The Well-Being of Children: Philosophical and Social Scientific Approaches 9783110450521, 9783110450514

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Gottfried Schweiger, Gunter Graf (Eds.) The Well-Being of Children Philosophical and Social Scientific Approaches

Gottfried Schweiger, Gunter Graf (Eds.)

The Well-Being of Children

Philosophical and Social Scientific Approaches

Managing Editor: Anna Michalska Language Editors: Sarah Hanagarth, P. Christian Adamski

Published by De Gruyter Open Ltd, Warsaw/Berlin Part of Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Munich/Boston

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 license, which means that the text may be used for non-commercial purposes, provided credit is given to the author. For details go to http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/.

Copyright © 2015 Gottfried Schweiger, Gunter Graf and chapters’ contributors ISBN: 978-3-11-045051-4 e-ISBN: 978-3-11-045052-1 Bibliographic information published by the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; detailed bibliographic data are available in the Internet at http://dnb.dnb.de. Managing Editor: Anna Michalska Language Editors: Sarah Hanagarth, P. Christian Adamski www.degruyteropen.com Cover illustration: © Zurijetae

Contents Acknowledgments Preface

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List of Contributors

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Gunter Graf & Gottfried Schweiger Introduction: Conceptualizing Children’s Well-Being

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Section I: Theories and Concepts of Children’s Well-Being Gunter Graf 1 Conceptions of Childhood, Agency and the Well-Being of Children 1.1 Introduction 20 1.2 The Social Construction of Childhood 21 1.3 Children as Equals? 26 1.4 Agency and Well-being 29 1.5 Conclusion 31 References 32

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Tatjana Višak 2

Does Welfare Trump Freedom? A Normative Evaluation of Contextualism 34 about how to Promote Welfare 2.1 Introduction 34 2.2 Childhood Obesity 34 2.3 Childhood Obesity as a Welfare Problem 36 2.4 Contextualism About How to Promote Welfare 39 2.5 Defending Contextualism in the Case of Childhood Obesity Prevention Against a Normative Challenge 42 2.6 Is Childhood Obesity a Special Case? 44 2.7 Conclusion 46 References 46 Tim Moore 49 3 Keeping them in Mind 3.1 Introduction 49 3.2 Competing Conceptualisations and the Challenges of Researching Children 49

My Study 53 Reflexivity as a Process Through Which Theoretical and Procedural Challenges might be Navigated 53 3.5 Re-Considering Vulnerability and Incompetence Reflexively 54 3.5.1 The Influence of Vulnerable Conceptions 56 3.6 (Re)considering Vulnerability Reflexively 57 3.7 Negotiating Risks with Ethics Committees 57 3.7.1 Managing Researchers’ Vulnerabilities 58 3.7.2 Encouraging Conversations about Vulnerability and Children within the Broader Research Field 58 3.7.3 Children’s Competence and Incompetence 59 3.8 Reconsidering Children’s Competence 60 3.8.1 Children’s Competence Greater than Suggested 62 3.8.2 The Influence of Incompetent Conceptions 63 3.9 (Re)considering Competence Reflexively 63 3.9.1 Being Aware of one’s own Theoretical, Ontological and Epistemological Position 63 3.9.2 Considering Methodologies and Methods 64 3.9.3 Reflecting on Power 65 3.9.4 Considering Competence within the Field 65 References 66 3.3 3.4

Bill Gardner 4 The Developmental Capability Model of Child Well-Being 68 4.1 Development and Capabilities 68 4.2 Developmental Capability Well-Being and Justice 73 4.3 Implications for the Care of Children 79 4.4 Conclusion 81 References 81 Gottfried Schweiger 84 5 Justice and Children’s Well-Being and Well-Becoming 5.1 Introduction 84 5.2 The Goals of Justice: Well-Being and Well-Becoming 84 5.3 Choosing Dimensions of Well-Being and Well-Becoming and the Currency of Justice 88 5.4 Pluralism and the Rule of Justice 92 5.5 Conclusions 94 References 95

Section II: Children Well-Being and Well-Becoming Amy Clair 6

Conceptualising Child versus Adult Well-Being: Schooling and Employment 98 6.1 Introduction 98 6.2 Engagement 99 6.2.1 Employee Engagement and Job Quality 99 6.2.2 School Engagement and Connectedness 101 6.3 The Happy-Productive Worker Hypothesis 103 6.4 A Brief Summary of Existing School/Subjective Well-Being Research 105 6.5 Do Differences between Children and Adults Undermine this Comparison? 106 6.6 Can this Comparison be Used to Influence Education Policy? References 109

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Alexander Bagattini 113 7 Male Circumcision and Children’s Interests 7.1 Introduction 113 7.2 Circumcision and the Bodily Integrity of the Child 115 7.3 Circumcision and Future Interests of the Child 117 7.3.1 Sexual Flourishing of the Future Adult 118 7.3.2 Autonomy 119 7.4 The Benefits of Circumcision 122 7.5 Conclusion 125 References 126 Mar Cabezas 129 Children’s Mental Well-Being and Education Healthy Bodies and Healthy Minds: Why do Children Need Mental Well-Being? 129 8.2 Some Changes in our Educational Systems: Three Promising Attempts? 131 8.3 Psychology and Ethics in Mental Well-Being: Before a How You Need a What 136 8.4 Conclusion 140 References 140 8 8.1

Matteo D’Emilione, Giovannina Giuliano & Paloma Vivaldi Vera 9

Will Children of Social Care Services Users be Future Users? Results of a Pilot Research in Rome 142 9.1 Introduction 142 9.2 MACAD Rationale: How the Model Works and How it Could be Developed 144 9.2.1 From the Capability Approach to Ecological Systems Theory: the Child at the Centre of the Development Process 147 9.3 Families’ Capabilities and Children’s Well-being: Results of Empirical Investigation 149 9.4 Policy-making and children’s well-being: lessons and concluding remarks 156 References 159 List of Figures

161

List of Tables

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Index

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Acknowledgments First and foremost, we would like to thank our colleagues who participated in the workshop “The Well-Being of Children: Theory, Practice and Policy” ­– which was a part of the MANCEPT Workshops in Political Theory 2013 – who have subsequently contributed their chapters to this book. We learned a lot from the discussions in Manchester and from reading our colleagues’ papers. Furthermore, we want to thank our home institutions, the Centre for Ethics and Poverty Research at the University of Salzburg and the international research centre for social and ethical questions (ifz), and their director, Clemens Sedmak. We are also grateful to the Austrian Science Fund (FWF) for funding our research project “Social Justice and Child Poverty” (P 26480), providing us with the opportunity to realize this book. We hope that our work is not only a contribution to the academic discussion, but also helps to make the world a better place for children.

