Inadequate recognition by institutions of the transition through adolescence

Nature

Typically, in Western societies and institutions such as schools, there is no equivalent to the tribal rites-of-passage. Indeed in many Western high schools there is inadequate recognition of developing maturity which aggravates adolescent delinquency, drug-taking, violence or suicide, and contributes to a disaffected, under-achieving student body.

Counter-claim

The high school system has not failed, rather entire societies are failing as they become internally fragmented and torn between opposing global ideologies and power groups. Demands are made to make institutions more liberal on the one side, and more repressive on the other, reflecting the same tendency to polarization that is found in the community which the schools image.