Children’s rights: A cross-border study of residential care

The United Nations (1989) Convention on the Rights of the Child came into force on 2September 1990 and since then the issue of children’s rights has increasingly becomepart of the discourse around child welfare. This article describes findings from a sixmonthexploratory study which examined children’s rights through the personalexperiences of those involved in the residential care system on both sides of the Irishborder. A series of interviews with policy-makers and professionals (n = 21) and focusgroups with young people living in residential care (n = 15) were used to investigatechildren’s rights under three broad headings: (a) provision of services, (b) protectionfrom harm and (c) participation in decision-making (Hammarberg, as cited in Walker,Brooks & Wrightsman, 1999). Young people were found to hold more negative viewsthan professionals, particularly with regard to their experience of participation rights.The value of a child-centred, ‘rights-based’ approach to research, policy and practice inresidential childcare is discussed.