Page 52 - Šolsko polje, XXXI, 2020, 3-4: Convention on the Rights of the Child: Educational Opportunities and Social Justice, eds. Zdenko Kodelja and Urška Štremfel
P. 52
šolsko polje, letnik xxxi, številka 3–4
of participative rights, ‘civil rights’ (privacy, information, freedom of
thought, conscience and religion, freedom of expression, right to receive
and impart information and ideas, freedom of association and peaceful
assembly); and c) as special Article 12 (the child has rights to express his/her
views freely in all matters affecting him/her, the views of the child being giv-
en due weight in accordance with the age and maturity of the child).
Participatory rights assume the image of the child different from
that offered by protection and provision rights: the child is no longer the
object but becomes the subject of the rights, actively involved in realising
these rights. The focus is on the child as an active human being perma-
nently involved in the process of constructing their own social reality.
Children are observed as autonomous personalities, subjects, participants
in social processes, not as being passively owned by the adults, the objects
of social control, and as social problems (Freeman, 1998). Children are
perceived as individuals, not as a collectivity, a group without characteris-
tics; which means that categories like age, gender, class, ethnicity, culture
and others have an important role to play in understanding childhood.
Observing the child’s rights as those that were traditionally observed as
adults’ rights, and announcing participation as one of the four basic prin-
ciples on which the CRC is based, means recognising the idea that child-
hood is a social phenomenon that children are active participants in pub-
lic life and are capable of participating in the recognition of their own
rights and the definition of their own best interest (James, 2009). The idea
of the child as a subject of rights leads to a reconsideration of those beliefs
which represent the firmest strongholds of the age-based discrimination
against children known as adultism, usually seen as the abuse of the power
that adults have over children (Flasher, 1978, according to: Liebel, 2014).
These beliefs are the following:
The child is a project for the future, an emerging being
This assumption builds on the idea of the incompetent, incomplete, im-
mature child who is in the process of developing and thus incapable of
any form of participation in the decision-making process. The assess-
ment of the child’s competencies for participation and adults’ conclusion
that children are not competent is frequently based o comparisons of the
child’s competencies with an ‘ideal adult’ who is always mature, rational,
competent and autonomous. The list of adults’ competencies makes high
demands even on the adults, not to mention the child. Even when the
competencies of a child are not compared with adult competencies, there
is a tendency to assess them according to adult standards rather than ac-
cording to what children really can do. The adults’ standards and their
50
of participative rights, ‘civil rights’ (privacy, information, freedom of
thought, conscience and religion, freedom of expression, right to receive
and impart information and ideas, freedom of association and peaceful
assembly); and c) as special Article 12 (the child has rights to express his/her
views freely in all matters affecting him/her, the views of the child being giv-
en due weight in accordance with the age and maturity of the child).
Participatory rights assume the image of the child different from
that offered by protection and provision rights: the child is no longer the
object but becomes the subject of the rights, actively involved in realising
these rights. The focus is on the child as an active human being perma-
nently involved in the process of constructing their own social reality.
Children are observed as autonomous personalities, subjects, participants
in social processes, not as being passively owned by the adults, the objects
of social control, and as social problems (Freeman, 1998). Children are
perceived as individuals, not as a collectivity, a group without characteris-
tics; which means that categories like age, gender, class, ethnicity, culture
and others have an important role to play in understanding childhood.
Observing the child’s rights as those that were traditionally observed as
adults’ rights, and announcing participation as one of the four basic prin-
ciples on which the CRC is based, means recognising the idea that child-
hood is a social phenomenon that children are active participants in pub-
lic life and are capable of participating in the recognition of their own
rights and the definition of their own best interest (James, 2009). The idea
of the child as a subject of rights leads to a reconsideration of those beliefs
which represent the firmest strongholds of the age-based discrimination
against children known as adultism, usually seen as the abuse of the power
that adults have over children (Flasher, 1978, according to: Liebel, 2014).
These beliefs are the following:
The child is a project for the future, an emerging being
This assumption builds on the idea of the incompetent, incomplete, im-
mature child who is in the process of developing and thus incapable of
any form of participation in the decision-making process. The assess-
ment of the child’s competencies for participation and adults’ conclusion
that children are not competent is frequently based o comparisons of the
child’s competencies with an ‘ideal adult’ who is always mature, rational,
competent and autonomous. The list of adults’ competencies makes high
demands even on the adults, not to mention the child. Even when the
competencies of a child are not compared with adult competencies, there
is a tendency to assess them according to adult standards rather than ac-
cording to what children really can do. The adults’ standards and their
50
