Revisiting the Three ‘R’s in Order to Realize Children’s Educational Rights Relationships, Resources, and Redress

Education rights are many and diverse, and there is a rich body of work to date that has attempted to capture them in a series of models and conceptualizations. The major challenge in the context of education and human rights does not, however, concern understanding what they are or indeed why they are necessary. Rather, it lies in the “doing” of rights—their realization. Thus, it is not the core content of education rights that presents the most difficult obstacle to realization, but the barriers that obstruct their implementation. This chapter considers the realization of education rights using a new typology based on three themes: relationships, resources, and redress.

Taking Part, Joining in, and Being Heard?

This chapter explores how Article 12 and the voice of the child are implemented. The chapter does so by making specific reference to ways in which children express themselves within two different English primary schools. The chapter introduces Article 12 as a commitment to giving due attention to children’s experiences. Using data vignettes, the chapter illustrates the value of paying attention to children by focusing on the micro moments of everyday school life. The chapter argues that children’s participation is necessarily political, suggesting that participation must be read as such and demonstrating how it is often subsumed within powerful dominant schooling discourses of conformity within different governmental climates that are regarded as beyond politics. The chapter identifies limited possibilities for transformation in the study’s research sites, discussed in terms of children achieving agency and enacting their own subjectivities. This is apparent even within the less coercive ethos of a school participating in the Rights Respecting Schools Initiative (UNICEF). The chapter argues that in order to open up possible transformational participatory spaces, adults in schools need to require opportunities to reflect together on the tensions within their own educational contexts and between supporting children’s participation and their conformity to wider schooling discourses. The chapter suggests that the provision of such opportunities will help to keep a focus on listening to children in line with the ambitions of Article 12.

The Health Rights of Children

Article 24 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) recognizes the child’s right to health and health care. Despite its importance, surprisingly little international advocacy focuses exclusively on child’s health. The Committee on the Rights of the Child has addressed health and health care issues in many of its General Comments, but it has been surprisingly slow to adopt a General Comment dedicated to Article 24. There has also been an apparent disconnect between children’s rights law and the global development agenda. While the UN Sustainable Development Goals address many of children’s specific health needs, they do not mention the CRC and are not framed in rights terms. Although progress continues in advancing Agenda 2030, it is not clear whether greater progress would have been possible were these goals expressed as a matter of children’s rights. Overall, this process appears to be a missed opportunity to advance the child’s rights to health.

Citizenship and Rights of Children

Citizenship plays a larger and more critical role in the life of children than it should. Children who lack citizenship are incredibly vulnerable to exploitation. In the migration context, a child’s citizenship can be largely determinative of where and with whom a child lives. Despite a modern children’s rights framework that recognizes the humanity and autonomy of children, citizenship and nationality still form an integral part of a child’s identity and play a critical role in a child’s development. It has a pervasive impact in securing other rights for children and can be a central factor in a child’s cultural and linguistic background, education, economic and environment exposures, and virtually all aspects of a child’s daily life. This chapter examines children’s right to citizenship and explores the ongoing crisis of statelessness that undermines these rights. It reviews the role that citizenship plays in both voluntary and forced migration of children, child-specific protections found in both universal and regional human rights frameworks, and the role of children’s citizenship in promoting family unity.

The Best Interests of the Child

The best interests of the child principle is considered a pillar of children’s rights law and, according to the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), is to be a primary consideration in all actions concerning children. Yet best interests is an elusive concept and principle that has no single authoritative definition or description. Internationally and domestically relevant in such diverse areas as family law, adoption, migration, and socioeconomic policymaking, the best interests principle requires flexibility and is best served by a case-by-case approach, as has been recognized by the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child and the European Court of Human Rights. This chapter analyzes relevant international case law and suggests the use of a number of safeguards to prevent such requisite flexibility from presenting a danger of paternalism, bias, or misuse.

Feminist Legal Theory and Children’s Rights

This chapter surveys the field of feminist legal theory (FLT) as a discipline in conversation, and in some ways allied, with children’s rights. After briefly reviewing the development of feminist legal theory, the chapter explores relevant debates among feminists and then discusses several feminist legal critiques and methods of relevance to children’s rights. The chapter ends by considering ways in which feminist legal theory and children’s rights are in conversation and by exploring the potential for newer variants of feminist legal theory to suggest new directions in children’s rights strategies.

The Interrelated and Interdependent Nature of Children’s Rights

The chapter analyses children’s human rights as universal norms and standards incorporated in the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) that are relevant in diverse national contexts. Discussing national experiences and the quasi-jurisprudence of treaty bodies, the chapter argues that understanding the interrelated nature of the different groups of rights in the CRC is essential for effective implementation of these rights. It is suggested that the concept of the indivisibility of human rights and the global agenda of sustainable development reinforce the need for this approach. The chapter also discusses the interdependence, compatibility, and conflict between children’s rights and the human rights of other groups, such as parents, women, and a community with which a child connects as he or she grows to adulthood. The chapter argues that incorporating children’s rights in national constitutions, rather than ad hoc legislation, encourages this holistic approach to implementing children’s rights.

Taking Children’s Human Rights Seriously

Despite the development of the children’s rights movement, human rights scholarship continues to overlook the rights of children. Even those like Ronald Dworkin, who proclaim the need to take rights seriously, are curiously silent, even ambivalent, when it comes to children. This inattention often forces advocates of children’s rights to the margins of human rights scholarship. In the few places where serious philosophical discussion of children’s rights does take place, the analysis intends to diminish the value of rights for children. These critics are not malevolent, and typically want what is best for children, but they do not think it can be accomplished through a children’s rights agenda. This chapter lays out a persuasive argument for a children’s rights agenda, or, for taking children’s rights seriously. Drawing from philosophy, history, literature, popular media, and of course the law, this chapter argues against the conventional deficit view underlying most arguments against the recognition of children’s rights and makes a case for the importance of children’s rights where rights are the currency in use.

Working Toward Recognition of the Rights of Migrant and Refugee Children

This chapter addresses the rights of migrant and refugee children who increasingly are forced into migration, either alone or with members of their family, due to violence, civil war, poverty, economic degradation, and other often-intersecting factors. While addressing the rights and obligations set forth in the Convention on the Rights of the Child and other international and regional human rights instruments, the chapter further seeks to bring attention to the complexity and fluidity of migration and the motives that spurn migration; the role of family in serving the child’s best interests; and the scope of considerations that must be accounted for in seeking to ensure that the next generation of immigrants is positioned to thrive.

Children with Disabilities: Achievements, Prospects, and Challenges Ahead

Children with disabilities are among the most vulnerable groups in the world—and a children’s rights approach is key for reversing historical wrongs and for promoting an inclusive future. To establish this argument, this chapter explores the state of affairs and legal protections for upholding the rights of children with disabilities. It critically examines major developments in the international framework that pertain to the rights of children with disabilities, and it considers some of the prime achievements—and challenges—that arise in the implementation of a child-friendly disability rights agenda. The chapter then zooms in on two particularly salient issues for children with disabilities, namely, inclusive education and deinstitutionalization, and highlights the successes and challenges ahead. The final section provides some concluding thoughts about the present and the prospect of upholding the human rights of children with disabilities.