Problem: Provide a response to: My Final Project focuses on the Pathways to Desistance Study, a seven-year longitudinal study that tracked over 1,300 serious adolescent offenders as they transitioned into adulthood. The criminal justice issue at the center of this topic is how and why delinquency subsides over time and what social, developmental, and ecological factors promote or inhibit desistance. By tracing serious juvenile offenders into adulthood, the study casts doubt on long-held beliefs that juvenile offenders inevitably grow up to be chronic adult criminals. Research suggests that desistance from crime is a natural part of development for many youths (Mulvey et al., 2010). To better understand how systems impact this natural developmental phenomenon, the Polarities of Democracy theory is used. Addressing youth offending and promoting long-term behavioral change requires an ecosystem of support including the courts, corrections, families, schools, communities, and youth development. Unfortunately, these systems often operate in ways that run on opposite sides of polarities. Benet's (2013) Polarities of Democracy theory provides a lens for understanding how youth navigate these systems. Two polarities are addressed with this topic: Freedom-Authority Diversity-Equality. Need Assignment Help?