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This chapter looks at some ‘loose ends’. That notion often implies what has been overlooked erroneously (or deliberately). In fact nothing substantial has been forgotten intentionally. Nonetheless, in an attempt to balance other chapters without taking diversionary routes to explain the relevance of some issues, these have been kept back as examples of matters that are very germane. They do not deal categorically with citizenship but have great bearing on how we think of it. Children’s, thus human, rights are at the core of this entire work. The first issue looked at here is how there is both a global view and a regional or continental view that are human rights instruments but that are designed to fit more appropriately, albeit it not perfectly, into their own setting.

The African Children’s Charter and European Convention on the Exercise of Children’s Rights

The African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child (ACRWC), sometimes known as the African Children’s Charter (ACC) was adopted by the Organisation for African Unity in 1990. It entered into force on November 29, 1999. By February 2009, only 3 of the 53 countries in Africa had not signed the ACRWC (see Appendix II) and it had been ratified by 45, whereby some countries which ratified did not sign and others have signed but not ratified. It was the first regional treaty on children’s rights. How it differs from the CRC is in that member states of the African Union believed the CRC missed important socio-cultural and economic issues particular to Africa. Some states which are still non-signatories are also gross violators of human rights generally. These include the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic, Somalia and Sudan. Violations include the recruitment of child labour, child soldiers, child trafficking, drug abuse, early childhood marriage, harmful cultural practices like female genital mutilation and male child preference and sexual exploitation.

Emphasis in the ACRWC is on African cultural values and experience when dealing with the rights of the child in instances that challenge traditional African views. Those often conflict with the CRC in areas such as early child marriage, parental rights and obligations towards children and those born out of wedlock. Many African campaigners felt that specifically saying that the CRC is higher than customs, traditions, culture or religious practice did not correspond with rights, duties and obligations in the ACRWC. It also has a clearer definition of the child as every human being aged less than 18 years. Article 1 CRC allows for exceptions, Article 2 ACRWC does not. It also tackled particular African issues affecting children such as the abolition of apartheid and similar systems. Now that apartheid is over, the same provision applies for children living under regimes practicing ethnic, religious or other forms of discrimination. It protects expectant mothers and those with infants and young children in prisons, allows girls the right of return to school after childbirth, prohibits marriage or betrothal of children, promotes constructive action for girls’ education and makes special reference to care of the child by extended families. It also prohibits the use of children as beggars, recruitment of children into the armed forces or armed conflict, protects internally displaced and refugee children, disabled children and encourages state parties to provide support for parents in ‘times of need’.

Unlike the CRC there is a means by which children can petition the ACRWC’s Committee of Experts regarding infringements of their rights (Articles 44 and 45). Thus its nature is both very complementary to and contrasts with the CRC. Moreover, it illustrates a quite different concept of personhood that suggests a very different approach to citizenship to that which emerges out of most other human rights documents. Those are usually very distinctly European conceptually. Articles 12, 13, 14 and 16 express some views such as freedom of expression and religion or a view of privacy that is essentially alien to societies that do not understand a concept of personalised private spheres (see also ENDA editions 2001:21–89).

However, Europe also has a vision that projects a European notion of childhood and children’s rights through the European Convention on the Exercise of Children’s Rights (ECECR) (see Appendix III) that was adopted by the Council of Europe in 1995 and entered into force on 1 July 2000. Thus far 28 have signed the convention and 17 have ratified out of 48 countries.

Each ratifying country is required to specify at least three types of family proceedings before judicial authorities to which the Convention will apply which include care procedures and removal and restriction of parental responsibilities. It is, thus, very different to the ACRWC and more concerned with collecting and offering information on the exercise of children’s rights, obtaining the views of children and raising awareness about their rights. Everything relates to their guardianship and representation in all cases or legal acts concerning them or their property. In essence it is more about families than the rights of individual children as per the CRC. It also goes a long way toward advocating a uniformity of European approaches to looked after children without giving them the degree of participation the CRC describes. It places a very different emphasis on children’s needs rather than on their active role as citizens within society more broadly. It does not go as far as the CRC in any respect and also fails to thoroughly address children themselves as those who bear rights that are safeguarded by adults. Surprisingly, a number of countries where children’s rights are well established such as Denmark, the Netherlands, Switzerland and the United Kingdom have neither signed nor ratified the ECECR.

