Child interest

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The term child's interest as defined by the United Nations lays down fundamental standards for the protection of children and emphasizes the need for "the child's interest to be a priority to be taken into account" in all measures by state and private institutions that affect children and young people. The concept of the child's interest found its origin in the Convention on the Rights of Children ( UN Convention on the Rights of the Child of November 20, 1989 ). In the German version, which was not authorized by the UN, the authentic term, e.g. B. engl. "best interest of the child", span. interés superior del nino with " child welfare ".

Three dimensions of child interest

The child's interest includes three dimensions: 1. Protection and care, 2. The will of the child and 3. Children's rights .

  1. Legal guardians , d. H. Parents or guardians have the right to exercise rights enshrined in law; but they must also comply with legal obligations to ensure the child's well-being through protection and care. To this end, the state shall put in place appropriate legislative and administrative measures. He is obliged to observe and register obvious violations of the child's interests by legal guardians, to inform the legal guardians of the illegality of their behavior and to withdraw their custody in an emergency (= exercise of the "guardianship of the state"). There is both the risk of an unjustified encroachment on parental rights and of insufficient protection of a child from their custodians. The state is a "failure guarantee" in the event that custodians abuse their rights and / or fail to meet their obligations, but also (especially as a welfare state ) an authority that may be obliged to promote the interests of the child.
  2. The will expressed by a child should not be ignored by decision-making adults. Children have a right to actively seek their well-being. However, the legal status of a minor gives adults the opportunity to prevent a (full) implementation of the child's will in practice, with reference to its objective best interests. To what extent the participation rights of the child or the control rights of adults should be decisive in conflict situations is controversial. What is not controversial, however, is the principle that with increasing age and increasing ability of a child or young person to “form their own opinion” (Art. 12 UN Convention on the Rights of the Child), their will must be taken more into account when making decisions.
  3. The basis of any discussion about children's interests are the children's rights established by the UN. They are intended to ensure the well-being of a child and serve its healthy development. Fact-related criteria are required to determine what is in the interests of a particular child in each individual case. As a rule, however, these are so indefinite that there is a large margin of discretion for legal guardians, so that the state has to exercise its guardianship cautiously. Because children's rights are also rights of defense against state organs that want to assert their understanding of the child's interests against that of the legal guardian.

Social scientific criteria of child interest

In order to be able to investigate the interests of the child from a social science point of view, dimensions must be established that are considered in the investigations with regard to the child's welfare. In the 2007 study "An overview of child well-being in rich countries" by the Innocenti Research Center, 6 dimensions were defined which are intended to describe the well-being of the child: material well-being, health and safety, educational well-being, family and peer relationships, behavior and risks and subjective well-being. The approach described assumes that it can be determined “scientifically” whether a child is “doing well” or not.

A distinction must also be made between the addressees of the children's interests:

  1. the legal guardian (usually the parents) as representatives of the minor's interests with special rights and obligations;
  2. the state, especially as an authority against which children can assert their right to education and schoolchildren must fulfill their compulsory education , as well as
  3. Third parties (all other people and instances in society and the economy who are related to a child or adolescent).

Matthias Jestaedt distinguishes the terms child's interest , child's will and child's best interests as follows: “The child's will is to be separated from the child's best interests . While that marks the well-understood child's interest , which is fundamentally to be determined by the parents , this means the actual child's interest . The child's will is to be used - as an essential indicator - to determine the best interests of the child, but only to the extent that it is compatible with the best interests of the child. With increasing maturity of the child / adolescent, the importance of the child's will grows - first for the determination of the child's best interests by the parents, then for the replacement of the parental determination by the self-determination of the child / young person. ”With this, Jestaedt implicitly contradicts the thesis that needs in the In the sense of "objectifiable", scientists can find out through research what a child needs and what is due to him. So is z. For example, the question of whether a boy should or should be circumcised against the background of a religious tradition cannot be answered using scientific means.