Preface The last few years have seen an increasing interest in the topic of well-being across different disciplines. Questions of measurement and such regarding the normative value of well-being for theories of justice have been widely discussed. Furthermore, it has been acknowledged that these theoretical considerations interlink with questions of policy design and political practice. Children are special in many aspects: it is a widely shared understanding that children are not able to fully understand their situation, that they are limited in their ability to make reasonable decisions about themselves and their actions, that they do not always act in their best interest, that they need the help and guidance of adults, and that they need special protection from various harms and from making wrong choices. It is further well studied that well-being during childhood has a significant influence on the entirety of a child’s future life and adulthood. These factors make the well-being of children a topic of importance but also one that is confronted with many conceptual, normative and methodological difficulties that need to be addressed by different disciplines. As such, the papers in our volume are divided into two sections: the first section consists of papers that deal with conceptual issues and discuss how the well-being of children can and should be grasped in a meaningful sense. The second part of the book deals with practical issues, specific cases and social environments in which the well-being and well-becoming of children is secured or endangered.

List of Contributors Gunter Graf is a research fellow at the international research centre for social and ethical questions (ifz) in Salzburg, and a postdoctoral researcher at the Centre for Ethics and Poverty Research (CEPR) of the University of Salzburg, where he works on the project “Social Justice and Child Poverty”. He is also a temporary lecturer at the Department of Philosophy at the Faculty of Cultural and Social Sciences of the University of Salzburg. He mainly works in political and social philosophy, with a focus on the capability approach and its relation to poverty and children. Email: [email protected] Gottfried Schweiger is a senior researcher at the Centre for Ethics and Poverty Research, University of Salzburg, where he is the principal investigator of the project “Social Justice and Child Poverty” (funded by the FWF Austrian Science Fund). He has published on poverty, unemployment, recognition, social justice, tax justice, and justice in professional sports. Email: [email protected] Alexander Bagattini is an assistant professor in Philosophy at the University of Düsseldorf. His areas of research and teaching are in the ethical implications of the concept of child well-being, children’s rights, philosophy of education and environmental ethics. He is also the principal investigator in the interdisciplinary research project ‟Child Well-Being as a Collective Interpretive Pattern” which is funded by the BMBF (German Federal Ministry for Education and Research / Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung). Email: [email protected] Mar Cabezas earned her PhD in philosophy from the University of Salamanca (2012) and specialized in the role of emotions in moral reasoning. She has an M.A. in Human Rights and is an expert in the Psychological Effects of Child Mistreatment (UNED, 2011). Currently, she is a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Salzburg on the project “Social Justice and Child Poverty”. Email: [email protected] Amy Clair is a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Oxford currently researching health, housing and well-being. She recently completed her PhD in education and child subjective well-being at the University of York. Email: amy.clair@sociology. ox.ac.uk Matteo D’Emilione, Giovanna Giuliano & Paloma Vivaldi Vera are researchers at the Institute for the Development of Vocational Training of Workers in Rome, Department of Social Policy. Email: [email protected]

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 List of Contributors

William Gardner is a child psychologist and statistician. He is a senior research scientist at the Research Institute of the Children’s Hospital of Eastern Ontario. He was previously professor of paediatrics, obstetrics & gynaecology, and community health and epidemiology at Dalhousie University and professor of paediatrics, psychology, and psychiatry at the Ohio State University. He has published extensively on children’s mental health, on psychiatric measurement, and on research ethics. His work has been supported by the US National Institutes of Health, the Agency for Health Research and Quality, and the Canadian Institute for Health Research. Email: [email protected] Tim Moore is a senior research fellow at the Institute of Child Protection Studies based at Australian Catholic University in Melbourne. He has conducted research in the areas of homelessness, young caring, juvenile justice, out of home care and Aboriginal youth. He has not only published extensively on these and related topics but also helped design participatory processes, supporting children and young people to actively shape, facilitate, evaluate and lead projects that directly impact on their lives. Email: [email protected] Tatjana Višak is a postdoc researcher at Mannheim University, Germany. She was previously a researcher and lecturer at various Dutch universities and at the Centre for Human Bioethics of Monash University, Australia. Her research focuses on value theory, normative theory and applied ethics. Email: [email protected]

Gunter Graf & Gottfried Schweiger

Introduction: Conceptualizing Children’s Well-Being The chapters in this volume are concerned with the adequate conceptualization and study of children’s well-being. Together, they do not present a coherent theory of children’s well-being but rather show the many different perspectives from which it can be approached. They are concerned with some of the key issues and problems that need to be addressed but certainly not with all that there are. This volume does not aim for completeness in regard to its main topic and it seems questionable if this could ever be a goal worth aspiring for. Children’s well-being is a highly complex, multi-dimensional and interdisciplinary issue, a multi-faceted concept that spans the whole variety of children’s lives and the social contexts in which they are embedded. It can be approached from different theoretical perspectives and conceptualized by means of a variety of sources. Three of them which are often found in the literature and which also have their place in this book are needs, rights and capabilities (Axford 2012). They accentuate different aspects of the well-being concept and have all been recognized as important policy objectives in children’s services. However, their exact meanings and relationships to each other are still the object of debate, even if it has to be recognized that each of them has to play a role in a comprehensive theory on the well-being of children. As such, the main goal of this volume is to highlight a few issues connected to and surrounding the well-being of children and the theorizing about it. The contribution of philosophy to this research of children’s well-being is relatively new but growing and we do hope that the philosophical chapters in this volume show that they are promising. In this introduction we want to give not only an overview of the chapters but also a short outline of some key issues in the recent discussions on children’s well-being and how they are reflected in the course of this volume. These are first, the aforementioned multidimensionality of children’s well-being and why it is best approached from an interdisciplinary perspective that aims to incorporate knowledge from different disciplines. A second issue is what is called the ecology of children’s well-being and that children’s lives are surrounded and shaped by different types of social environments (family, neighbourhood, political and legal system etc.). The third issue is the interrelation of children’s well-being and well-becoming. Research should not only be concerned with how children actually live but how this affects their growing up and their later life without viewing children only as adults-to-be. Finally, we want to discuss the relation between children’s well-being and ethics, in the sense that well-being and well-becoming are always not only descriptive and explanatory concepts but normative and prescriptive as well.

