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Disputats Stockholm : Stockholms universitet, 2008.

This study aims to examine how preschool teachers believe that they are working on democracy and children’s rights at mealtimes in preschool. This study aims to find out if preschool teachers could see obstacle to implementing these meals in a democratic manner. Interviews with preschool teachers are used as method as preschool teachers can share their thoughts and ideas about how they work. The results of the study show that preschool teachers tend to focus on the children to be satisfied and have a quiet moment together instead of working with democracy and children’s rights at meals. Preschool teachers mention the available options and obstacles to create democratic meals. The large number of children at the dinner table was one of the obstacles they mentioned. / Sammanfattning Den här studiens syfte är att undersöka hur förskollärare anser att de arbetar med demokrati och barns rättigheter vid måltiderna på förskolan. I undersökningen tar jag även att ta reda på om förskollärarna kunde se några hinder för att kunna genomföra dessa måltider på ett demokratiskt sätt. Metoden som studien utgår från är intervjuer med förskollärare, för att de då får möjlighet att dela med sig av sina tankar och idéer kring hur de arbetar. Resultatet i studien visar att förskollärarna inte har fokus på att arbeta med demokrati och barns rättigheter vid måltiderna, fokus ligger istället på att barnen ska bli mätta och ha en lugn stund tillsammans. Förskollärarna tar även upp de möjligheter och hinder som de kan stöta på för att skapa demokratiska måltider. Det stora barnantalet vid matbordet var ett av de hinder som de såg.

This thesis examined the extent to which South Africa has domesticated the international provisions protecting foreign migrant children. The thesis further investigated procedural gaps and makes recommendations in respect of law and procedure to ensure the adequate protection of the rights of undocumented foreign migrant children in South Africa.

Syftet med studien är att undersöka hur de svenska humanitära organisationerna Tam-Tam, PMU, SoUG samt Barnfonden bedriver/vill bedriva socialt arbete för att främja barns rätt till utbildning och skolgång i Togo. Vidare ämnar studien ta reda på om faktorer som bemötande och förhållningssätt har någon betydelse i deras sociala arbete i landet. Utöver detta önskar studien granska om organisationerna använder sig av olika tillvägagångssätt gällande kön i det sociala arbetet. Studien har en kvalitativ ansats och bygger på semistrukturerade intervjuer med nämnda organisationer. I resultatet framkommer det att organisationernas sociala arbete med att främja barns rätt till skola och utbildning utformas på olika sätt. Viktiga faktorer i arbetet är att samarbeta med lokala aktörer för att stärka individerna i samhället på flera plan. Samtliga organisationers arbete har ett särskilt fokus på att bidra till att stärka flickors och kvinnors position i samhället. Via olika projekt syftar organisationerna till att göra utbildningen och skolgången mer jämställd mellan pojkar och flickor i landet. Ytterligare en viktig del i organisationernas utvecklingsarbete handlar om att informera och medvetandegöra barnens föräldrar om utbildningens betydelse. Många familjer är fattiga och ett stort antal vuxna i landet har aldrig själva utbildat sig, vilket minskar motivationen att satsa pengar på någonting de saknar kännedom om. Organisationernas arbete med att motverka den utbredda analfabetism som finns i Togo samt att förbättra föräldrars ekonomi bidrar till att familjer i större utsträckning skickar sina barn till skolan. Studien har analyserats utifrån teorierna empowerment och kritisk teori för att identifiera och granska hur dessa synsätt kan bidra till organisationernas sociala arbete gällande främjandet av barns skolgång i Togo. / The purpose of this study is to analyse how Swedish organizations, namely the PMU, Barnfonden, Swedish Social Workers without Borders and Tam-Tam are working to promote children’s right to education in Togo. Furthermore, the study intends to find out whether factors such as attitude and approach has any meaning in their social work in the country. In addition, the study wishes to examine whether organizations use different approaches concerning gender in social work. The study employs qualitative research methods and is based on semi-structured interviews with the organizations mentioned. Our findings suggest that the organizations’ social work with regard to promoting children’s right to education has been structured in several different ways. One important factor in this social work is the collaboration with local actors to strengthen individuals` status in society, which is conducted at several levels of society. All of the organizations have focussed in particular on strengthening the social status of girls and women. The organizations have initiated various projects in order to promote gender equality in education. Another important aspect of this work involves informing the children’s parents about the importance of education. Many families are poor and a large number of adults in the country lack any education of their own. These circumstances could lessen parents’ willingness to invest money into education, as they lack knowledge about its benefits. The organizations’ efforts to counteract Togo’s widespread illiteracy and to improve parents’ finances have resulted in more families sending their children to school. The analyses in this study are based on the empowerment theory and the critical theory, and we intend to identify and review the ways in which these theories can help organizations promote children’s education in Togo.