The Influence of Religion

It is not only continental and regional notions of what children are. Their status and such issues as protection and provision for them can also define them. In states that are theocratic or very much influenced by religion there are other questions arising that influence any move toward a universal notion of the child citizen. Savitri Goonesekere (Ali et al. 2007:16) has the following to say about the influence of Islam:

Legislative reform takes the form of reviewing old laws or enacting new ones. Participation rights are addressed incidentally in this context, as when laws of evidence and procedure are modified so as to facilitate children’s access to justice and protect child witnesses and victims. (…)The age of majority is often addressed as a topic for reform because ‘protection’ requires identification of children by an appropriate age cohort. Law reforms do not in general adopt a holistic approach to definition of childhood in terms of the CRC’s overarching concept of child rights. Inconsistencies in the definition of childhood for varying purposes remain untouched, even when legislation clarifies an age of majority.

Family law and personal status is also an area that has been addressed in law reform. (…) There is in general a reluctance to address (…) citizenship (…) for law reform. A few countries in Islamic jurisdictions and mixed legal systems have reviewed the approach to passport laws, citizenship and visas from the perspective of women’s and children’s rights. The plural legal systems and Islamic law studies show how women’s rights and issues of discrimination on the basis of gender have been addressed to only a limited extent in law reform. We have noted that both women and children were denied legal rights in all four legal traditions. Despite the changes in the law that have occurred over time, some reform on women’s rights continues to interface with reforms on child law. This is seen in the area of criminal laws on sexual exploitation and trafficking, domestic violence, harmful customary practices, citizenship and immigration, HIV/AIDS, guardianship and custody and forced marriage.

The reform initiatives on women’s rights and children’s rights have been pursued invariably as parallel projects and not on the basis of connected approaches to realizing the standards of both CEDAW and the CRC. (…) The plural mixed legal system study shows that law reform has not touched a range of discriminatory colonial and customary laws.

Whilst this looks specifically at Islam, the same can be said to an extent for other religions. The family is more often than not the locus of their vision of the child, protected by their adult caretakers rather than as bearers of rights as individuals, thus ‘guardianship and custody’ take centre stage. Also, where Goonesekere refers to citizenship it is in the context of nationality. It is a concept that is sometimes at odds with the notion of a global religious community (for instance, the idea of a ‘Nation of Islam’) that places individual rights behind the collective ones of the belief group, thus often relegating the principle of the individual civil and human rights of each person when referring to adults let alone children. Whilst most states operate secular legal systems, some are more influenced by others than one or more religions within their boundaries.

The USA and Children’s Rights

In the USA a number of conservative religious organisations including the Christian Coalition, Concerned Women for America, Eagle Forum, Family Research Council, Focus on the Family, John Birch Society, National Center for Home Education and Rutherford Institute have been at the forefront of opposition to the CRC. These and other organisations made a considerable effort to represent the CRC as a threat, with the greater part of opposition claims arising from unsubstantiated concerns about national sovereignty, states’ rights and the parent-child relationship. Some opponents believed the CRC arrogates national and state sovereignty, would undermine parental authority and inevitably allow and encourage children to sue parents, join gangs, have abortions and dictate how people raise and teach their children.

Those claims and assessments were a result of misconceptions, incorrect information and lack of understanding about the implementation of international human rights treaties in the USA. Extraordinarily, opponents of the CRC criticised provisions added by the Reagan and Bush Senior administrations during the drafting process that attempted to reflect rights American children have under their Constitution and were those that effectively prompted the need to have explicitly participatory rights. Right wing, fundamentalist Christian, Republican Senator Jesse Helms expressed an opinion that: “…the Convention on the Rights of the Child is incompatible with the God-given right and responsibility of parents to raise their children” and that “the Convention has the potential to severely restrict States and the Federal Government in their efforts to protect children and to enhance family life”. Thus, in a doctrine that essentially teaches tolerance and respect for each other, US fundamentalists have used Christianity to underline the moral duties of the family above the possibility of protected personal rights ensured constitutionally. In fact the US Constitution never specifically mentions children as bearers of the rights it protects. In their recent book comparing children’s rights in the USA with countries where it is widely accepted that children should have more rights, Albertson Fineman and Worthington (2009) call the tension between religion and human rights ‘competing paradigms’.