© 2015 Gunter Graf & Gottfried Schweiger This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 License.

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 Introduction: Conceptualizing Children’s Well-Being

Multidimensionality and Interdisciplinarity In recent years, there has been an increasing interest in the well-being of children. Many academic contributions to the field have been made by a variety of disciplines and it is acknowledged that these theoretical considerations interlink with questions of policy design and political practice (Axford 2012). In fact, children’s well-being is a concept that can now be found in many documents and is frequently discussed in public debates about children (McAuley and Rose 2010). Today, while there is no clear-cut and unanimous definition of its exact meaning and scope, one insight is well-established, one which also finds support in this book: there are many aspects that are of importance to a child’s life, and an adequate understanding of a child’s well-being must be able to do justice to this multidimensionality (Ben-Arieh et al. 2014). Health, safety, social inclusion, material security, education and the child’s satisfaction with life as a whole are a few examples of such aspects. These aspects are frequently found in concepts of child well-being, and all have to be integrated and acknowledged in their own right. This does not mean that it is of no value to study or analyse just one or more selected domain(s); such studies can indeed be relevant for many important purposes and in fact, practical constraints often limit the range of studies and projects. But a comprehensive picture of the well-being of children must include a variety of dimensions and set them in relation to each other. Such a multidimensional approach, as we suggest it here, is intuitively plausible and fits well with our considered judgements when evaluating the life of a child. This becomes particularly clear when we think about it in terms of compensation. If a child, for instance, has wealthy parents and a stable social network but a lack of mental health, it would be inadequate and objectionable to argue that the high achievement in some domains compensates the problems in another. In fact, the goal of achieving wellbeing in such a case is tantamount to targeting the mental health issue, irrespective of achievements in the other dimensions. Of course, this might be more easily achieved if the social environment is supportive and if financial issues do not constitute a barrier. But still, such examples show that there are good reasons that the different elements of a child’s well-being should be valued individually and that one should be careful with trade-offs between them or with attempts to reduce them to one single measure for the sake of theoretical simplicity or easier policy recommendations. By reducing the complexity, there is a risk of distorting our everyday experiences too much, missing central aspects of social realities. Furthermore, recognizing the multidimensionality and the different layers of wellbeing brings to our attention the many connections and interdependencies between the different domains that matter. In this way, a basis for a differentiated empirical analysis can be provided, which can eventually have a direct impact on improving the well-being of children and corresponding policy recommendations. On the one hand, such an approach provides the framework for identifying those disadvantages for well-being which have particularly “corrosive” effects in that they negatively



The Ecology of Children’s Well-Being 

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influence other domains of well-being and development. On the other, it points to those elements of a child’s life which are likely to have ample positive impacts on the child’s situation and which should therefore be fostered and secured with priority (Wolff and De-Shalit 2007). In this sense, a multidimensional approach to children’s well-being can be considered an “analytical tool” necessary for an effective and target-oriented social policy for children. Amongst all these considerations, the perspective of the child herself must not be forgotten (Alderson 2008). Often enough judgements about the well-being of children are made by adults – parents, researchers, policy makers etc. – without considering the voices of those who are the subject of the discourse: children. Here enters another important aspect of the multidimensional nature of the well-being of children. There are both objective and subjective dimensions that count and that provide valuable insights. Objective dimensions refer to goods or states of a person which are considered valuable without taking the person’s point of view into account, while subjective ones rely on the perceptions and evaluations of the person in question (Ben-Arieh 2010). It is still the subject of scholarly debate how objective and subjective dimensions should be balanced against each other, an especially important question in those circumstances in which they conflict. But some of the chapters of this book strengthen the argument that children have to be involved in the conceptualization of their well-being and that their points of view and experiences provide an irreducible element of it. Well-being is always related to subjective well-being even if it should not be reduced to it. These few remarks already indicate that researching and theorizing about the well-being of children should not be limited to one single discipline. The well-being of children touches on many different facets of a child’s life and happens at the intersection between individual agency and its cultural and social embeddedness. Accordingly it must be approached from a variety of angles, combining different sources of knowledge and ways of thinking. Due to different methodologies and research paradigms, such an endeavour is challenging and not likely to lead to a clear cut, coherent and complete theory. However, only constant interdisciplinary debate will further deepen our understanding of the well-being of children and the ways it can be improved, and this book should be read as one contribution to this overall aim.

The Ecology of Children’s Well-Being Many researchers have looked at children and their development from a rather individualistic perspective (James, Jenks, and Prout 1998). They have researched and defined different stages of development, looked at those factors which are beneficial or disadvantageous for the process of growing up, and have differentiated between a variety of areas of development, e.g. physical, cognitive, emotional and psychosocial. Of course it has been recognized for a long time that

