Cross-Branch Collaboration: What Can We Learn from the Collaboration Between Courts and the Division of Youth Services in Missouri?

In Cross-Branch Collaboration: What Can We Learn from the Collaboration Between Courts and the Division of Youth Services in Missouri?, Harvard social policy lecturer Julie Boatright Wilson uses the Missouri juvenile justice system as a case study that highlights strengths and weaknesses associated with collaboration. In doing so, the paper both offers general lessons learned from the Missouri experience and raises questions that should be addressed by those interested in achieving the potential benefits of collaboration across branches in criminal justice matters.

Julie Boatright Wilson, the Harry Kahn Senior Lecturer in Social Policy at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, is a sociologist whose work focuses on child welfare, juvenile justice, and poverty policy issues. Her recent work examines federal and state child welfare policies on adoption and the role of state agencies in the lives of struggling families.