The purpose of this qualitative sociological law study is to examine the relationship between the social services and civil court to apprehend if knowledge about the child's best interest is transfered from social workers to the legal system. This have been done by investigating civil court cases concerning custody transition from biological parents to foster parents according to 6 chapter 8 paragraph in the law of parenting, built upon the legal principle of the best interests of the child. Eight cases has been examined by using a method of qualitative text analysis and categorised into five primary categories and three concepts linked to sections of the law. The material has been analysed through a sociological law perspective, social constructionist theory and attachment theory. The study shows that a variety of factors interacts when it comes to determining what’s in the best interest of the child . Moreover, the civil court refers in all eight cases to social services assessments of the child's situation. This suggests that social services have an informal power position when it comes to decisions on custody transition in accordance with the child's best interests.

The universally controversial issue of deaths in custody is especially pertinent to South Africa. This study was prompted due to the increasingly diminishing ability for a concerted effort at tackling this issue by all parties involved. The 5 year retrospective, descriptive case audit performed at the Pretoria Medico-Legal Laboratory aimed to evaluate the current medico-legal investigation of deaths in custody in Pretoria, South Africa. Over half of the deaths (52%) occurred as a result of police action, 30% in police custody and 18% in correctional services custody. Gunshot wounds and hangings were the number 1 and 2 most common causes of death, respectively, with homicide and suicide being the 2 most common manners of death, respectively. The principal conclusion from the results is the presence of a flawed and malfunctioning medico-legal investigation system. The introduction of a formal protocol is urgently required to provide a framework for these investigations. / Dissertation (MSc)--University of Pretoria, 2013. / Forensic Medicine / MSc / Unrestricted

The aim of this study was to understand which factors that lay the foundation for social workers’ custody investigations and the judges’ decisions in custody disputes. Additionally, it was to examine the social workers’ and the judges’ views on children’s’ rights in this process. The study was based on qualitative research where six semi-structured interviews were conducted. Four social workers and two judges working with custody- investigations, and disputes were interviewed. The analysis consists of two key concepts: the concept of discretion and child sociology. The result shows that judges and social workers experience difficulties with interpreting the best interest of the child, that there are different perceptions about when lone and joint custody should be considered and how to best design the rights of access. A common consensus among the interviewees with regards to the best interest of the child, is that each situation requires an individual interpretation while considering necessary safety aspects. Social workers’ statements tend to dominate how the best interests of a child is defined in a judge’s decision. Both professions find ways to accommodate the best interests of the child, even though it does not always turn out ideal. There is a strong believe that the child’s voice is governing the decision, even though our study shows that it is not always considered in the custody investigations nor in court.