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 Introduction: Conceptualizing Children’s Well-Being

there is an interaction between the individual child and his environment and that, for example, close and loving relationships with parents or care-givers are an important element of a child’s well-being and development. However, the wider embeddedness of a child in different spheres, systems and norms of a society has been neglected in the study of children until fairly recently. In the meanwhile this has changed and one of the blooming fields of childhood studies relates to the complex relationships between the individual child and the different social spheres she is part of. Pioneered by Uri Bronfenbrenner (Bronfenbrenner 1979), such an ecological model is now seen as the point of reference in the literature on the wellbeing of children and has been developed further by many others (Aldgate 2010). It is now acknowledged that we need to recognize a variety of layers and complex social groupings and norms which all influence the individual child and which have to be taken into account when theorizing her well-being. Among them are not only the immediate environment and the close family which were traditionally in the focus of research on children, but also the extended family, friendships and peers, the neighbourhood, networks, the family’s social status and the state with its systems and institutions. Furthermore, the culture within which a child grows up is now critically analysed by scholars and many aspects of a society’s way of treating its children, which have generally been taken for granted are now being challenged and scrutinized. For example, social hierarchies based on age are critically reflected and discourses emphasizing innocence, ignorance and vulnerability as “natural” characteristics of children, justifying their weaker social positions, are questioned (Mayall 2002). This shift in the approach towards the study of children, making their ecology a central object of investigation, also becomes apparent if we look at the scientific disciplines interested in children. While traditionally psychology and biology were seen to provide the most important knowledge for understanding a child’s life, development and learning, nowadays many other disciplines show that they can contribute to our understanding of the lives of children. History, anthropology, sociology and many more have put children and childhood on their research agenda, asking their specific questions and addressing them with their own methodologies and approaches. With this we do not want to suggest that psychological and biological knowledge has become replaced or outdated or that it may be neglected in the study of the well-being of children. In particular, many insights of development psychology are still valid and are an important source of knowledge. Rather we claim in line with recent developments that there are simply more perspectives on children’s lives which are valuable, that children are always social actors with particular places in the different systems of the society they are part of and that it is therefore crucial to analyse childhood as a social phenomenon, too. Such an approach widens our perspectives and points to the importance of looking at children’s lives in combination with other variables of social analyses such as class, gender, or ethnicity (James and Prout 1997). Accordingly, it becomes clear that in a society, children live and grow up in highly diverse circumstances



Well-Being and Well-Becoming 

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which leads to the consequence that many authors state that it is better to talk about “childhoods” in the plural. This insight gets further support if we approach the issue from an international and cross-cultural point of view which confirms the variety of manners in which childhood is recognized and institutionalized (Weisner 2014). The role of an ecological perspective in the well-being of children is therefore twofold. On the one hand it contributes on a conceptual level by pointing to the many social and cultural constructions present in theorizing about children and their families and by reminding us that individual development happens in a context constituted by a variety of systems, norms and relationships. On the other, it is of great importance for practical matters. There are many stakeholders in the child’s environment that matter and individuals can only flourish if they are provided with adequate conditions. Measures to improve the well-being of children must therefore take the entire ecology of a child into account. It is essential that different systems interact so that effective and lasting results can be achieved.

Well-Being and Well-Becoming So far we have discussed child well-being as a multi-dimensional and ecological concept. But it is furthermore a dynamic and developmental concept, closely connected to well-becoming. Well-being refers to the actual state of a child, while well-becoming is concerned with the transition from one state of being to another. Obviously, childhood is a phase of constant change and development – physiological, mental and social – and children will not be children for their lifetime, but become adults (Aldgate et al. 2006). They are growing, developing skills and self-relations; they learn to interact with others and how to behave in different settings. Well-being demands that this process is one in which the material, physical, and mental and emotional needs of the child are met, while well-becoming demands that it happens in a way that supports that these needs – which change and develop themselves – are also met in a later stage of life, and possibly over the whole life course. Well-being and well-becoming are connected through various biological, psychological and social channels and it is reasonable to conceptualize the well-being of children in a way that includes their well-becoming right from the beginning (Ben-Arieh et al. 2014). This implies that it is not only essential to define certain developmental stages and benchmarks that should be reached and operationalized to help guide policies and the work with children, but also to develop an understanding of what is a worthy and good adult life; a task that demands integrating knowledge from different disciplinary perspectives, and from children and adults themselves. Childhood heavily influences adulthood and the whole future life course (Settersten Jr, McClelland, and Miao 2014). Nearly all the competencies and freedoms that are valued in adulthood – such as being a productive member of society and

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 Introduction: Conceptualizing Children’s Well-Being

an engaged citizen, or being educated and autonomous – have to be grounded and developed in childhood. Therefore there are very good reasons to guide the interactions of children with their environment, enabling them to enjoy a variety of freedoms in adulthood. In fact, it would be unjust to deprive children of a wide range of support to acquire the relevant competencies through comprehensive measures in social and family policy, education and health care. There is overwhelming evidence that growing-up in ill-being – for example because of ill-health, maltreatment, neglect or a lower socio-economic position – leads to ill-being in later life and is one major reason for sustaining inequalities (Duncan and Brooks-Gunn 1997). In fact, equality of opportunity in many different areas is decided in childhood. But childhood is not only a preparatory stage that one should be interested in because we want productive adults who enjoy well-being. Childhood is of intrinsic value and valuable to children qua children. A focus on the well-becoming of children and their future lives should not be instrumentalised, ignoring the child’s current well-being. A good childhood is certainly not to be judged only by looking at the outcomes in later life, but also by the way children live as children, taking among other things their subjective experiences and happiness into account. Especially participatory approaches and the shift to focus on the subjective perspectives of children on their own lives appear promising in this regard (Hill et al. 2004).

Children’s Lives and Justice We have laid out a multi-dimensional, ecological concept of well-being in relation to the well-becoming of children. But why should one – researchers, social workers, policy makers – be interested in the well-being of children in the first place? Are there reasons to prioritize it and to give it special attention compared to other societal challenges? These questions cannot be answered by interrogating the theoretical and empirical work on child well-being alone, but they demand an ethical perspective (Archard and Macleod 2002). Implicitly, we suppose, nearly all research on child well-being and practical work with children is driven by such ethical convictions that parents, teachers, politicians etc. owe children a good life and that it is morally bad if children suffer from ill-being that is avoidable. The concepts of well-being and well-becoming themselves are based on ethical assumptions about what is morally right and good or just. Without such normative reasoning the definition of comprehensive concepts of well-being and well-becoming would be impossible, because they guide our understanding of what a good life for children should look like and what adults and society as a whole should enable children to be, do and become (Biggeri and Mehrotra 2011). This is a matter of justice for children and how the institutions and the distribution of benefits and burdens should be designed (Graf and Schweiger 2015, Macleod 2010). Children are special subjects of



