Children’s Economic and Social Rights

Abstract

Is there such a concept? Do they really exist? To speak of children’s economic and social rights implies an affirmative answer to these questions. But the drafting history of the Convention on the Rights of the Child reveals the fragile nature of the distinction between economic and social rights and civil and political rights for children. Indeed, if not for a late intervention from UNICEF, this distinction may well have been erased from the lexicon of children’s rights. It did however survive but only just. This chapter explores the vulnerable and often clouded relationship between children and economic and social rights. It labours to offer some doctrinal clarity with respect to the natur..