scholarly journals THE HISTORY OF THE LAW OF ADOPTION IN SOUTH AFRICA

Obiter ◽  
2014 ◽  
Author(s):  
Glynis van der Walt
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Political Ideology ◽  
Family Care ◽  
Major Influence ◽  
Legal Concept ◽  
Welfare Of The Child ◽  
History Of ◽  
Private Context ◽  
The Right ◽  
International Instruments

The article traces the historical development of the legal concept of adoption from early civilization to present day South African law. The requirements and consequences of the practice of adoption changed with time, and with the waning of the popularity thereof, adoption as a legal concept was unknown in Roman-Dutch law – the common law of South Africa .During the early 1900‟s increasing numbers of informal “adoptions” taking place in South Africa led to the promulgation of the Adoption of Children Act 25 of 1923. Where conducive to the welfare of the child, adoption was permitted. However, the political ideology of the time in South Africa had a major influence on adoption as a legal institution, with the consequence that the considerations of the welfare of the child were superseded by the ideology of racial segregation. Post constitutional democracy led to the securing and protecting of basic human rights, not least of all within the private context of ”family”. Ratification of international instruments which made provision for adoption, together with the dawning of the constitutional era in South Africa saw the child as the bearer of his or her own rights. In terms of our Constitution, every child was guaranteed the right to family care or parental care or appropriate alternative care. The article focuses on the development and evolution of adoption to its present-day status.

The International Evolution of the Right of Children to Social Security

2017 ◽  
Vol 30 (2) ◽  
pp. 484-503
Author(s):  
Gugulethu Nkosi
Keyword(s):  
Social Security ◽  
Economic Rights ◽  
Cultural Rights ◽  
Legal Documents ◽  
Welfare Of The Child ◽  
African Charter ◽  
The Right ◽  
Scarcity Of Resources ◽  
International Instruments ◽  
Social Security Beneficiaries

This article seeks to provide an analysis of the right of children to social security as provided for in the various international legal instruments, and as assimilated in other legal documents. Furthermore, it argues that scarcity of resources prevents children from enjoying socio-economic rights, including the right to social security adopted through international instruments and entrenched in domestic laws. The Convention on the Rights of a Child provides for the right to social security in the event of lack of resources to benefit the child. So does the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights and the African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child. In all the said legal instruments, the clauses on social security do not explicitly prescribe the rights that ought to be promoted through it. However, since the jurisprudence on socio-economic rights= emphasises the view that socio-economic rights are interrelated, interdependent and indivisible, it can also be safely said that through social security, beneficiaries, that is children, should be able to enjoy access to other socio-economic rights in general. Therefore, the significance of the right to social security as a means to address poverty and facilitate the development of children is explored.

International Human Rights Law and the Access of Children of Asylum Seekers to Social Assistance in South Africa

2021 ◽  
Vol 53 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ademola Oluborode Jegede ◽  
Puleng Letuka ◽  
Tivoneleni Edmund Lubisi
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
Asylum Seekers ◽  
Social Assistance ◽  
International Human Rights Law ◽  
International Human Rights ◽  
Regulatory Frameworks ◽  
International Human ◽  
The Right ◽  
International Instruments

There is a massive presence of asylum seekers in South Africa. Amongst this population are children who need social assistance from the state distributed as ‘grants’, due to their dependence, vulnerability and developmental requirements. South Africa is a state party to international instruments on human rights and has a regulatory framework including the Constitution which allows for the application of these instruments and guarantees the right to social security for everyone. This article focuses on whether the existing corpus of international instruments on human rights and relevant domestic regulatory frameworks may allow children of asylum seekers the access to social assistance in South Africa. While demonstrating that the access to social assistance for children of asylum seekers is implied under international human rights instruments, the article establishes that this has not found expression in the application of existing legislation on social assistance in South Africa. By deploying an appropriate interpretive approach, courts may respond to this normative gap and thereby assist in guaranteeing the access of these children to social assistance in South Africa.

scholarly journals A Consideration of Sections 249, 250 and 259 of the Proposed Third Amendment Bill to the Children’s Act in Light of the Best Interests Principle

Obiter ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 41 (4) ◽  
pp. 934-947
Author(s):  
Glynis van der Walt
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Family Care ◽  
Best Interests ◽  
Current Status ◽  
Adoption Process ◽  
Intercountry Adoption ◽  
Alternative Care ◽  
Constitutional Right ◽  
The Republic ◽  
The Right

With the promulgation of the Constitution in 1996, national legislative recognition was given to the principle that a child’s best interests are of paramount importance in every matter concerning the child (s 28(2) of the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa, 1996). Section 28(1)(b) expressly provides for the right of a child to family care, parental care or appropriate alternative care. Based on economic and other factors, developing countries like South Africa experience difficulties in meeting the constitutional right of a child to have his or her best interests met and the placement of an orphaned or abandoned child (OAC) in appropriate alternative care is no exception. In light hereof, the current note considers whether the proposed amendments to the Children’s Act (CA, Act 38 of 2005 as amended) introduced by the Third Amendment Bill (GG 42005 of 2019-02-25), with particular reference to sections 249, 250 and 259 comply with this constitutional right. These three sections are of particular relevance to placing a child in permanent care in the form of both national and intercountry adoption. In particular, section 249 makes provision that no consideration may be given in respect to adoption, section 250 limits the persons who are allowed to provide adoption services and section 259 makes provision for the accreditation for the provision of intercountry adoption services. All three sections are relevant to the adoption process of an OAC. Alternative care options available and the basis for determining which placement decided upon is deemed to be the most appropriate for the child concerned, are considered in light of the proposed amendments. A consideration of the current status of the child welfare system in South Africa as well as the statistics of the many children in need of alternative care, serves to provide a background in determining whether the proposed amendments meet and further the vulnerable OAC’s best interests.