Children’s Lives and Justice 

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justice and this care for children is driven by such interrelated concepts as vulnerability, innocence and incompetence. They justify a particular concern for children’s well-being and well-becoming and why paternalism – in a more comprehensive way than it is justified towards adults – is the right way to fashion the relationship between children, adults and institutions. Every human being is vulnerable to physiological, psychological and social harm and infringements. In this respect adults and children are very similar and the question is in what respect children are more vulnerable, or vulnerable in a different way (Dixon and Nussbaum 2012). The concept of childhood encompasses a wide range of developmental stages and age groups, from newborns to adolescents, and the vulnerability to certain dangers differs largely between them. Still, a very generalised account can highlight several dimensions of children’s greater vulnerability. First, the bodies and minds of children are “weaker” and less robust. Bodily injuries, mental stress, maltreatment and exploitation can severely harm them (Trickett et al. 2011). Second, children are less competent and have limited capacities in comparison to adults. They have fewer abilities and opportunities to shape their lives – if they are very young this is nearly impossible for them. Third, they are more dependent on adults for their well-being and well-becoming and they are limited in their capacities to protect themselves. This greater dependency that is certainly obvious for young children and which declines over time as children grow older and become mature, makes them more vulnerable. They are in an economically and socially weaker position and their world is largely dominated by patterns and institutions that they have no control over and which they can only influence to a small degree. Hence, it is a common understanding that children are responsible for their well-being to a much lesser extent than adults. They are born into a family, neighbourhood and society which they have not chosen and from the very beginning they are influenced by these social contexts. Children are more vulnerable and incompetent than adults and are less responsible for their well-being – these assumptions hold in general, despite there being differences between children and the fact that many adults are also in similar positions. Nonetheless, such assumptions may also be misused to treat children wrongly and to suppress them, e.g. if children are treated as mere objects without opportunities to be heard and to participate in decision-making processes. Hence, it is important – and this will be shown several times in this volume – that children do have certain competencies, that they have their own wishes and perceptions, and that these need to be respected. Because of their position in a world that is full of potential dangers for them, our concern for children is justified; the best way to address our concern is to take care of children in a paternalistic manner. This means that their well-being and well-becoming become the central focus and acquire a higher value than the choices of children without downplaying them. This paternalism raises the question of who is responsible for the well-being of children and to what extent (Macleod 2007).

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 Introduction: Conceptualizing Children’s Well-Being

About the Chapters in this Volume The papers in our volume are divided into two sections: the first section consists of papers that deal with conceptual issues and discuss how the well-being of children can and should be grasped in a meaningful sense. The second part of the book deals with practical issues, specific cases and social environments in which the well-being and well-becoming of children is secured or endangered. The first chapter by Gunter Graf, “Conceptions of Childhood, Agency and the Well-Being of Children” stems from the observation that different societies possess diverse conceptions of childhood. They differ in their assessment of when it begins, ends, how it should be divided and which dimensions are relevant when demarcating it from adulthood. Therefore, the commonly held conviction that childhood and the way we deal with children is a simple and natural fact of the way human beings develop has been seriously challenged – childhood and the social norms we associate with it are contingent and indeed the notion of the “social construction of childhood” has become widespread in the social scientific literature. However, as Graf shows, the importance and normative implications of these insights are still unclear and there is considerable disagreement between different theoreticians about what the considerable social component in any conception of childhood means for the evaluation of the well-being of children and, from a moral point of view, the way children are treated in modern western societies. While some argue that the focus on protection and the stress of children’s vulnerability as key components of the way a good childhood is conceived in many contemporary states constitutes clear moral progress, others are sceptical and defend the view that children are one of the last oppressed groups in need of liberation. In this chapter, Graf discusses some aspects of these different approaches, focusing particularly on the role of children’s agency for their well-being. In the first part the author engages with key texts of the sociology of childhood and the social constructivist thesis of childhood. It will be shown that children are indeed social agents influencing their own lives and those of the persons in their environment in many ways and that power relations are an important category in considering the relationship between children and adults. In the second part, however, he argues that a strict interpretation of the mentioned sociological thesis yields to a relativist position that must be refuted. Children are not small adults and the way they perform their agency is crucially different from the agency of mature adults. In particular, agency in the moral domain can only happen under certain conditions and on the basis of certain competencies children usually lack or possess to a lesser degree than adults. It is argued that such a concept of moral agency provides a helpful guideline for understanding the crucial difference between children and adults that holds in any cultural context, even if the specific demarcations may be considerably different. In the concluding third section, Graf indicates that there are good reasons that the two discussed approaches to children’s agency and their wellbeing – a sociological one challenging many cultural assumptions in the treatment



About the Chapters in this Volume 

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of children, and a philosophical one focusing on the good of moral agency – should engage seriously with the other in order to do justice to the complexities of childhood. The second chapter by Tatjana Višak, “Does welfare trump freedom? A normative evaluation of contextualism about how to promote welfare”, examines childhood obesity as a welfare problem and defends contextualism when dealing with how to prevent childhood obesity and thereby promoting child welfare. Contextualism is the view that promoting welfare is not only – and perhaps not even primarily – a matter of individual choice, but most importantly a matter of being situated in the right social and physical context. The structure of the chapter is as follows: After a short introduction, Višak introduces in section 2 the case of childhood obesity. In section 3 she points out that, according to all common accounts of welfare, childhood obesity is a welfare problem. In section 4, she introduces contextualism in dealing with how to promote welfare. In section 5, she defends contextualism as a way of preventing childhood obesity against its major normative challenge, which is the criticism that maintaining or creating the relevant contexts might diminish the child’s option freedom. In section 6, she tentatively explores whether her defence of contextualism generalizes to adults and to the prevention of other welfare problems. Thus, Višak will not establish in her chapter the superiority of contextualism over individualism, which is an empirical issue; instead, she illustrates what contextualism as an empirical claim about how best to promote welfare amounts to. Furthermore, she defends contextualism in the specific case of childhood obesity prevention against a normative challenge and briefly explores whether this defence of contextualism generalizes to other contexts. Tim Moore presents in his contribution “Keeping them in Mind” a study which provided a group of experienced researchers the opportunity to reflect on their practice and the practice of research with children in Australia; to consider how they understand children and childhood and how their research is underpinned and influenced by the assumptions they hold. It asked researchers to consider how factors in the research environment (i.e. funding bodies, ethics committees, the broader academic field) influenced their research practice, for example the tensions that they have encountered and how they navigated their way through the often complex and “messy” world of children’s research. This chapter argues for and stresses the importance of reflexive practice as an endeavour for the individual practitioner, for teams of researchers and for the broader academic field within which research is conducted. It provides a critical analysis of past and current practice. The premise is that the way children are constructed by individual researchers and within the teams, systems and academic fields within which they conduct research will ultimately affect the type of research commissioned, the methodologies adopted and the level of engagement children enjoy throughout the research process. Exploring notions of vulnerability, competence and participation, the author will account for researchers’ approaches and the ethical, methodological and ideological challenges that emerge. Finally, Moore presents a reflexive practice framework that might be used by future

