Keywords

Introduction

This chapter is concerned with the intersection of the right to education through UNCRC Article 29 (United Nations, 1989) with traditions of education and hence with thinking through some of the implications of translating this legal text into the specific educational contexts that impact upon the lives of children and young people at the present time. As such, the direction of travel accords with recent work in the field of children’s rights that calls for approaches that are both more critical (Quennerstedt, 2013; Reynaert et al., 2012) and more theoretically adventurous (I’Anson, 2016; I’Anson et al., 2017; Holzscheiter et al., 2019). This critical and theory-informed approach necessarily extends to thinking about the kinds of education that are both implied and enacted – in the name of the UNCRC – within particular settings. Here, a case study of the translation of children’s rights within the context of the Scottish education system will ground the discussion and help surface assumptions that might otherwise remain hidden. The chapter concludes with some observations concerning difficulties faced in constructing a universal appeal to education, and, in the light of this, the importance of attending to ways of negotiating difference.

Article 29: The Aims of Education

On first reading, Article 29 appears relatively uncontentious: all children are to be accorded a right to an education that promotes:

  1. (i)

    the holistic development of the full potential of the child (Article 29.1a), including development of respect for human rights (29.1b),

  2. (ii)

    an enhanced sense of identity and affiliation (29.1c), and

  3. (iii)

    his or her socialization and interaction with others (29.1d) and

  4. (iv)

    with the environment (29.1e) (taken from General Comment No. 1: The Aims of Education (Article 29), United Nations (2001))

However, it is not immediately clear to which distinctive tradition of education this makes appeal. In this connection, it is helpful to recall that Biesta (2011; Stoltz & Biesta, 2018) identifies a number of distinct (western) traditions of education, each holding fundamentally different – and incommensurable – assumptions about what “education” consists in. These traditions include the dominant Anglo-American approach in which education is regarded as not being a distinct discipline in itself, but as constituted by, and reliant upon, other disciplines such as psychology, philosophy, history, and sociology. Such an understanding is classically set out in the writings of Hirst (1966). This understanding is so deeply rooted within Anglo-American contexts that the very idea that education might be considered a discipline in its own right, with its own characteristic matters of concern and ways of going on is, for many, quite unthinkable. But for those within continental contexts, where traditions of educational inquiry such as Bildung and Erziehung have a long history, the idea of education as a discipline in its own right is not without plausibility.

So to which characterisation of education does Article 29 appeal? Whilst the concept of ‘Education’ appears to be unproblematic, and therefore presuming a shared matter of concern, the subsequent principles that are laid out might nevertheless appear to cut across extant traditions. Thus dimensions (i) and (ii) of Article 29 might, on the face of it, appear to align with the continental tradition of Bildung, given their emphasis on self-formation; for, as Hu (2015, p. 17) has observed, this tradition:

emphasizes a process of holistic growth, self-realization of the individual as an entirety, freedom, and self-understanding as well as a sense of social responsibility, and which puts the development of the individual’s unique potential and self at the centre of educational processes.

However, the insistence in (i) upon ‘including development of respect for rights’ might be considered as an instrumental concern that lies outside the specific resources of Bildung per se. Dimension (iii) with its explicit concern with socialisation might fit with an Anglo-American multi-disciplinary approach in which the sociology of education has a foundational role. If the educational provenance of Article 29 remains somewhat unclear within the text of the article itself, its subsequent elaboration within the General Comment issued in 2001 (hereafter, GC), draws out this article’s implications far more definitely. It is to a consideration of this that we now turn.