scholarly journals The Obligation to Provide Free Basic Education in South Africa: An International Law Perspective

2017 ◽  
Vol 14 (6) ◽  
pp. 96 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lorette Arendse
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Basic Education ◽  
Exact Nature ◽  
Economic Rights ◽  
Free Primary Education ◽  
Legal Obligations ◽  
International Obligation ◽  
Constitutional Right ◽  
The Right ◽  
International Instruments

In South Africa many learners are denied the right to basic education because of the levying of school fees and other educational charges, in spite of the international obligation imposed on government to provide free primary education. This article examines the exact nature and extent of this obligation by exploring the concept of "free" basic education. The applicable international instruments and their interpretation as well as the significance of the right to education as a central, facilitative right are examined in order to establish the content of the right to basic education and the legal obligations that ensue. Against this background, the implications of the South African Constitutional Court's approach to the realisation of socio-economic rights and the possibility of  the establishment of a core minimum obligation are analysed. It is argued that learners in South Africa may come from different socio-economic backgrounds but as learners in the same public school domain and as equal bearers of their constitutional right to basic education all of them are entitled to the same type and quality of free basic education.

Z-line degradation and phagocytosis of sarcomeric fragments in myonecrosis

1983 ◽  
Vol 41 ◽  
pp. 790-791
Author(s):  
Melinda L. Estes ◽  
Samuel M. Chou
Keyword(s):  
Vastus Lateralis ◽  
Inflammatory Myopathy ◽  
Muscle Disease ◽  
White Female ◽  
Inflammatory Cell Infiltrate ◽  
Limb Weakness ◽  
Muscle Diseases ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Right ◽  
Mononuclear Inflammatory Cell

Many muscle diseases show common pathological features although their etiology is different. In primary muscle diseases a characteristic finding is myofiber necrosis. The mechanism of myonecrosis is unknown. Polymyositis is a primary muscle disease characterized by acute and subacute degeneration as well as regeneration of muscle fibers coupled with an inflammatory infiltrate. We present a case of polymyositis with unusual ultrastructural features indicative of the basic pathogenetic process involved in myonecrosis.The patient is a 63-year-old white female with a one history of proximal limb weakness, weight loss and fatigue. Examination revealed mild proximal weakness and diminished deep tendon reflexes. Her creatine kinase was 1800 mU/ml (normal < 140 mU/ml) and electromyography was consistent with an inflammatory myopathy which was verified by light microscopy on biopsy muscle. Ultrastructural study of necrotizing myofiber, from the right vastus lateralis, showed: (1) degradation of the Z-lines with preservation of the adjacent Abands including M-lines and H-bands, (Fig. 1), (2) fracture of the sarcomeres at the I-bands with disappearance of the Z-lines, (Fig. 2), (3) fragmented sarcomeres without I-bands, engulfed by invading phagocytes, (Fig. 3, a & b ), and (4) mononuclear inflammatory cell infiltrate in the endomysium.

Popliteal artery thrombosis secondary to a tibial osteochondroma

VASA ◽  
2011 ◽  
Vol 40 (3) ◽  
pp. 251-255 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gruber-Szydlo ◽  
Poreba ◽  
Belowska-Bien ◽  
Derkacz ◽  
Badowski ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Case Report ◽  
Magnetic Resonance Angiography ◽  
Popliteal Artery ◽  
Doppler Ultrasonography ◽  
Histopathological Examination ◽  
Previous History ◽  
Plain Radiography ◽  
Artery Thrombosis ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Right

Popliteal artery thrombosis may present as a complication of an osteochondroma located in the vicinity of the knee joint. This is a case report of a 26-year-old man with symptoms of the right lower extremity ischaemia without a previous history of vascular disease or trauma. Plain radiography, magnetic resonance angiography and Doppler ultrasonography documented the presence of an osteochondrous structure of the proximal tibial metaphysis, which displaced and compressed the popliteal artery, causing its occlusion due to intraluminal thrombosis..The patient was operated and histopathological examination confirmed the diagnosis of osteochondroma.

Voices and Visions: Mind, Body and Affect in Medieval Writing

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Corinne Saunders
Keyword(s):  
Medical Humanities ◽  
Family Care ◽  
Literary Texts ◽  
Cultural Perspective ◽  
Historical Sources ◽  
Disease Treatment ◽  
History Of Disease ◽  
Health And Illness ◽  
History Of ◽  
Cultural Texts

A properly critical medical humanities is also a historically grounded medical humanities. Such historical grounding requires taking a long cultural perspective, going beyond traditional medical history – typically the history of disease, treatment and practice – to trace the origins and development of the ideas that underpin medicine in its broadest sense – ideas concerning the most fundamental aspects of human existence: health and illness, body and mind, gender and family, care and community. Historical sources can only go so far in illuminating such topics; we must also look to other cultural texts, and in particular literary texts, which, through their imaginative worlds, provide crucial insights into cultural and intellectual attitudes, experience and creativity. Reading from a critical medical humanities perspective requires not only cultural archaeology across a range of discourses, but also putting past and present into conversation, to discover continuities and contrasts with later perspectives. Medical humanities research is illuminated by cultural and literary studies, and also brings to them new ways of seeing; the relation is dynamic. This chapter explores the ways mind, body and affect are constructed and intersect in medieval thought and literature, with a particular focus on how voice-hearing and visionary experience are portrayed and understood.

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