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children’s researchers to account for their theoretical assumptions and to ensure methodological and ethical transparency. This framework encourages the active participation of children not only in the design and implementation of research activities but in reflexive practice activities and, ultimately, in the co‐construction of new knowledge and theory. In his chapter, “The Developmental Capability Model of Child Well-Being”, Bill Gardner aims to rethink how the capability approach applies to children in light of recent social scientific theorizing by James Heckman, who has recently adopted capability language in his writing. Theorists of justice, including capability theorists, have not sufficiently appreciated the importance of the fact that human capabilities develop over time. Gardner argues that a developmental reconceptualization of capabilities has significant implications for how we think about children’s well-being, how we think about justice, and about how we should organize and carry out human services for children in light of these conceptions of well-being and justice. Gardner focuses on the concept of kernel capabilities, meaning that they are prerequisite to the development of a wide range of other capabilities. For example, being able to manage negative emotions is a capability that is essential to functioning in many contexts, understanding the rules of chess is required for functioning in only a few. The capability approach asserts that having capabilities creates a wide space of potential functioning, which is one meaning of freedom. Failure to develop a kernel capability would inhibit the development of many other capabilities. Preventable impairments in kernel capabilities are thus restrictions of freedom and prima facie unjust. This suggests that interpersonal comparisons of capabilities should include a focus on kernel capabilities. Finally, Gardner also discusses the policy consequences of such a commitment to reducing inequality in children’s developmental trajectories on kernel capabilities in the area of paediatrics. In the last chapter of the first part of this book, “Justice and Children’s Well-Being and Well-Becoming”, Gottfried Schweiger examines the role that the concepts of wellbeing and well-becoming can play in the design of a theory of justice for children. He argues that well-being and well-becoming can serve as the ultimate goals of justice for children, as they allow us to better understand the specific needs of children as agents of justice and their embeddedness in certain social contexts, and they can guide the selection of the currency of justice and the rule of their distribution. Drawing from the critical theory of recognition of Axel Honneth and Amartya Sen’s capability approach, Schweiger claims that the currency of justice should be those capabilities and functionings that comprise the well-being and well-becoming of children. Such a list does not have to be final but should be drafted based on the best empirical evidence available, bearing in mind that children’s lives and futures are shaped by the environments they live and grow up in and the different institutions and agents they interact with. Ideally these allow children to be heard and involved, giving them space to make their own choices; the goal should be to support and protect children’s current well-being and to support them in their development into autonomous



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adults with sufficient levels of well-being. Furthermore, Schweiger concludes that justice for children, if it wants to be comprehensive, should incorporate a pluralism of rules of distribution that are applied to the certain capabilities and functionings that are important for the well-being and well-becoming of children. The tripartite differentiation of David Miller can provide a good starting point in this matter, and one that concurs with the main assumption of the recognition approach that children have a claim for the experience of all three forms of recognition – care, esteem and respect. Such rules also reflect the developmental dimension of justice that is expressed in its orientation on the well-being and well-becoming of children. The rules themselves – sufficiency, equality and desert – are of importance for children and express their moral and political status. The second part of the book is opened by a contribution of Amy Clair, “Conceptualising Child versus Adult Well-Being: Schooling and Employment”. She investigates the differences between the well-being of children and that of adults, focusing on the comparison between the effects of schooling on the well-being of children and employment on the well-being of adults. Research has identified ways in which employment quality and experiences are related to the well-being of adults. For example the happy-productive worker hypothesis has been used to demonstrate a relationship between subjective well-being and productivity, while other research has found a relationship between employment quality and subjective well-being which gave the unexpected result that, contrary to common belief, poor employment can be more detrimental to an individual’s subjective well-being than unemployment. Clair examines whether such hypotheses can be used in relation to children’s experiences of school. And if so, can they be used to justify increased interest in the effects of schooling on children beyond educational attainment to broader well-being measures at a time when political discourse regarding education is heavily focused on standards? Clair gives an overview of findings from a range of secondary, quantitative data sources regarding the relationship between schools and child subjective wellbeing, primarily using multilevel modelling. These findings will then be discussed in relation to the existing knowledge regarding adult well-being and employment, and in relation to the difficulties associated with measuring the well-being of children as opposed to adults. Using data from 7 year-olds, analysis so far shows a significant relationship between the school a child attends and the level of subjective well-being that they report. However, the results also show a negative relationship between subjective well-being and attainment at this age, which can potentially be seen as evidence that the happy-productive worker hypothesis does not apply to children in school ‘producing’ good examination results. However, it seems likely that this will vary with age as the importance of educational attainment increases, and so further analysis will investigate this alongside other characteristics. Alexander Bagattini discusses in his chapter “Male Circumcision and Children’s Interests” one of the sensitive topics in recent public discussions about children’s well-being and well-becoming. The main aim in his paper is to draw attention to

