The Complexities of ‘Home’: Young People ‘on the Move’ and State Responses

‘Home’ invokes ambiguous meanings for policy, practice and academia. This article explores the complexities of ‘home’ in relation to the experiences of two groups of young people in transitory circumstances (UK children who go missing from the family home or alternative care; and young people who have been separated from their home and families as refugees). We consider how the meaning given to ‘home’, despite its inherent ambiguity, functions as a central concept around which the vulnerability and credibility of children and young people are constructed. By problematising the universalised concept of home and the notion of ‘family’ that it implies, this article contributes to criminology and refugee studies by exploring State responses to ‘youth journeys’ (within and to the UK) through an idealised lens of ‘home’. This normative view, we suggest, forms the basis for determining State responses, with significant consequences for these young people.