Herald View:

IT is easy to ridicule the suggestion that gang crime and serious street violence can be tackled by offering yoga, breathing exercises, and spiritual healing. But the suggestion that the Scottish Government look to Scandinavia, Hong Kong and California for ideas on ways to prevent violent criminals – usually men – from reoffending is well worth considering.

Much ground-breaking work has already been done to tackle organised crime and gang culture in Scotland. Glasgow’s internationally renowned VRU has been widely hailed – most recently by Iain Duncan Smith.

Unfortunatley, the former Conservative leader is something of a repeat offender when it comes to missing the point of lessons from Scotland. He notoriously had an ‘epiphany’ about social exclusion in Easterhouse, before launching a series of savage benefits cuts.

Now, despite his praise for the VRU, Mr Duncan Smith is calling for more aggressive use of stop and search by police, particularly in London.

Yet the VRU’S work, while residing within Police Scotland has often involved admitting that others can do a better job. Not just health services, schools and community justice programmes but surgeons, parents and ex-offenders, and employers willing to give people a second chance.

It is in this context that the research of Professor Ross Deuchar should be considered. While considerable progress has been made in tackling gangs and organised crime in Scotland we should not be above learning lessons from abroad.

And whether you describe it as group therapy, or brotherhood or spirituality, many of the ideas Mr

Deuchar champions in his new book – based on work done with Asian Triad members, LA “gangbangers” or biker gangs in Copenhagen – make sense.

Involvement in gangs can often come about when young men, particularly those whose family life is troubled, neglectful or abusive, seek out an alternative family.

The violent cultures they join often thrive on a distorted version of masculinity – the traditional hard man and notions such as loyalty and respect.

What ‘spiritual’ approaches have in common is that participants are given reason to consider what they want from life, the kind of person they want to be, and more constructive ideas of what it means to be a man.

There is evidence programmes such as LA’S Homeboy Industries can provide that. Importantly, they rely on peers to help recruit participants and demonstrate that change is possible.

If yoga and breathing exercises can help put offenders in a situation where such self-reflection can begin they should not be lightly dismissed.