Abstract
To illuminate the role that Miller plays with regard to the wider realm of youth policy, I will employ the analytic approach of Professor John Kingdon, whose influential book Agendas, Alternatives, and Public Policies (Agendas) provides a framework for understanding how ideas move from mere proposals to effectuated policy. His approach emerges from the pluralist tradition, which emphasizes government processes and the role of political influence in affecting policy choices. In posing Kingdon’s central question – “How does an idea’s time come?” – to the Miller decision, this Article employs Kingdon’s theoretical framework in two ways. First, Kingdon’s framework is used to identify the factors, both political and scientific, that helped set the stage for the decision. Second, the Article explores how the identification and articulation of those factors will influence how we understand and deal with young offenders and disadvantaged emerging adults in the coming years.
Recommended Citation
Clark M. Peters,
Precedent as a Policy Map: What Miller v. Alabama Tells Us about Emerging Adults and the Direction of Contemporary Youth Services,
78 Mo. L. Rev.
(2013)
Available at: https://scholarship.law.missouri.edu/mlr/vol78/iss4/8