Legislators have been involved in several disputes over the methods of determining responses in criminal juvenile laws to adopt logical plans and policies; as a result, various models have emerged for the penelisation of juvenile delinquency. The most common models represent justice and welfare. The justice model emphasises the acceptance of strict punishments used for intimidation or entitlement, whereas the welfare model seeks to improve the behaviour/personality of juvenile delinquents by guaranteeing the right to rehabilitation. This paper addresses the following question: What penalisation model is accepted in both the laws of Iran and the international human rights system for the differentiation of criminal justice? In this study, a descriptive-analytical method is employed to answer such questions by reviewing national and international laws from a comparative perspective. Research findings indicate the normalisation of the welfare discourse in various regulations of international documents, which reflect individualisation, pluralism of de-incarceration leniency, and absolute prohibition of strict approaches. By contrast, Iran’s legislative discourse tends to adopt opposite models due to the nature of juvenile delinquency. In other words, the justice model and the alternative model are accepted as the dominant penalisation models based on the possibility of applying physical punishments and guaranteeing the right to security in sharia-related crimes as well as individualisation and freedom deprivation centrality in punishments.