Demonstration Research and Manifest Versus True Adoption: The Natural History of a Research Project to Divert Adolescents from the Legal System

All researchers know that what goes on “before the beginning’’ influences their research. We all know how, in ways that are rarely reported, certain events, attitudes, values, and experiences influence what actually takes place during a project’s formal conduct. Those who are familiar with the work of Seymour B. Sarason will recognize that the phrase “before the beginning” is taken from his book The Creation of Settings and the Future Societies (1972), where he notes that “a major obstacle to our understanding of the creation and development of settings is the surprising lack of detailed descriptions of their ‘natural history’ ” (p. 26). Sarason goes on to note that, with the thousands of professionals who devote themselves to the study and change of organizations, it is surprising there is so little understanding about how such settings are created and developed. “What must be recognized ... is that (their) ideas derive almost exclusively from observing and working with chronologically mature settings” (p. 26, italics in original). The same may be said for demonstration projects, which are almost universally described in the literature as if they were created and ended during the project’s actual conduct. There is no past and no future.