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Summary: To date little has been done to find out about
children’s own experiences of rights violations
and what children actually think and feel about
child rights. This survey represents at least a
first attempt to sample children’s own views
and experiences of their rights and violations
of these rights.
Brief of the research project
Save the Children Sweden commissioned the present research to:
- highlight the importance of listening to children’s views on rights and to
promote the concept of carrying out regular opinion polls with children
- assist NGOs, CBOs, relevant government departments and individuals
working for the advancement of child rights to focus on themes mentioned
by children and implement them in their children’s rights programming.
Children’s participation
This research involved the participation of children. In the qualitative
aspect of the work children participated in activity-based research groups
where they described their experiences of rights in their lives and
discussed solutions to the rights violations they experienced. In the
quantitative aspect of this study children participated by stating their ideas
through a verbal questionnaire.
Boyden and Ennew (1997) in their seminal work on participatory research
with children point out that if children’s participation is to be more than
token the following needs to be taken into account:
- New considerations about ethical issues in research, that are particularly
important in research with powerless groups;
- The capacities of children at different ages and stages of development;
- The development of participation as an element in research and
programming, for which adults and children need to acquire and use new
skills and competencies.
All three points were taken into account in developing the approach for this
research.
The research was devised in such a way as to take particular ethical issues
into account and to make sure the activities were suited to the ages and
stages of development of the children and youth. In addition, particular
efforts were made to increase capacity in children’s participatory research
through passing on new skills to young fieldworkers around the country.
Owner: Save the Children Sweden, Pretoria pdf: www.crin.org/docs/resources/publications/violence/SCS-Childrens-Opinion-...