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the different facets of children’s interests and to how they are related to parental prerogatives in the case of circumcision. Endorsing the liberal standard, he argues that parents should in general decide what is in the best interest of their children; however, as parents may fail to interpret the best interest of their children, sometimes children must be protected against what parents think best for them. Consequently, Bagattini endorses the following claim: by default, parents have the right to decide what is in the best interest of their offspring, which entails having the right to overrule children’s opinions about their own interests. It entails further that this overruling authority of parents can be overridden itself if there is conclusive evidence or if there are fundamental normative reasons for the claim that parents do not act in the best interest of their child. Starting out from this perspective, Bagattini follows Joseph Mazor in that children’s interests in bodily integrity and sexual flourishing (as adults) can be overridden by parental prerogatives in circumcision and in other cases, as long as unreasonable risks for the child are ruled out. Bagattini’s main worry concerning circumcision is that it undermines autonomy as a precondition for permanent bodily modifications. Autonomy is a general and absolute good in the sense that all take part in it and that there is no way of relativizing it. True enough: the liberal standard (in education) is part of our liberal tradition. Moral egalitarianism is, however, part of this tradition as well, and is incompatible with excluding persons from equal rights like the right to exercise their autonomy (in medical as well as in other contexts). Yet if children are circumcised before they can make up their own mind on the matter, they will never have the chance to take a stance, which, in turn, means excluding the persons children are supposed to become from having equal rights. As Bagattini points out in the last part of his chapter, he does not see any putative benefits having the normative force to override this violation of children’s interests. Mar Cabezas’ contribution “Children’s Mental Well-Being and Education” analyses how a holistic approach to health as more than the lack of physical diseases, including mental and social well-being, has led to the need to question the standard curricula offered by public schools, especially if mental health is recognised as a children’s right. Given the high demand by teachers, psychologists, social workers along with other experts with respect to depression, aggressiveness, demotivation etc. among children and young adolescents, three different kinds of programmes have been established during the last two decades: a) emotional intelligence programmes, b) cognitive and positive psychology programmes, and c) social and creativity education programmes. These three main general attempts to include psychological education programs in schools will be summarised briefly as well as their main thesis, strengths and achievements concerning children’s mental well-being. In the last section, their main limits and risks will be considered, shedding some light on the institutional challenges that they still have to face in order to be universally established. The question concerning their normative assumptions when applied to children will be addressed in particular. An excessive euphoric attitude toward their promising results is at risk of putting the ethical education of children in the hands of a non-normative scientific discipline.



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Psychological programmes do in fact offer valuable tools for achieving some ethical goals that affect social interaction and individual well-being. In applying them to children, however, if the moral assumptions are not made explicitly, and are discussed and interiorized by children, these could become ambivalent tools. As a result, if western societies assume a culture of human rights which rejects cruelty and violence, and if our goal is ensuring children’s mental well-being, then we should not forget to integrate philosophical and moral education with emotional and psychological training in order to ensure that children and adolescents are provided with the means to achieve selfrealization, and mental and social well-being in democratic societies. “Will Children of Social Care Services Users be Future Users?” is the title of the last chapter of this book, written by Matteo D’Emilione, Giovanna Giuliano and Paloma Vivaldi Vera. Family is the core place where identity processes are developed, and for this reason, its role is particularly relevant during early childhood development; for example when parents devote time, personal care and support to the well-being of their children, they perform activities which are crucial for the development of their cognitive, language and social skills. Serious crises and persistent adversity, such as poverty, have an impact on the whole family and can disturb the functioning of a family system with ripple effects to all members and their relationships. In a poor and deprived condition, families can become dysfunctional and risk factors can become multiple, compromising the life and the well-being of the most vulnerable. D’Emilione, Giuliano and Vivaldi present results of a primary data collection survey on the poverty of people who benefit from social care services in Rome, with a specific focus on households with children. The chapter by D’Emilione, Giuliano and Vivaldi is based on an original model of multidimensional analysis of poverty that considers a broad set of life domains (house, community, health, emotions, knowledge, income). This model, called MACaD (Multidimensional Analysis of Capability Deprivation) has been developed within the theoretical framework of the Capability Approach (A. Sen, M. Nussbaum) and is focused on the measurement of the degree of individually achieved functionings in each life domain with respect to the possession of tangible and intangible goods according to a specific multidimensional index. To answer the question of how the well-being of children can become a matter of policy and political practice, the results of their survey are useful for two main reasons: first, a significant share of children living in deprived households could become potential social care services users; secondly, contrary to what one might expect (the authors point out again that all the households of the survey are beneficiaries of social services for different reasons), a significant proportion of children are living in households which are able to enter a process of social inclusion. Specifically, deprived households in the sample live in a situation of low income, in a poor community situation (households with few social relations, poor family connectedness, living in relatively depressed urban areas) and low agency achievement. Using a multidimensional analysis, it is therefore possible to focus on those dimensions in which the households are mostly deprived, and to develop policies which can respond more specifically to their needs.

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Lessons Learned: The Future of Well-Being At this stage, we would like to briefly comment on some insights we, as philosophers interested in the moral and political status of children, gained from the debates present in this book, but also were we see the prospects of further developing an interdisciplinary approach to the well-being of children, with a focus on philosophy and the social sciences. In particular, there are four interrelated points which attracted our attention and which have to be taken into account when dealing with the issue at hand. They can be found, in different forms and at different levels in many of the contributions to this book, constituting, as we read it, general results from our joint project. First, the interdisciplinary study on the well-being of children is in need of a high degree of conceptual clarity if it wants to lead to valuable outcomes. The current debates, however, do not always come up to this standard and there is the real danger that representatives of different backgrounds and traditions talk at cross-purposes even if they have the sincere interest to collaborate. Basic concepts such as needs, rights, autonomy, agency or paternalism are used differently across disciplines, generating misunderstandings and communication barriers. Here, philosophy, as we understand it, can be of additional value since one of its main tasks is to get the concepts right. At the same time, it has to acknowledge that a theory of the well-being of children has to do justice to the complexities of the reality and that idealizing too much might lead to an account which does not fit the needs of the real world. Misunderstandings between different disciplines might lead to two different consequences, which are both detrimental to the gain of knowledge. On the one hand, people might disagree about a certain account or dimension of well-being just because they understand the used language differently, while there is, at a deeper analysis no dissent at all. On the other, conceptual confusions might also hide disagreements and sometimes contested issues only arouse if concepts, which appear to have the same meanings, get scrutinized, leading to the result that it becomes clear that there are, in fact, incompatible views to be discussed. As a consequence, attempts to foster interdisciplinary exchange must always be aware of these conceptual difficulties and be very clear about the positions they are defending. Second, any researcher and policy maker has to acknowledge that the well-being of children is a thick concept, embracing normative and descriptive features which cannot be neatly separated. There is no value free approach to the well-being of children, and every concept has to face a plenty of normative challenges. Empirical knowledge alone cannot tell which dimensions are crucial, how they should be weighed against each other or if there are dimensions which are of universal value. When developing an account of well-being, a researcher should therefore be aware of his assumptions and make them explicit. As we all know, questions of value often are difficult to resolve and therefore it is also likely that every concept of the well-being of children be a contested one. However, the respective debates will certainly profit