The General Comment (United Nations, 2001) outlines the contours for a rights-inflected account of education that claims to draw its key principles from a reading across the corpus of rights (United Nations, 2001, §6). The text foregrounds a “holistic” (§12) “child-centred” education (§9), that is “balanced” and in which children themselves “bridge” tensions (United Nations, 2001, §4). Such metaphors do considerable rhetorical work in terms of holding together the narrative advanced, but the account presented is clearly ambitious – even quite radical – in scope, claiming its promotion of values, policies and ethos apply “not only within schools and universities but also within the broader community” (United Nations, 2001, §19). Nor does the ensuing narrative only hover at an abstract level of principle; the promotion of a curriculum that is relevant to a child’s multiple contexts requires the development of requisite ‘tools’ that afford the possibility of:

  • critical thinking,

  • ethical capacities (that enable the taking on of responsibility, resolution of disputes in non-violent ways, and to act sustainably), and

  • confidence in making significant life decisions. (United Nations, 2001, §7, §9, §13).

This manifests a concern to ground the values and principles enunciated earlier. In like manner, the meaning of the term ‘discrimination’, for example, is not left hanging, but is carefully differentiated into a number of specific forms that this can take, such as gender inequality, illness, racism, and hostility to other forms of difference (United Nations, 2001, §10–11). The significance of a practice orientation to children’s rights is also drawn out (United Nations, 2001, §15).

The net effect of this elaboration of rights principles and values would appear to be an alignment with, or at least an affinity for, child-centred discourses of progressive education, such as those associated with Pestalozzi and Froebel (Darling, 1994), albeit one legitimised through appear to children’s rights principles. The GC recognises that such an account of education represents an explicit challenge to existing grammars of schooling (United Nations, 2001, §18). However, if the UNCRC had previously been characterised as presenting a “peculiar combination of bold intent and potential toothlessness”, as Lee (1999, p. 457) once put it, within the GC there are unequivocal steps taken to try and ensure this approach to education has critical and universal traction. Thus a considerable amount of space is given over to elaborating measures through which States parties might instantiate the values, principles and practices outlined, with clear expectations with regard to reporting and accountability, including steps to be taken when things go awry (§20–28). And so, whilst the GC acknowledges that the aims and values of education are set out in “quite general terms and their implications are potentially very wide ranging” (§17) there is, nevertheless, a clear expectation that the translation and formal incorporation into States parties’ respective legislative, administrative and education policies will take place “at all levels”. Just as the UNCRC might be seen as promoting an understanding of childhood that has itself become constitutive, governing understandings of what are, and are not, deemed to be appropriate ways of being a child (Holzscheiter et al., 2019) so, too, is this the case in regard to education. In a parallel way, in Article 29, as elaborated in the GC, the UNCRC appears to be promoting its own distinctive form of education to which States parties are accountable.

The Issue of Translation

Given that Article 29 presents a distinctive vision of education, along with quite detailed expectations regarding its implementation, how, in practice, do States parties enact these requirements? Here, it is necessary to say a few words about the work of translation, especially given the significance that is attached within the GC of Article 29 to a series of technologies through which this understanding of education is to gain presence within national law, policy and professional guidance. Having outlined a theoretical approach to translation, it then becomes possible to focus more specifically upon how Article 29 is translated within a specific educational context: that of Scotland.

The metaphor of translation is useful in foregrounding the kinds of practices and mediations involved in this work. Translation derives from the Latin trans-latio, which means to “lift across, move, transfer” (Readings, 1992, p. 183). In the process of transfer change takes place, and identifying the specific stages involved in this work of bridging make it possible to mark both the different kinds of translations that are performed and the kinds of assumptions that are in play.

Theoretically, such an approach draws upon work associated with socio-material approaches such as Actor Network Theory (ANT) and in particular upon the work of Bruno Latour. In his early work, Latour noticed that scientists’ own accounts of their work tends to play down – and to overlook – many of the routine material activities that actually go on in the laboratory as integral to scientific practice. His study with Woolgar, Laboratory Life, provided an empirical description of scientists’ work that was quite ground-breaking at the time with its focus upon what scientists actually do (Latour & Woolgar, 1979). An especially clear illustration of the value of such an approach can be found in Latour’s (1999) subsequent study where he accompanied a variety of scientists investigating the edge of an Amazon rainforest. Here, Latour tracked the ways in which a material substance, such as soil, via various tests and associations, became translated into data, which, in turn, informed the development of concepts that eventually became academic texts. These academic papers were then circulated, engaged with, and taken up by readers considerably removed from the actual circumstances of their initial production. A key insight in this study was that this work necessarily involved a series of translations; at each stage of translation, something was gained in terms of generalisability, but something too was lost in terms of the specificity of location and materiality. Latour also noticed that, as each stage in this process was achieved, the successive translations that were a condition of its possibility, tend to become invisible. Noticing the translations that cumulatively enable a particular achievement is, therefore, quite difficult after the event.

