviews with street-based drug users.Findings: Drug transactions, viewed as interaction rituals, may help create group solidarity among the members of the scene. Group solidarity is displayed in social bonds that drew former members back to the scene and in the inclusion of isolated, immigrant men. Conclusions:The street-based drug scene in Oslo, with its repeated interaction rituals and bonds of group membership, provides a community for people who experience low degrees of solidarity elsewhere, as demonstrated in the case of immigrants. This paper encourages a continued and improved emphasis on contexts for drug use as socially enabling environments.

This study explores the penal character of diversion programmes through the subjective experiences of young drug-law offenders. Specifically, punishment experiences are investigated through qualitative interviews with 24 offenders who were arrested between the ages of 15 and 17. The diverted adolescents described four experiences of punishment attending the programmes: (1) deprivation of time; (2) deprivation of social bonds; (3) deprivation of dignity and (4) deprivation of self. These subjective experiences of punishment, which all reflect the supervisory character of alternative penal sanctioning, differed in severity across programmes, individuals and abstraction levels. Punishment is largely an unspoken aspect of diversionary practices, emphasizing the importance of a subjectivist approach to assessments of penal character.

The penal repertoire for young offenders in Europe encompasses an increasing variety of alternative sanctions. Research indicates that the availability and implementation of these sanctions vary within jurisdictions, raising issues of unequal treatment for equal offences. Among possible factors associated with intra-jurisdictional disparities in alternative sentencing outcomes is the socioeconomic status of young offenders. This study investigates the social profile of diverted youth, thereby addressing social inequalities in alternative sanctioning. Register data on all 15- to 17-year olds charged with minor drug offences in Norway between 2005 and 2015 ( N = 3209) were compared to a randomly drawn sample of non-offenders ( N = 69,201). Offenders who were diverted from a fine to a conditional waiver of prosecution, either with or without rehabilitative measures, were classified with an alternative sanction. Socioeconomic status was measured by an indicator combining register data on household income and parental education. Probit regressions with sample selection were used to identify social gradients in alternative sanctioning. By extensive register linkages, we were able to control for a range of well-known confounders such as gender, immigrant status, family composition, parental crime, and geographical centrality. We found that the probability of receiving a conditional waiver of prosecution was around 5% points higher for youth from a medium-high socioeconomic status background and 8% points higher for youth from a high socioeconomic status background compared with their low socioeconomic status counterparts. The positive social gradient pertained to sanctioning with rehabilitative elements and not to minimal interventions. Social inequality in desistance-oriented sanctions, which may consolidate pre-existing inequalities in criminal charges, is likely influenced by the resources parents have at their disposal to get involved in their children’s legal processes.