It seems quite extraordinary that when one turns to the travaux préparatoires for the CRC, during the early 1980s the USA was profoundly involved in drafting what were to become participation articles 12, 13, 14 and 15 (Detrick 1992:224–96). Those are the wholly human rights based notions, mostly based on the International Bill of Human Rights. It is those the religious right finds most threatening. In roughly a decade and a half the USA went from being at the very heart of driving the drafting process to full adoption to becoming the most notorious objector to the CRC. They signed in 1995 but as yet have not signalled when they might ratify. Worldwide they are only matched by Somalia who signed in 2002 but have no internationally recognised government who would be able to ratify. In the USA the competing paradigms continue to dominate the lobby for unconditional ratification. During his presidential campaign in October 2008, President Obama was asked about the CRC and answered thus: “It’s important that the United States return to its position as a global leader and promoter of human rights. It is embarrassing to find ourselves in the company of Somalia, a lawless land. I will review this and other treaties and ensure that the United States resumes its global leadership in human rights.” At the time of writing this there has still been no review.

In other countries, including the UK, there has been protest, attempts to derogate or be exempted from legislation prohibiting corporal punishment by Christian groups. They often justify their stance by citing Old Testament passages in 2 Samuel and Proverbs. The key New Testament text cited in support of harsh physical punishment of children is usually Hebrews 12:6–7.Footnote 1 The argument essentially supports a notion of the need for hard discipline as an important part of learning to be a ‘decent’ and ‘virtuous’ adult. That line of reasoning most certainly keeps children subservient to the will of parents and elders.

The Influence of the CRC

Despite religious barriers, in fact most countries have ratified the CRC and children’s rights have improved somewhat as reports to the Committee on the Rights of the Child tend to indicate. The exception is no notably great steps forward in civil and human rights terms that would give good measure of children being integrated into their societies as equal members. If anything, they are now somewhat more protected in the name of children’s rights than previously and are more easily identifiable as a ‘group’ with needs for special provisions and protection than before.

This separation of people into identity groups is one of the issues that appear to inhibit the integration of people into a more consistent identity as equal citizens irrespective of age, gender or other status within nation states. More recently, the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) (see Appendix III) was adopted on 13 December 2006 by the United Nations in New York and opened for signature on 30 March 2007. It received its twentieth ratification on 3 April and entered into force on 3 May 2008. At the time of writing this, there have been 114 ratifications and 153 signatories out of a possible 192 countries. Those include the European Union which ‘concluded’ the treaty (thus, ratified it to the extent responsibilities of member states could be transferred to the EU) on 23 December 2010. The Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities has 65 ratifications and 90 signatories.

States parties must guarantee that persons with disabilities enjoy inherent rights to life on an equal basis with others (Article 10), ensure equal rights and the advancement of women and girls with disabilities (Article 6) and protect children with disabilities (Article 7). They shall have equal rights and not be separated from parents against their will, except when authorities determine that this is in their best interests. They should never be separated from parents on the basis of the disability of either child or parents (Article 23). Countries must also recognise that all persons are equal before the law, prohibit discrimination on the basis of disability and guarantee equal legal protection (Article 5). In short, it goes somewhat further than the CRC towards equality that begins to address issues similar to citizenship as an expression of full membership of society since the CRPD attempts to secure full membership of society for those it represents. Despite the guiding principle that all human rights are indivisible as with other treaties such as the CRC or those dealing with women’s or ethnic rights, it does have an element of what critics of human rights treaties consider to be separation into particular human typologies and interest groups working a little counter the indivisibility principle.

