Peer-reviewed article
Child Protection and Well-Being: A Right or a Privilege
Nora Hamzeh ·
Summary
Written by AI, not yet AICS's view · claude-haiku-4-5-20251001This study examines children's well-being within educational policy frameworks, arguing that well-being should be a right rather than a privilege. The author draws on Nussbaum's Capability Approach and Bernstein's pedagogical rights to propose a framework for understanding childhood in neo-liberal contexts. The work aims to influence how educational policymakers view and support children's well-being in schools. International educational organizations like the International Baccalaureate and Council of International Schools are incorporating well-being into their evaluation and accreditation structures.
Key points
- Well-being is a complex notion gaining interest in research and educational organizations
- Children continue to face hardships across various cultures and societies
- The study proposes using Nussbaum's Capability Approach to frame children's well-being
- Connections are drawn between Bernstein's pedagogical rights and child well-being
- The work invites policymakers to reconsider how children are viewed and placed in societal contexts
Limitations
This appears to be a conceptual or theoretical paper that proposes a framework rather than an empirical study. The document does not provide data on whether the proposed approach has been tested or what outcomes result from its application in educational settings.
Abstract
The aim of this study is to shed light on children’s well-being in the frame of educational policy. Current research on well-being opens the discourse on children and their placement in policies and reforms. Children continue to face hardships in societies in various cultures up to current times (WHO, 2022). Well-being is a complex notion that presents new interests in recent research with educational organizations, such as the International Baccalaureate (IB) and Council of International Schools (CIS) incorporating this concept in their structures for evaluation and accreditations providing implications for policy makers. Considerations on how children are viewed, including the child in neo-liberal contexts invite us to address the ways children are thought of and placed in societal contexts with connections to social justice and children’s well-being. This study proposes Nussbaum’s (2011) Capability Approach and draws connections from Bernstein’s pedagogical rights, to highlight a different view on childhood inviting the narrative for policy makers to make new considerations that support children’s well-being in schools and educational contexts.