A parallel approach to the socio-material translations noted by Latour, can be helpful in identifying the various translations through which a legal text, such as an article of the UNCRC, must pass if it is to inform actual situations of intergenerational practice. In an earlier paper I’Anson et al. (2017) argued that it is important to acknowledge an international economy of translation in relation to children’s rights. Figure 2.1 (below) identifies no fewer than five (5) such points of translation:

Fig. 2.1
figure 1

The international economy of rights. (From I’Anson et al., 2017, p. 59)

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Table 2.1 (below) summarises each point of translation, together with a description of the relevant section (§) in the GC (United Nations, 2001):

Table 2.1 Summary of Points of Translation within the International Economy of Rights, with connections to the United Nations Article 29 General Comment
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Just as in the scientific studies recounted above, transformation takes place at each of these points of translation. At each point, once a specific translation has been achieved, the work involved tends to become invisible and forgotten. Consequently, practitioners seeking to enact a particular policy prescription or performance indicator that is the outcome of work by policy makers to mediate a legal text to their situation of practice, will tend to regard their actions as ‘simply doing rights’ rather than as the outcome of one particular translation that might have been performed differently. In one sense, the international economy of rights enacts translations in a reverse order from that described by Latour in so far as the process here is from a pre-given text to its embodiment within actual situations of practice. This, as we will see, creates certain tensions with regard to negotiating between the demands of Article 29 and diverse cultural contexts.Footnote 1 Having outlined an approach to understanding the work of translation, which is necessarily involved in mediating children’s rights into practice, we now consider an empirical case study of this translation work within Scotland.

Case Study: Translating Rights Within Educational Contexts in Scotland

Scotland is an interesting case study given its aspiration to have an education system that is thoroughly rights informed. Indeed, according to the Scottish Government’s (2019, p. 5) Consultation on Children’s Rights:

We believe that delivering the rights of children and young people as enshrined in the UNCRC is fundamental to making children’s rights real and Scotland the best place in the world to grow up.

How, in practice, does this ambition translate into the field of education? In recent years one discourse in particular has been foregrounded within the Scottish education policy context, where the approach taken to children’s rights has become inseparable from that taken with respect to children’s health and wellbeing.Footnote 2 Indeed, this pairing of children’s rights with their health and wellbeing is a key feature of the “landmark” legislation passed by the Scottish Parliament in 2014 – the Children and Young People (Scotland) Act 2014 (CYPA). This effectively puts much of the “Getting it Right for Every Child” (GIRFEC) initiative onto a legal footing. GIRFEC identifies eight indicators of wellbeing, and these are often summarised under the acronym SHANARRI, that stands for – Safe, Healthy, Achieving, Nurtured, Active, Respected, Responsible and Included. An influential publication that provides guidance for practitioners describes GIRFEC as the “bedrock” for all children’s services (Scottish Government, 2012, p. 6). A wide range of curricular initiatives draw upon this framing, and it is particularly evident in recent national curriculum policy such as Building the Ambition: National Practice Guidance on Early Learning and Childcare (Scottish Government, 2014). One of the reported advantages of the GIRFEC approach to realising the government’s obligations has been the possibility of a common language between different professionals working with children and young people, such as teachers and social workers.