Det övergripande syftet med denna uppsats är att utifrån ett rättsociologiskt perspektiv undersöka huruvida begreppet barnets bästa förverkligas i domstolars beslut samt familjerätters yttrande gällande vårdnadstvister. Uppsatsen söker vidare förklara lagrummets gränser avseende vårdnadstvister då domstolar och familjerätter samarbetar under speciella omständigheter. Åtta stickprovsutvalda rättsfall, med bifogat yttrande från socialnämnd, utgör grunden för studien. Den empiriska delen bygger inledningsvis på en delanalys i form av meningskoncentrering, för att övergå till att inringa särdrag i analyserad text med utgångspunkt i om och huruvida barnet har fått komma till tals. Barnets bästa tycks beaktas så långt det är möjligt i vårdnadstvister men begreppets innebörd har en tendens att tolkas av vuxna, vilket kan leda till att det definieras ur ett vuxenperspektiv istället för ett barnperspektiv. De professionella aktörerna har makt medan barnet har inskränkt handlingsförmåga i rätten, det råder en hierarki i vårdnadstvister. Barnets röst kan vara svår att urskilja då föräldrarnas konflikt har en tendens att dra allt fokus till sig.

This thesis examined the extent to which South Africa has domesticated the international provisions protecting foreign migrant children. The thesis further investigated procedural gaps and makes recommendations in respect of law and procedure to ensure the adequate protection of the rights of undocumented foreign migrant children in South Africa.

This thesis is set in the Western Australian education system and centres on the question of how primary schools can actively foster conditions conducive to creating and sustaining education in and for democracy and human rights. In Australia, as elsewhere, there is a widespread acceptance of the need for democratic education also referred to as civics and citizenship education. The perceived lack of public understanding of democratic principles and practices has, in the last decade, led various Australian governments to commit significant resources ($ 31.6 million) to civics and citizenship education programmes such as Discovering Democracy (DD). This thesis argues that political engagement and civic learning is most effective when schools commit themselves to deliberately embedding a set of democratic educational principles in everyday practices. In contrast to traditional approaches to citizenship education that tend to focus on the operational aspects of representative governments, institutions and history, this thesis argues that education for Democracy and Human Rights (DaHR) can be effectively achieved through the fostering of DaHR in education. In this task the thesis draws on the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC). The CRC is rooted in a range of basic values about the treatment of children in schools and elsewhere, and encompasses basic rights to which children are entitled. The study empirically investigates through up close observations, interviews and surveys the efficacy of pedagogy for civic and citizenship learning in four schools identified as places of strong democratic practice. This study was able to identify particular commonalities between the four case study schools that were conducive to creating and sustaining democratic principles and practices. These schools, although very different in their composition, were lead by principals who shared the view that children under their care were subjects in the making with increasing rights and responsibilities rather than objects to be manipulated, controlled and protected. The findings suggest that experiencing democracy and human rights in daily school life in a variety of situations and on a number of different levels can effectively contribute to the learning of the meaning and advantages of democratic values such as the rule of law, participatory decision-making and due process. It also concludes that there may be a relationship between parental socio-economic background and the possibilities available for students to engage in effective civic learning and citizenship practices. The relationship between socio-economic background and other structural factors including gender and ethnicity in relation to possibilities of civic learning needs to be investigated in a larger study.

Magister Legum - LLM / This thesis examined the extent to which South Africa has domesticated the international provisions protecting foreign migrant children. The thesis further investigated procedural gaps and makes recommendations in respect of law and procedure to ensure the adequate protection of the rights of undocumented foreign migrant children in South Africa. / South Africa

The aim of this study is to analyse the discourses drawn upon by community paediatric nurses in relation to children’s rights to health. The philosophy of Michel Foucault has been used to underpin the analysis of the interviews and exemplars of five experienced community nurses, revealing conflicting power relationships and discourses. Rights are formalised morality and so from a children’s rights perspective, discourses reflect both the moral and ethical positions of the nurses. Children are constructed as developing human beings whose moral status gradually changes and who, through a lack of developmental autonomy, entrust their decision-making to their representatives (parents and caregivers) as their trustees. Rights are correlative with the obligations and duties toward children by both families and society. Society constructs legislative and politically organised structures to govern raising children because children are an intrinsic social concern. Whilst representing society’s interest in children’s rights to health, nurses in the home act as a conduit for multiple governing structures. The nurses in this study construct their “truths” and knowledge about children’s health rights from nursing, medicine, law, education, and social policy. However, the values of individual parents can conflict with universal values for children’s health and wellbeing. Therefore representing society positions nurses as “agents of the state”, a role that potentially holds power over parents and children and leads to the epithet of “the health police”. Within the institution of the family, and in the privacy of the home, there are also mechanisms of power that can resist the mechanisms of the state and its representatives. Therefore the discourse “it takes a village to raise a child” competes with the “my home is my castle” discourse. Nurses negotiate a fine balance between these power relations. Nurses are challenged with using power productively to promote children’s rights whilst respecting the role of parents and families. I argue that children’s rights are central to the moral and ethical work of nurses but that such work is often obscured and invisible. I propose that children’s community nurses are excellent at negotiating networking and connecting at a micro level, but need to create a more sophisticated and cohesive entity at a macro level to become fully political children’s rights advocates.