Amicus Curiae

Introduction to Special Section

Maria Federica Moscati — Fri, 01 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Rights of the Child or Parental Authority in Children’s Medical Treatment Cases?

Jo Bridgeman — Fri, 01 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Recent cases concerned with the future medical treatment of a child with a life-limiting condition have presented, on appeal, the argument that the threshold for intervention in a parental decision about the child’s medical treatment should be significant harm rather than best interests. The basis of the claim is that parents know their child best and, consequently, should have the right or authority to make decisions about their child’s future. Although unsuccessful before the courts, these legal arguments have inspired the inclusion of provisions in Bills before Parliament aimed at enhancing parental authority in such cases. This article examines this modern reincarnation of the claim to parental authority, in the context of the medical treatment of a seriously ill child. It argues that reform of the law to re-assert parental authority would be a seriously retrograde development—a contemporary conservative reformulation of the child as object—which would significantly erode the rights of the child. Rather, it is argued that the child should be at the centre of the shared care of parents and professionals focused upon the individual child’s needs, interests and rights. This article concludes with a fictional account of an attempt to reform the law to place the interests, rights and voice of the child at the centre of determination of their future medical treatment.

Keywords: children’s interests, rights and voice; parental authority; children’s medical treatment; best interests or significant harm threshold.

Children in Family Mediation

Marian Roberts — Fri, 01 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

This article explores the impact of three interlinked developments on both theoretical understanding of the specific role of children in family mediation and on its professional practice implications. First, the adoption of an imported terminology deviates from the clarity and precision of existing policy in respect of the nature and purpose of professional intervention in relation to children in mediation; second, current high standards of practice risk being compromised by an overemphasis of a rights approach to determining a child’s direct participation in mediation; and third, how a failure to sufficiently recognize the impact on families of multiple harsh pressures, including poverty and deprivation, at a time of conflict and stress, risks both overstating the scope of mediation for meeting a child’s needs as well as underplaying the complexities involved in relation to the direct participation of children in mediation. The article explores the tensions arising from these developments and the challenges, theoretical and professional, involved in protecting the ethical and professional principles of mediation while ensuring that the voice of the child can be heard in the process.

Keywords: ADR; mediation; family mediation; children in mediation; children’s rights.

Criss-crossings of Psychological Practice in Adoption Processes

Lucía Coler, Gabriela Z Salomone — Fri, 01 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Psychologists have acquired an increasingly significant role in the field of child protection in Argentina. Particularly in regard to their participation in the adoption system, psychological reports and interventions have taken great prominence when an exceptional protection measure of family separation is decided or when the adoptability status of a child is under consideration, among other instances. The increasing incidence of intervention by psychologists makes it necessary to analyse the factors that infuse the practices conditioning professional criteria. From a mental health perspective, it is necessary for professionals in the area to be able to provide a reading of the subjective aspects at stake. Based on this, we reflect on the importance of articulating both the children’s rights field and the field of the individual subject involved in each case.

This article presents some results of PhD field research conducted in Buenos Aires, Argentina, by analysing qualitative interviews and the retrieval of information from legal files collected from a Civil Court and from several institutions related to the adoption system. It examines various institutional and discursive criss-crossings that affect the work and the viewpoint of psychologists in this area of their activity.

Keywords: adoption; ethics; institutions; psychology; subjectivity.

Doing Rights, Making Citizens

Hung-Ju Chen, Po-Han Lee — Fri, 01 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

How does the right to education inform respect for citizenship rights, where school education becomes a site of contestation over democracy? Drawing on a review of all documents produced during international reviews of Taiwan’s implementation of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child and interviews with members of high-school student governments, in this article, we demonstrate how local educational systems negotiate to meet international child rights standards. We further argue that experiences of being involved in student governments and human rights review processes empower the students, informing them of a future where they feel relevant and responsible in networking and decision-making.

Keywords: civil and political rights; Convention on the Rights of the Child; education reform; right to education; school government; Taiwan.

Adopting a Rights Lens to Children’s Training in Football Academies

Nuno Ferreira, Anna Verges Bausili — Fri, 01 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Sporting issues are increasingly the subject of legal intervention in the United Kingdom and elsewhere, but the effect of commercial pressures on young football players remains largely unaddressed. Underpinned by an empirical assessment of the English Premier League’s self-regulation on youth development matters, this article argues in favour of the need to adopt a rights-based approach to children’s involvement with professional football academies. Based on data gathered through almost 80 semi-structured interviews across England, the analysis concentrates on stakeholders’ awareness of children’s rights and how they influence football academies. The article concludes with policy recommendations to ameliorate the issues identified.

Keywords: children; football; children’s rights; sports; Premier League.