On the other hand, repeating and reinforcing principles through specialised treaties reinforces standalone ones like the CRC by placing principles in more than one context to make indivisibility make sense within diversity. Whether or not that contributes toward delivering full membership of any society depends on how many of the treaties are signed and ratified by a particular state. With regard to citizenship this probably contributes very little at all. The examples in this chapter are in fact clear illustration of the dichotomies that probably work against universal principles ever being entirely possible. Indeed, one might go further and look the kind of view of citizenship propounded by Ruth Lister (1997, 1998, 2006a, b, 2008) and other feminist scholars. Those, however, are predicated on the provenance of the progress of women in Western society. Whilst they advocate for women worldwide, they tend to be more uncompromising than conciliatory and do not work well for the kind of continental regional identity the ACRWC promotes and where religion is a force majeur in resisting societal change in the first place.

This chapter has taken these examples of ‘loose ends’ in order to fill in some gaps in preceding chapters. They have been consciously separated into this chapter with a very clear objective. That is to exemplify the difficulty in applying any kind of universal principle to begin with and more so when a more abstract concept such as children’s citizenship is the question to be resolved. It also rounds off foregoing chapters and moves data toward analysis and conclusion.

Children’s Views on Citizenship

Whilst citizenship education is becoming more widely available to mostly secondary age but also some primary age children little is known about children’s own views on their position before attaining majority. Ruth Lister and a group of colleagues have examined this question in the UK (e.g.: Lister et al. 2003; Smith et al. 2005) by talking to young people. In the first article they take young people’s views from a series of interviews and in the second examined their inclusionary understanding of what citizenship is. It was based on a major qualitative study that examined young people’s status as citizens. The hypothesis is that UK social policy presumes that young people do not have citizenship therefore it requires intervention to develop it. That supposition is not based on concepts of citizenship but how youth is conceived to be. Their research found that youths interviewed expressed a number of different versions of citizenship, frequently concurrently. There were particular narrow conceptions described, like the employment-oriented model that can also exclude young people. Alternatively, there were views that related to “a constructive stance towards the community” (2003: 238) that better emphasised young people’s citizenship. The article concluded by recommending a more conceptually all-inclusive view of citizenship in order that young people’s citizenship status as citizens becomes more acceptable.

What that research ultimately reveals without making that point overtly, is that citizenship education is informing ‘citizens to be’ but see that there are difference points of view depending on whether the interviewed youth see it as a social, economic or political role in their society.

The second study began with the proposition that citizenship literature includes surprisingly few empirical studies. They looked at how young people in one city perceived citizenship and their own transition into citizens. Five distinct models predominated of which the foremost was a ‘universal status’ which was followed by ‘respectable economic independence’ then ‘constructive social participation’ and finally, but less often, both a ‘social-contractual model’ and the ‘right to a voice’. The degree to which the youth interview recognised themselves as citizens reflected those models and their own life experience. Clear distinctions were described between what it meant to be a ‘good’ and ‘first class’ citizens, in which respect they had greater difficulty expressing their rights rather than responsibilities. On the whole, their views drew on an assured understanding of the concept of citizenship that went more in the direction of a communitarian than either a liberal or civic-­republican paradigm. One of the authors’ concluding points was how comprehension of the notion of citizenship can be either inclusionary or exclusionary.

Very few studies have examined young people’s views to the extent of either of these studies which are both examples of UK youth rather than offering a wider perspective. Howe and Covell (2007) in Canada, Holden and Clough’s (1998) contributors looked at Australia and Europe, as well as the UK. However both books look primarily at citizenship education. Guerra (2005) examines young people’s participation in governance and allocation of a municipal budget in Barra Mansa near Rio de Janeiro in Brazil. She describes a limited view of participation in civil society that, despite the title ‘Citizenship Knows No Age’ and including children’s views on what they are doing, is not actually describing citizenship. Carbajal and Ljuslin (2012) examining the situation of illegal immigrant youth in Switzerland through their words, ask the question whether citizenship is possible but are largely confusing it with nationality and participation in civil society. These studies typically exemplify the majority of the relatively few child and youth inclusive studies that that introduce the word citizen or citizenship but then do not actually go beyond child participation. It is, therefore, very difficult to draw any real conclusions about children’s views or what their expectations may be.