Notwithstanding these advantages, Tisdall (2015, p. 807) contends that children’s rights and children’s wellbeing “differ conceptually, methodologically and politically” and should not, therefore, be regarded as equivalent discourses. Such an acknowledgement would suggest that rather than simply conflating the different genealogies of wellbeing and rights it is necessary to acknowledge these differences and present them as different – rather than unified – discourses. It might be objected, however, that, despite such differences, the discourse associated with GIRFEC does effectively address what are sometimes referred to as the “3Ps”: rights concerned with provision, protection, and participation (Quennerstedt, 2010). The difficulty with this position is that it neglects the ways in which these are realised in practice; it is noteworthy, for example, that the GIRFEC discourse, beyond providing information to children about the SHANARRI indicators, tends to privilege a professional’s judgement as to whether or not a particular concern might be raised. It is not primarily concerned with educational or pedagogic issues, such as how children might come to acquire the critical and ethical tools identified in GC §7, 9 (United Nations, 2001) discussed above. Moreover, the strong association of children’s rights with a health and wellbeing discourse in Scotland also runs the risk that other, specifically educational, imperatives become side-lined (I’Anson, 2018). And so, whilst acknowledging the seriousness with which Scotland has foregrounded children’s health and wellbeing in recent legislation and policy, it is necessary to ask critical questions as to the extent to which such measures actually address a children’s rights agenda and, more precisely, State parties’ specific educational obligations as set out in Article 29, GC. Here, the use of an educational heuristic may be useful in further pinpointing some of the issues at stake.

In this connection, it is worth recalling that education derives from the Latin ēducēre, which means, quite literally, “to lead out” (Masschelein, 2006, 2010a, b); from this root, it then becomes possible to trace a number of significant lines along which a distinctively educational approach might be articulated. One such educational heuristic characterises education as consisting in three elements: the critical, experimental and ethical elements, respectively (I’Anson & Jasper, 2017). Each element is characterised in the following terms; firstly, the critical element, aims to situate knowledge within the discursive and material conditions of its production. This problematises particular claims in relation to knowledge where this “restrict[s] or limit possibilities of insight, comparison and considered practice” (I’Anson & Jasper, 2017, p. 145). Secondly, the experimental element opens up inquiry to empirical investigation, so as to explore the socio-material effects that “comprise relations between entities and practices” (I’Anson & Jasper, 2017, p. 143). Finally, the ethical element is concerned with the complex relational implications and responsibilities “in thinking through the implications of educational practice” (I’Anson & Jasper, 2017, p. 143). Although distinct, each of these three elements is, in practice, mutually constitutive and so each is a necessary dimension of education. Within these terms, therefore, a distinctively educational translation of children’s rights will seek to develop policies and pedagogies that actively keep in play the critical, experimental and ethical elements. Conversely, a translation that neglects one or more of these elements would, within these terms, be regarded as lacking in these respects. Such a heuristic has affinities with the principles advocated in the GC in so far as this acknowledges the specific tools and pedagogic practices necessary if this “leading out” is to be meaningfully accomplished by children. By the same token, it becomes possible to identify and locate possible barriers to education being realised, where pedagogies are limited in both scope and challenge.

It is here that one might wish to raise a series of critical questions concerning the educational restrictions that a translation of a children’s rights agenda within a health and wellbeing framing brings in its train. With such an approach, it might be argued, the ethical element is foregrounded at the expense of the other two educational elements: the capacities for critique and experimentation. Within these terms, we might wish to ask how, for example, a child or young person might acquire critical literacy practices or be afforded opportunities for trying things out empirically so as to learn from such experiences. Important though a health and wellbeing translation is, it is clear that this does not fully encompass the educational requirements of Article 29: whilst the GIRFEC approach addresses the ethical element, an exclusive focus upon health and wellbeing may lead to a forgetfulness of the critical and experimental elements of education. Consequently, such a translation may neglect the kinds of critical and experimental capacities that the intersection between education and children’s rights might otherwise engender.