Child Q, School Searches and Children’s Rights

Simon Flacks — Fri, 01 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

The troubling case of “Child Q”, regarding a black girl who was strip-searched at her school while on her period in 2020, highlighted the discriminatory and often brutal treatment experienced by young people at the hands of the police. This commentary considers the response to the incident, focusing on the local authority’s use of a children’s rights framework to assess the actions of both police and schoolteachers. It compares the scrutiny of police powers to stop and search minors in public with the lack of focus on powers to search pupils in schools, noting the potential for disproportionality and the need for systematic data collection. It draws attention away from the focus on individual police failures and towards systematic problems with disciplining school pupils, focusing on suspicions about drug use—and the smell of cannabis specifically—as a potential source of inequitable outcomes.

Keywords: drugs; racism; education; policing; exclusions.

Queerness as a Gift, LGBTQ+ Parenting and the Benefits to our Children

Jacob Stokoe — Fri, 01 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Open Letter to the Editor

Francesca Cavallo — Fri, 01 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Aesthetic Verdicts

Amy Kellam — Fri, 01 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

This article examines the landmark 1878 defamation case of Whistler v Ruskin, a pivotal legal battle that underscored the complexities of adjudicating art criticism under defamation law. The trial arose from John Ruskin’s scathing critique of James McNeill Whistler’s work, which led Whistler to sue for libel, seeking validation not just of his art but of his artistic philosophy. Despite the public fascination and Whistler’s tactical use of the trial as a platform for self-promotion, the jury’s award—a derisory farthing—hinted at their view of the lawsuit as frivolous. This case emphasizes the intrinsic challenge of legal systems grappling with subjective art valuation and critiques, the evolving norms of defamation, and the implications for the freedom of speech. While Whistler nominally won, the repercussions for both men were significant, affecting their finances, reputations and positions within the art world, and the trial’s legacy continues to inform the discourse around art, law and cultural value.

Keywords: James McNeill Whistler; John Ruskin; Victorian libel law; defamation; art criticism; aesthetics; 19th-century British art; fair comment.

Editor's introduction

Michael Palmer — Fri, 01 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Full issue

Michael Palmer — Fri, 01 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Human Rights for Justice

Justice Sir Dennis Adjei — Fri, 01 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

The persons who occupy public office—including those created by the Constitution of Ghana 1992 and any other enactments—and private organizations and institutions that perform public functions or receive public resources are accountable to the citizenry, particularly those whose taxes are used to set up public offices and pay their salaries either in whole or in part, or to provide or support private bodies to perform public functions. The term “public institutions” has a broader meaning within the context of access and the right to information than its ordinary meaning.

The technical meaning of “public institutions” within the context of the right to information covers institutions created by the Constitution, any other enactments and private organizations or institutions that perform public functions or receive public resources. The author uses “public institutions” in its technical sense in this article to avoid repetition of private institutions or organizations that provide public services or receive public resources.

In most cases, public institutions fail to observe the culture of accountability and transparency and decide on the types of information to disclose and those not to be disclosed, to render the citizenry impotent to hold them accountable. The persons who occupy offices in public institutions hold those offices in trust for the citizenry, and, as trustees and fiduciaries they are required to be accountable, transparent, prudent, faithful, honest and not to commingle their personal properties with the properties that they hold in trust for their citizenry.

Discretion was hitherto exercised by public institutions as to the information which may be disclosed to the public or not did not have statutory backing, as a result of which some of them have acted capriciously. In order to make the officers of public institutions accountable and transparent, most states have enacted Right to Information Acts to give statutory backing to persons who may seek information from occupiers of public institutions to ensure that they discharge their mandates as trustees and are accountable to the nationals of their respective countries.

Furthermore, the enactments on right to information are intended to give a clear exemption to information that cannot be disclosed with the sole aim of protecting the public interest in democratic societies in accordance with the Oath of Secrecy taken by public officers and which prevents them from revealing matters that shall be brought under their consideration or knowledge through the discharge of their official duties.

This article discusses the international law position of the right to information, taking into account the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights 1965, the European Convention on Human Rights 1950, the American Convention on Human Rights 1969 and the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights 1981; and further discusses the Right to Information Act 2019 (Act 989) in Ghana and its effectiveness in promoting the culture of accountability, transparency and faithfulness within the public space; and, furthermore, assesses its impact on democracy and the justification for some of the exemptions provided by law to protect public interest in democratic countries.

The right to freedom of expression includes the freedom to seek, receive, hold opinions and impart information and ideas without public interference, except for restrictions imposed by the state which have been enacted into law and are necessary. The laws that are necessary in a democratic society to restrict freedom of expression must take into account the interests of national security or public order, territorial integrity or public safety, the protection of health or morals, the respect of the rights or reputation of others, the prevention of crime or disorder, and the disclosure of information received in confidence, and for the maintenance of the authority and impartiality of the courts.1

There will also be a brief discussion on freedom of information and access to information concerning the environment held by public officers and private institutions and organizations that provide public functions.

Keywords: freedom of expression; international law; freedom of information; journalism; Ghana.

News and Events

Eliza Boudier — Fri, 01 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000