The discovery and promotion of the “at risk” category especially in relation to young people has largely supplanted older categories, such as “delinquency” and “maladjustment” under the “sociology of deviance”. The novel feature of the risk category is its capacity to embrace the entire youth population, far exceeding the scope of older practices informed by deviancy theory. To critically review the application of at-risk concepts to young people, two representative case studies are drawn on, with attention given to the ways they are informed by functionalist sociology. The study indicates how risk-based research connects with the governance of young people, and how risk researchers tend to locate the source of the problem within the individual, their family, and immediate community. Too much risk-based research relies on normative assumptions about the social and economic dependence of young people which when given expression and legitimacy through the research findings reinforce discourses about youth as dependent. Much of this work tends to rest on assumptions about youth as dependent and in need of close supervision. Notes, references