The Concept and Development of Children's Rights

Abstract

Despite the fact that the rights of the child began to be discussed in the nineteenth century, they came to the fore after the world wars in the twentieth century. Children, who were considered to belong to their fathers during the agricultural capitalism period before the Industrial Revolution, were also used for domestic labour. Children began to break away from their homes with the Industrial Revolution, after this long period of almost no rights. During this period, child labour, which is cheaper than adult labour and seen as the lever of capitalist accumulation, has become an important part of production. In the second half of the nineteenth century, through the 1920s, called the ‘child rescue age’, compulsory education came to the fore as a way of disciplining children. The perception that children are a group that needs to be protected as a separate category and not as a property reveals the necessity to regulate their working conditions and to ensure their rights. In this regard, the Geneva Declaration of the Rights of the Child realised the first real progress in 1924. Then, after the Second World War, which brought children's rights to almost a halt, the Declaration of Rights of the Child was signed in 1959. Both of the declarations rely heavily on protection and care services. The touchstone of the development of child rights is the Convention on the Rights of the Child, adopted by the United Nations General Assembly on 20 November 1989. The Convention became the human rights convention that was approved by the largest number of countries ever. It is the only human rights convention that uniquely combines civil, political, social, cultural, and human rights. Despite all these developments, children continue not to be regarded as subjects and to be exploited in the production of surplus value as the reserve army of labour.

Citation

Dirikoç, A. (2022), "The Concept and Development of Children's Rights", Yerdelen, B.K., Elbeyoğlu, K., Sirkeci, O., Işıkçı, Y.M., Grima, S. and Dalli Gonzi, R.E. (Ed.) Being a Child in a Global World, Emerald Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 117-124. https://doi.org/10.1108/978-1-80117-240-020221011