A distinction must be made between "advocacy" and "guardianship" representation of the interests of minors by adults. There is a " dichotomy between the best interests of the child and the will of the child" that cannot be resolved. “In extreme cases, a decision that does not correspond to the child’s current will can better correspond to the child’s best interests overall [; d] Nevertheless, the consideration of the child's will is part of the child's best interests. Caring failure to consider the child's will must also be justified in front of the child. "

The glossary funded by the German Federal Ministry for Family, Senior Citizens, Women and Youth, “Durchblick. Information on the protection of minors "expressly admonishes custodians that" [the] parent's right to upbringing contained in Art. 6 (2) GG [...] is not a "right to rule" over children, but a "serving" right in the interests of the child's best interests ".

See also

literature

  • Freeman, Michael: Article 3. The Best Interests of the Child. A Commentary on the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. Leiden / Boston 2007.
  • The UN Children's Right Convention: Theory meets practice. Proceedings of the International Interdisciplinary Conference on Children's Rights, 18-19 May 2006, Ghent, Belgium. Antwerp / Oxford 2007.
  • UNICEF: Child poverty in perspective: An overview of child well-being in rich countries (PDF; 1.5 MB). Innocenti Report Card 7. Florence 2007.
  • Zitelmann, Maud: Child welfare and child will in the field of tension between education and law. Votum, Münster, 2001.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ UN Convention on the Rights of the Child: Art. 3, Paragraph 1
  2. ↑ Status of treaties - ratification status from the CRC. Published by: UN Treaty collection , accessed on March 19, 2019 (English).
  3. ^ Jörg Fegert: In the best interests of the child. Child welfare and child interests as a guiding principle or as a plea in child protection. Child Protection Congress 2013 March 21, 2013 in Zurich ( Memento from August 11, 2017 in the Internet Archive ). Ulm University Hospital. 2013, p. 35
  4. ↑ Matthias Jestaeft: child welfare and parents primacy . Lecture at the Evangelical Academy Bad Boll . 1st - 3rd April 2005
  5. ^ Jörg Fegert: In the best interests of the child. Child welfare and child interests as a guiding principle or as a plea in child protection. Child Protection Congress 2013 March 21, 2013 in Zurich ( Memento from August 11, 2017 in the Internet Archive ). Ulm University Hospital. 2013, p. 25
  6. ↑ Nina Oelkers / Mark Schrödter: Child welfare and child will. For the well-being of children from the perspective of the capability approach . In: Capabilities - Empowerment and Realization Chances in Educational Science (Ed .: Hans-Uwe Otto / Holger Ziegler). VS Verlag. January 2008, p. 151
  7. ↑ Convention on the Rights of the Child - Article 3 ( Memento June 11, 2010 in the Internet Archive )
  8. ↑ Freeman, Michael. Article 3. The Best Interests of the Child. A Commentary on the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. Leiden / Boston 2007. p. 1.
  9. ↑ Hendrik Kremer: “In the best interests of the child…? - The rights of migrant and refugee children in Germany ” . Friedrich Ebert Foundation . April 9, 2008
  10. ↑ UNICEF. Child Poverty in perspecticve: An overview of child well-being in rich countries. Innocenti Report Card 7. Florence 2007.
  11. ^ Matthias Jestaedt: Child welfare and parental primacy . Lecture at the Evangelical Academy Bad Boll . 1st - 3rd April 2005, thesis 14
  12. ↑ Jörg Fegert: “Parents as the best guarantors of children's interests?”. Scientific Symposium: Genital Autonomy: Physical Integrity, Religious Freedom and Sexual Self-Determination - From Theory to Practice. University of Cologne, May 6, 2014 ( Memento from May 25, 2015 in the Internet Archive )
  13. ↑ Münster Forum for Theology and Church: The Cologne circumcision judgment . City of Münster, 2012
  14. ^ Jörg Fegert: In the best interests of the child. Child welfare and child interests as a guiding principle or as a plea in child protection. Child Protection Congress 2013 March 21, 2013 in Zurich ( Memento from August 11, 2017 in the Internet Archive ). Ulm University Hospital. 2013, p. 19
  15. ^ Jörg Fegert: In the best interests of the child. Child welfare and child interests as a guiding principle or as a plea in child protection. Child Protection Congress 2013 March 21, 2013 in Zurich ( Memento from August 11, 2017 in the Internet Archive ). Ulm University Hospital. 2013, p. 21
  16. ↑ Federal Working Group on Child and Youth Protection: Online manual for child and youth protection. Keyword “children's rights” . Berlin 2015