Within the Scottish educational context, therefore, significant steps have been taken as regards the translation of a children’s rights agenda within the terms of an ethics of care, but wider questions remain vis-à-vis ways in which broader educational principles, values and practices might be realised.

The foregrounding of a dynamic understanding of the three elements of education also opens up questions as to the role that specific subjects might play in relation to a broader rights-informed education, especially given the prominence attached to sustainability in the GC (United Nations, 2001). This is to raise a series of educational questions as to the kinds of knowledges and practices that are implicated in thinking more fully about the requirements of Article 29. A renewed concern with media literacy, for instance, might be considered especially vital at a time of “fake news”, when politicians can peddle false statistics on the side of a bus with impunity, and the media reiterates negative and one-sided representations of “Islam” on a daily basis. Likewise, a more extended educational discussion of rights might include within its purview some of the complex ethical issues raised by acts of cultural appropriation (Young & Brunk, 2012).

The implications of engaging the right to education are therefore far-reaching indeed, with ramifications that cut across multiple subject areas, activities and environs. This raises a challenge to many settled areas of practice, for the GC §18 (United Nations, 2001) makes it clear that the simple adaptation of existing approaches is insufficient:

Approaches which do no more than seek to superimpose the aims and values of the article on the existing system without encouraging any deeper changes are clearly inadequate.

The pedagogical implications of this potentially extend to a questioning of many routine teaching activities – that are so taken for granted that they are all but hidden. John Law (2009) once remarked that, as a rule of thumb, to the extent that something is invisible, it is probably doing quite a lot of work in holding a particular state of affairs in place. A good example of this is the practice of lesson planning – which is as ubiquitous as it is consequential. As Allwright (2003), observes, lesson planning approaches that students on Initial Teacher Education (ITE) programs are inducted into, tend to have a behaviourist genealogy and a teacher-centred orientation. If a children’s rights-based approach is subsequently introduced, this is typically grafted upon this already habitual approach to lesson design. The effect of this is that practices to elicit young peoples’ feedback can appear somewhat tokenistic and peripheral to the main lesson aims that have already been determined by the teacher. Rather than beginning with rights-informed questions that might foreground consultation and the promotion of children’s capacities to meaningfully engage in pedagogical issues, a foundational practice keeps traditional teacher-centric approaches in play. This is just one issue that is illustrative of the kinds of pedagogical re-thinking that the intersection of children’s rights and education might provoke.

Of course, the question then emerges as to how a children’s rights-based approach is evaluated: at what point is a professional’s educational responsibility to children discharged, how is this determined, and by who? At the present time, professional codes of conduct typically resolve such questions in terms of lists of performance indicators that an individual professional is expected to evidence in particular ways.Footnote 3 Whether this issues in a more radical educational questioning (in terms of, for example, the three elements of education), and whether this issues in a preparedness to reconceive the purposes of education in the light of Article 29, is an open question.

Decolonising Article 29: Towards a New Ecology?

A critical reading might question the extent to which the discussion of education hitherto is couched primarily in terms of western traditions – derived from minority world contexts – and also note that the direction of policy travel within the existing “international economy of rights” tends to be one way: from a prescribed and authorised text to its translation into multiple contexts of intergenerational practice – in majority world contexts. The acknowledgement that majority world contexts may instantiate different values and relational priorities that are in tension with the promotion of autonomy and agency that tend to characterise western approaches, has potentially far–reaching repercussions in relation to rights (Tisdall & Punch, 2012). In this connection, it is noteworthy that Schweisfurth’s (2011) study of 72 projects concerned with instituting learner-centred education in contexts with different cultural logics identified significant and consistent failures in the translation of this approach to education, with “cultural mismatch” being recognised as one of the main factors. A greater sensitivity to power relations, broader expectations and a more nuanced approach to cultural translations are desirable in the light of this (Thomson, 2013). In moving forward, perhaps a different understanding of governance is also necessary in which the critical issue is sustained engagement with educational matters of concern rather than alignment with a pre-given ordering. This is to gesture towards an ecology of rights, in which there is scope for feedback (and forward) from situated and embodied practice within particular locales. In this connection, the identification of “gaps” in understanding is significant as a potential resource for understanding difference: not for these to be “closed” but as a means for creating and sustaining conversation across this divide. Such an approach is well articulated by Jullien (2014) in his work that is specifically concerned with creating dialogue between western and Chinese traditions. Once a gap in understandings has been identified this becomes a site from which another’s point of view can be approached. This has the advantage that not only does this promote a hospitality to difference, but such practice can also enable a surfacing of hitherto unknown aspects of one’s own culture, since this is approached from another’s vantage point. Whilst a detailed consideration of possible ways of re-imaging the kinds of dialogue that a children’s rights approach to education might promote lies beyond the scope of this particular chapter, the identification of critical tensions and possibilities is nevertheless opened up from a consideration of the Scottish case study that has been our focus here.

