Status of Child Rights in the International Community

The UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (OHCHR, Convention on the Rights of the Child, Retrieved from www.ohchr.org/EN/HRBodies/CRC/Pages/CRCIndex.aspx, 1989), enforced since 1990, obliges States to ensure by appropriate legislation and effective provisions children’s rights to care, protection, social security, development, education, and active involvement in all actions and measures that are of concern to them. The articles of the Convention are highly relevant throughout the world for teachers, parents, and children who cooperate in the institutions of educational systems serving children and their societies. This chapter gives a concise summary of the content of the Convention, the history of child rights since the beginning of the last century, and the debates about adequate understanding and implementation of the rights incorporated in the Convention. It underlines that the Convention, though titled as the Convention on the Rights of the Child, asks for an intense dialogue of adults and children who have to be respected as human beings with their own perspectives, best interests, and hopes for a good life in community with others.