‘Making Children’s Rights Real': Lessons from Policy Networks and Contribution Analysis

ABSTRACTThe UN Convention on the Rights of the Child is the most ratified human rights convention in the world. There has been considerable progress in incorporating these rights into domestic law, regional and local policies. However, cross-national research continues to show gaps in implementing and realising these rights. This article draws on theoretical developments on policy networks and Contribution Analysis (CA) – a theory-based model used to monitor and evaluate programmes – to evaluate recent developments in children rights advocacy in Scotland. With the official national commitment to ‘making rights real’, Scotland is a fertile test case to examine what strategies are likely – or not likely – to result in embedding children’s rights legally and practically in their lives. The article concludes that successful advocacy needs to consider which key actors are included or excluded from networks, to anticipate disruption and strategise accordingly, and to recognise the key role of ‘network managers’...