Youth Work Book Review

In Youth Work, Nichols draws on an institutional ethnography and communitybased research, which was conducted over the course of more than one year at an Ontario youth emergency shelter – ‘Street Youth Shelter, Middlesborough’.
Nichols adopts a definition of youth work in the book that extends beyond the work of a “child and youth worker” (p.5) to include “all of the things young people do in institutional settings… as well as the activities of any practitioner who works with youth” (p.6). She argues that the work of young people and practitioners is co-ordered (Miller and Rose, 2008) “in ways that contribute to young people’s institutional and social marginalization” (p.6) and illustrates this through revealing a number of institutional ‘cracks’
Stella’s experience reflected what Hopper et al. (1997) would identify as life on the ‘institutional circuit’, as in addition to staying in the SYS for three years, she was also repeatedly institutionalised in a number of mental health and youth justice facilities, returning to a “clinical treatment centre for youth” on each release from custody.
The resultant “upheaval” (p.71) impacted on Stella’s personal relationships and participation in educational opportunities, with lockdown facilities, in particular, affecting her personal well-being. This also brought Stella into contact with a wide range of professionals who were charged with managing the risk Stella was thought to pose – a threat evidenced by her street involvement, abuse, crime, substance use, mental health issues, lack of stable housing and absence of social supports
(psychiatrists, psychologists, police officers, teachers, youth workers, probation officers, child welfare workers or shelter workers). Her refusal on several occasions, however, to participate in institutional relations, at least in the expected ways, meant that she was often subject to interventions against her will (p.66).
Nichols highlights the dangers of individualistic ‘cover your ass work’, which aims to protect a worker’s or organisation’s professional reputation and describes the ways in which institutional processes do not meet the immediate needs of young people who are in need of stable housing. The gathering and dissemination of data, for example, is used as evidence of whether individuals/agencies are doing their jobs, rather than used to improve services for young people.
Chapter 6 details Nichols’ experiences of community-based research and using its findings to inform the development of a life-skills programme for young people – the
Transitioning Life-Skills Program (TLP). The chapter outlines how Nichols uses political theory to interpret the research findings and takes account of the embeddedness of neo-liberal values in programmes, policies and institutional practices
334 European Journal of Homelessness _ Volume 9, No. 2, December 2015 evident in youth work. The idea of focusing on life-skills development – focusing on skills related to budgeting, healthy eating, health work and safe sexual practices
– originated from shelter workers’ accounts and, suggests Nichols, reflects a