Agency in an age of structure: the role of YOT managers in shaping Welsh youth justice

This article explores the dynamics between structure and agency in Welsh youth justice, focusing on the discretionary power of Youth Offending Team (YOT) managers. Drawing on qualitative research with practitioners, policy actors and young people, it explores how ‘soft devolution’ and local discretion facilitate the development of bespoke, rights-based practices that diverge from their English counterparts. Framed through Mills’ sociological imagination and Giddens’ structuration theory, the article demonstrates how YOT managers translate national policy into locally grounded practice, shaping outcomes in ways that both reflect and reconfigure wider structures. The voices of young people themselves underline the stakes of this process, revealing how professional discretion can either stifle or support their aspirations for the future. The findings highlight how frontline innovation, embedded in devolved governance and rights-based legislation, can transform space for a more welfare-oriented approach to youth justice in Wales. More broadly, the study offers lessons for devolved and quasi-devolved contexts, showing how local agency can sustain meaningful reform within structurally constrained systems.