his paper reports an analysis of participation rates and types of delin-T quent behaviour using self-reported offending data from school students and apprehended juvenile offenders in Brisbane (n = 903) and in Shanghai (n = 565).The rate of participation in most categories of offending in the Brisbane sample was higher than in the Shanghai sample, with Brisbane school students being much more likely than Shanghai students to report at least one type of offence (85.8% vs. 28.8%). However, factor analyses revealed a common crime pattern across both samples, with behaviours grouping into theft, property-related offences, fighting, and disturbing public order. Brisbane school respondents were more likely than their Shanghai counterparts t o commit multiple types of offences. Co-offending peaked a t ages 15-16 in Brisbane and 17-18 in Shanghai, but was more common in the Shanghai sample than in the Brisbane sample. It is argued that compared with Australian young people there is a greater presence of social institutions in the lives of Chinese adolescents in the form of family, community and state controls, and that these mostly informal control systems appear to have been successful so far in containing the criminogenic impacts of rapid social change.This article undertakes an analysis of the patterns of juvenile offending using selfreported delinquency data collected from different groups of juveniles in Brisbane, Australia and Shanghai, China, focusing on the participation rate, variety of delinquent behaviour, and co-offending in the two cities.Australia and China are quite different countries with different social structures, cultures and populations. Australia is a liberal democratic society, in which law plays a very important role. By contrast, traditional mechanisms of social

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