Conclusion

There is an inherent ambiguity in the approach taken to education within the UNCRC. As we have seen, Article 29 is not specifically aligned with any one tradition of education, although the approach described in the GC might appear to have close affinities with certain forms of progressive education. The position taken is to ground these principles, values and practices in a reading drawn from across the articles of the UNCRC itself. Of course, were Article 29 to specify which “education” it was appealing to, it would, perhaps rightly, be charged with a kind of cultural imperialism – an educational colonisation – in so far as a specific disciplinary tradition of education was to be imposed upon areas where other cultural logics and values obtain. On the other hand, the refusal to specify (and to articulate a position from) a specific tradition of education, inevitably results in difficulties in ascertaining the extent to which a given translation addresses specifically educational principles, values and practices. Given that Article 29’s grounding is in other-than-educational principles, the approach taken to education is ultimately instrumental and performative, which issues in a centre to periphery approach to governance. As the case study of Scotland’s response to Article 29 demonstrates, the translations involved are both complex and educationally demanding. It can be difficult, in practice, to ascertain the extent to which a serious concern with children’s health and wellbeing is promoted in ways that are educational – and the extent to which a fully educational agenda exceeds these terms.

Few would dispute that the articulation of a right to education, for all children and young people, in all circumstances, might appropriately be characterised as bold. And yet, as the analysis undertaken in this chapter might suggest, the very possibility of articulating such a right to education is beset with multiple challenges regarding what such an education might consist in, the translations to which this gives rise, and the ways in which such a call might acknowledge and respect cultural difference. To this extent, the right to education, as articulated in Article 29 and in its ensuing GC, might also be characterised as impossible – impossible, that is, not in the sense that this cannot be attained, but in the sense that its realisation is always yet to come, to be always worked out anew in as yet new and unforeseen circumstances. It is in this sense, therefore, that the right to education is necessarily impossible. But – in so far as this call is in the name of education – this leading out will involve raising critical, experimental and ethical questions and part of the challenge is that this appeal is unlimited. In its effort to ensure that Article 29 is taken up, the GC offers detailed expectations in terms of accountability and these tend toward a centre-periphery account of governance, as we have seen. Given the ethical and empirical difficulties to which this gives rise, it may be more appropriate instead to work with the metaphor of counterpoint rather than that of alignment. Such an openness would encourage mutual exchange regarding significant matters of educational concern in a manner which, according to Brown (2005, p. 74), “complicates a single or dominant theme through the addition of contrasting themes or forces”. To this extent, counterpoint:

promotes an anti hegemonic sensibility and requires a modest and carefully styled embrace of multiplicity in which contrasting elements, featured simultaneously, do not simply war, harmonize, blend, or compete but rather bring out complexity that cannot emerge through a monolithic or single melody.

It is to be hoped that some such “carefully styled embrace of multiplicity” may offer productive ways of engaging the many refractions of Article 29, in ways that promote new forms of dialogue about educational matters of concern.