Intervention Technologies in juvenile delinquency in Chile: following a portfolio

Abstract This article deals with intervention processes in young people linked to the adolescent criminal responsibility law, promulgated in Chile in 2007. Elements of Governmentality Studies are used to propose the analysis of intervention technologies. A qualitative methodology is proposed, which incorporates elements of the Actor Network Theory. Different documents and materials are analysed with the purpose of following up on an intervention instrument designed between 2009 and 2011 for the treatment of people with problematic substance use and subsequently adapted to young law offenders. The main results describe processes of translation of interests of the government agency in charge of designing the policies for the treatment and rehabilitation of the problematic use of substances and different moments of the process of development and adaptation of the intervention instrument. This is analyzed using concepts from the Actor-Network theory. It is concluded that the instrument functions as a mediator between a logic of government and the intervention strategies aimed at young law offenders, which paradoxically makes invisible the elements that participate in its network, typical of law infringement.