Syftet med studien är att, utifrån en kritisk-saklig utredningsmetodik, granska hur familjerättssekreterare presenterar och bedömer barnets bästa och våld i nära relationer i 16 vårdnads-, boende- och umgängesutredningar. Utredningarna är gjorda av familjerätten i Örebro kommun. För att besvara studiens syfte och frågeställningar har den kvalitativa metoden dokumentgranskning använts i kombination med en semistrukturerad intervju. Studien visar att barn under nio år regelmässigt fråntas rätten att göra sin röst hörd samt att ett vuxet barnperspektiv genomsyrar utredningstexterna. Konsekvensen blir att barnets perspektiv osynliggörs och utelämnas. Språket har en avgörande betydelse för hur våldsproblematik hanteras, våldet tenderar att tonas ner eller ignoreras helt i bedömningen. Våld i nära relationer relateras inte till barnets mående, anknytning eller föräldraförmåga. Det är inte heller något som diskuteras eller tas hänsyn till i bedömningen. Den kritiskt-sakliga utredningsmetodiken har genom sina teoretiska begrepp varit ett grundläggande verktyg i studiens analys och diskussion. Detta har kombinerats med den lagstiftning som reglerar familjerättens uppdrag samt anknytningsteori och barnets bästa. Studien ämnar bidra till reflektion, inspiration och upplysning rörande barnets bästa och våld i nära relationer i vårdnads-, boende- och umgängesutredningar. Förhoppningsvis kan studien även bidra till att öka barnens inflytande i vårdnadstvister, stärka deras ställning och göra deras röster hörda. / The aim of the thesis is to examine, based on critical-factual investigation methodology, how family law secretary’s presents and assess “child’s best” and domestic violence in 16 custody-residence- and contact investigations. The investigations are made by family law in Örebro. To reach the aim of the study and the research questions the qualitative method document review was used in combination with a semi-structured interview. The results of the study showed that children younger than nine years routinely were denied the right to have their voices heard and also that an adult child’s perspective permeates the investigations. The consequence is that the child's perspective became ​​invisible or omitted. Language has an important part in how violence is handled, it tends to be grayed or ignored in the assessment. Domestic violence is not either related to the child’s wellbeing, attachment theory or parenting skills. That is also something that is not discussed or taken into consideration in the assessment. The critical-factual investigation methodology through its theoretical concepts has been a fundamental tool in the analysis and discussion. This has been combined with the law that regulates the family law assignment, attachment and “child´s best”. The study intends to contribute to a reflection, inspiration and enlightenment concerning “child´s best” and domestic violence in custody-, residence- and contact investigations. Hopefully, the study also helps to increase the children's interests in custody disputes, strengthen their position and to make the children´s voices heard.

The purpose of this study was to explore if and how the Swedish Supreme Court are using the concept “the child’s best interest”. This concept is used a lot in Swedish legislation, but it needs interpretation every time it´s used and is often perceived as unclear. This makes it interesting to see how this affects the individual child´s legal rights. Furthermore I want to see if the Supreme Court listen to the child´s own opinion and if not, are there any justifications to why not. The study has a quantitative starting point, where I have gone through a number of judgments and then chosen seven out of a qualitative point where there has been a discussion from the Supreme Court around the individual and the best interest of the child for the individual child and the methods of analysis used in this study are social constructionism, legal sociology and analysis of the idea. The study shows a lack of consistency among the professionals of what the concept really stands for, which negatively affects the legal rights for the individual child. The solution is a closer collaboration between social workers, judges and lawyers to make the concept clearer and more applicable.

No abstract available. / Thesis (LL.M.)-University of Natal,Durban, 2002.

Orientadora: Profa. Dra. Camila Nunes Dias / Dissertação (mestrado) - Universidade Federal do ABC, Programa de Pós-Graduação em Ciências Humanas e Sociais, 2017. / A presente pesquisa iniciou-se a partir de uma pergunta: as audiências de custódia representam um ponto de inflexão no Sistema de Justiça Criminal? Instituídas em fevereiro 2015 em São Paulo, foram apresentadas como importante mecanismo para a redução do número de prisões provisórias e mais atenta observação dos direitos e garantias das pessoas presas. Entretanto, o Sistema de Justiça Criminal funciona segundo lógicas que historicamente têm se mostrado pouco permeáveis aos princípios democráticos previstos Constitucionalmente. Assim, com a pesquisa, cuja técnica privilegiada foi a observação direta da cena das audiências, buscou-se compreender, a partir da interação entre os atores, como as velhas práticas relacionadas ao funcionamento do SJC são excluídas ou incorporadas ao novo instituto, e ainda, os limites que se impõem à potência inovadora das audiências de custódia, partindo do pressuposto que compõem um arranjo institucional muito mais amplo, que engloba desde as agências policiais até o sistema prisional. Apesar de ser possível identificar pontos de inflexão tendo como foco de análise apenas a cena das audiências de custódia, observa-se também permanências sobretudo no que diz respeito ao descrédito atribuído às narrativas dos indivíduos presos, e questões relacionadas à violência institucional. / This research started from a question: do custody hearings represent a turning point for the Brazilian criminal justice system? Implemented in February 2015 in São Paulo, they were presented as an important mechanism to reduce the number of pre-trial custody and assure a more attentive observation of prisoners¿ rights and guarantees. However, sense, the research - whose privileged technique was the direct observation of the hearings¿ scene, with specific attention to the interactions among the actors involved ¿ was aimed at understanding how old practices related to the functioning of the system are excluded or incorporated into this new institute, as well as the limits imposed to its innovative power. These research questions were based on the assumption that custody hearings are part of a broader institutional arrangement, which encompasses a wide range of actors, from police agencies to prison authorities. Although it is possible to identify inflection points when focusing the analysis on the hearing scene itself, it is also possible to notice aspects that remain unchanged, especially regarding the discredit towards prisoners¿ narratives and issues related to institutional violence.

