In Wild Arabs and savages: a history of juvenile justice in Ireland, Paul Sargent provides a sociologically-based study of how the Irish juvenile justice system developed. Covering the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, Sargent’s book is a thoughtfully considered interpretation of a deeply controversial topic that delves into a system now associated with prison-like confinement, abuse and childhood vulnerability. Wild Arabs and savages is therefore timely and relevant. Sargent commences by providing a somewhat descriptive overview of the structure of the nineteenth- and twentieth-century juvenile justice system. He traces the post-Famine introduction of industrial and reformatory schools, the opening of borstals, post-independence moral panics about the morally decadent Irish youth, state inaction on dire institutional conditions, the Kennedy Report of 1970 and a renewed late-century concern about juvenile delinquency. Set against this narrative, Sargent also considers changing attitudes to childhood crime. Nineteenth-century commentators often disparaged child criminals as fundamentally immoral. Gradually, causative factors such as poverty and social circumstances became incorporated into criminological models. Psychological treatment, rather than moral punishment, played an increasing role in the management of juveniles. Sargent covers much ground in his opening chapter; perhaps too much. Nonetheless, he offers a thorough examination of the various ideological contexts that shaped historical perceptions of juvenile crime and investigates the uniqueness of disciplinary technologies in Ireland; a country where institutionalisation remained the predominant method of dealing with child crime as other countries turned to alternative strategies. Like many countries, Ireland moved towards community-based care models but at a comparatively gradual pace.

Applying a governmentality perspective grounded in Foucauldian methodology, a subsequent chapter investigates the visibility and invisibility of the various institutions established to tackle juvenile crime. At times, Sargent over-applies his methodology. For instance, mid-nineteenth-century governments undoubtedly relied increasingly upon analysing statistical knowledge to gather information on citizens, render social problems visible and devise governmental strategies (such as the reformatory school). Sargent convincingly mentions that many historical studies of Irish institutions are too descriptive. Yet over-analysis of themes such as, for instance, the rationale behind gathering and publishing statistical evidence in annual reports distracts at times. Despite this reservation, Sargent offers fascinating information on the development of children’s courts and borstals while observing that visible (e.g. reformatory schools) and less visible (e.g. crime prevention initiatives in the community) techniques of governing evolved in modern Ireland.

A third chapter examines the rationalities behind systems of juvenile care/punishment. Sargent emphasises the influence of the Catholic Church which sought to retain its pre-dominance in industrial school management and rescuing youths from criminal lifestyles. The impact of religious forces ensured that the Irish juvenile justice system developed quite uniquely. It was only in the 1970s, Sargent posits, that emerging rationalities of psychology, social work and probation began to challenge established methods of managing child crime. In a subsequent chapter, Sargent examines disciplinary technologies. He emphasises the physical environment of industrial and reformatory schools and details how time, space and routine was organised to effect a rigid system of control and personal organisation. Children consumed meals at set times, residents rose from their beds simultaneously and order was reinforced through architectural structure. Sargent also explores pastoral initiatives. In his closing chapter, Sargent maps the shifting frameworks that structured ideas on juvenile delinquency throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Blame, he suggests, became invariably apportioned to environment, family rearing and psychological defects rather than immorality. In this chapter, Sargent provides a fascinating overview of the (relatively late) incorporation of psychologists in rectifying deviant Irish childhoods.

Wild Arabs and savages is a well-written and meticulously researched account of public attitudes and state/community responses to juvenile crime. Sargent adopts a theoretical approach based on Foucauldian methodologies to examine his topic. The Foucauldian approach might weaken the appeal of this study to historians who might have found a chronological approach – still rooted in theory – more accessible. Due to his Foucauldian leanings, Sargent is generally less attentive to important themes including how children interacted, or rebelled against, the unyielding mechanisms in place to effect physical and psychological control. But a powerful overview is provided of how employees in the juvenile justice system sought to regulate institutional life to create new behavioural patterns. The book will be of interest to both sociologists and historians, although the Wild Arabs and savages’ theoretical denseness will ultimately limit the impact of the study among non-academic audiences.