1 Abstract This thesis with the subject "The forms of custody for underage children in the times after split-up or divorce of their parents" is dealing with possible types of arrangements of custody for a child after the break up of his parents. This topic is currently very live in the Czech Republic, as well as in other advanced countries, because the amount of divorces is rising. According to the valid legislation it is possible to entrust the child, after the divorce of his parents, to either the custody of one of the parents, shared custody of both parents, joint custody or, if deemed necessary in regards to the needs of the child, to the custody of another person. The aim of this thesis is to create an overview which will acquaint the readers with all options of arrangements of the custody for children after the divorce of their parents which are established in the section § 907 of Act no. 89/2012 Coll., Civil Code. The increased attention is paid to the shared custody because of several recent breakthrough jurisprudences of the Constitutional Court of the Czech Republic concerning this legal institute. This thesis is split into 5 chapters, excluding introduction and conclusion. In the first chapter I concern with historical development of the legislation of decision making regarding the entrusting of...

The purpose of this study was to gain an understanding of how district courts reason in cases where visitation is granted between children and a parent accused of violence either towards the child or the other parent. Our research question revolves around how the district court reasons regarding information about violence and to what extent the children’s opinions is taken into account in the decisions. We have examined 11 cases from 2022, collected from district courts in Skåne and Blekinge, Sweden. Discourse analysis has been employed as a suitable method to study the construction of meaning through language in the court decisions. The results show that the district court tends to focus on the parents’ difficulties in cooperation or conflicts rather than on the reports of violence within the family. In several of the judgments, violence has been reformulated through language use, where violence is described, for example, as a conflict. This results in the minimization or invisibility of the violence. The significance and severity of the violence are also diminished as the district court questions the credibility of the reports of violence. When granting visitation between a child and a potentially violent parent, the risk of violence has been minimized, and instead, the child’s need for close and good contact with both parents has been given significant weight in these decisions. The children’s opinions have been briefly described and weighed very little in the district court’s assessment in all of the judgments. When the child’s opinions have been taken into account, the district court has reasoned about how children are influenced by the parents. Often, the oldest child’s opinions have represented the views of the siblings as well.

Doctor of Philosophy / Department of Family Studies and Human Services / Melinda Stafford Markham / Walter R. Schumm / This study produces a grounded theory of how parents make decisions regarding the custody arrangements of their children in the divorce process. Eleven parent/adolescent pairs in shared physical and legal custody arrangements were interviewed. Ten factors were found to influence the custody arrangement decisions of divorcing parents: former partner, children, work, new partner, use of a lawyer, role of family, parenting role, place of residence, finances, and divorce. Parents also weighed perceived costs and rewards when making custody arrangement decisions. In addition, an understanding of the involvement of an adolescent in the custody arrangement decisions was gained through this research. The majority of adolescents in this study had some type of input in the custody arrangements at one point or another. Parents and adolescents both expressed concerns with involving adolescents in custody arrangement decisions as well as an appropriate age for adolescent involvement, and how to determine when an adolescent is ready to be involved in the custody arrangement decisions. Custody arrangement decisions are complex decisions that parents and adolescents face; a number of factors are considered and the custody arrangement decision making process varies for all families.