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if it is made clear from the outset that defining the well-being of children connects to value questions and that it is impossible to reach a “neutral” understanding of the term. To be clear, empirical knowledge has a great part to play and it would also be a fruitless endeavor to address the issue as a purely theoretical matter detached from the empirical world, as some philosophers think it is the right way to do ethical theory. But it seems that the ethical dimension of the concept has been neglected in many disciplines concerned with the study of the well-being of children and it is time for a change in this regard. From the philosophical discussion one can also learn in this respect, that the domain of the normative is certainly not beyond rational scrutiny or a simple matter of taste, as it sometimes seems to be assumed by researchers outside of philosophy. Rather, also in this field arguments can be put forward and a rational discourse cultivated which can lead to reasoned outcomes for the sake of everyone affected. Third, and following from the former considerations, we want to suggest that a comprehensive discussion of the concept of children’s well-being will lead inevitably to questions which are at the heart of political and social philosophy. As the contributions in this book show, there are overwhelming reasons for wellbeing research to go beyond a narrow focus on the individual child and only her most immediate context and to take many different layers of her environment – her ecology – into account. But if this step is taken and the enormous role a child’s social context plays in conceptualizing her well-being acknowledged, researchers will be confronted with issues of justice, inequalities and disadvantage. In most of today’s societies children’s effective chances to live a life in well-being and well-becoming are unequally distributed. The social position they are born into determines to a high degree the levels of well-being they will enjoy, which translate, on an aggregate level at least, to disadvantages positions in adulthood. The concept of well-being certainly is a valuable one for unmasking this situation and there are good reasons to think that it could play an essential part in a critical theory about disadvantage, poverty and social exclusion. Also in this respect the philosophical arguments and social scientific research have the potential to act together for fleshing out the details of such an account, which could be the subject of research attempts in the future. Again, these considerations show how important it is to combine normative reasoning with empirical knowledge and that philosophical and social scientific approaches to the well-being of children should be seen as allies, not only in the gathering of knowledge and the construction of theories but in the pursuit of making our world a better place. This point brings us to a fourth issue, which is central for many chapters of this book. As important as it is to theorize about the well-being of children and to develop a critical normative perspective, one must not forget to translate the often abstract debates into concrete policies and measures which can make a real difference for the affected children and their families. There is a need to develop support programs which effectively improve the well-being of children, paying attention to the concrete contexts they are living. At the same time, it is important that a society keeps in mind

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that it is often its basic structure which produces structural injustices to the detriment of specific groups of children. Also concerning this matter, concrete improvements have to be aimed for. Naturally, it is not the sole responsibility of researchers to work towards the realization of more effective policies. However, they also have a part to play and a responsibility to develop theories which are able to guide the respective processes. These four points represent only a small selection of insights and impulses we got from the interdisciplinary dialogue we started. However, they were certainly important for our understanding of the book’s topic and we hope that they clarify why we are convinced that it is essential to continue the research on the well-being of children for both theoretical and practical purposes.

References Alderson, Priscilla. 2008. Young Children’s Rights Exploring Beliefs, Principles and Practice. London; Philadelphia: Jessica Kingsley Publishers. Aldgate, Jane. 2010. “Child Well-Being, Child Development and Family Life.” In Child Well-Being: Understanding Children’s Lives, 21–38. London / Philadelphia, PA: Jessica Kingsley Publishers. Aldgate, Jane, David Jones, Wendy Rose, and Carole Jeffery, eds. 2006. The Developing World of the Child. 1st ed. London / Philadelphia, PE: Jessica Kingsley Publishers. Archard, David, and Colin M. Macleod, eds. 2002. The Moral and Political Status of Children. 1st ed. Oxford / New York, NY: Oxford University Press. Axford, Nick. 2012. Exploring Concepts of Child Well-Being: Implications for Children’s Services. Bristol: Policy. Ben-Arieh, Asher. 2010. “Developing Indicators for Child Well-Being in a Changing Context.” In Child Well-Being: Understanding Children’s Lives, edited by Wendy Rose and Colette McAuley, 129–42. London / Philadelphia, PA: Jessica Kingsley Publishers. Ben-Arieh, Asher, Ferran Casas, Ivar Frønes, and Jill E. Korbin. 2014. “Multifaceted Concept of Child Well-Being”. In Handbook of Child Well-Being: Theory, Indicators, Measures and Policies, edited by Asher Ben-Arieh, Ferran Casas, Ivar Frønes, and Jill E. Korbin, 1st ed., 1–27. Dordrecht / New York, NY: Springer. Biggeri, Mario, and Santosh Mehrotra. 2011. “Child Poverty as Capability Deprivation: How to Choose Domains of Child Well-being and Poverty”. In Children and the Capability Approach, edited by Mario Biggeri, Jérôme Ballet, and Flavio Comim, 1st ed., 46–75. Basingstoke / New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan. Bronfenbrenner, Urie. 1979. The Ecology of Human Development: Experiments by Nature and Design. Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press. Dixon, Rosalind, and Martha Nussbaum. 2012. “Children’s Rights and a Capabilities Approach: The Question of Special Priority”. Chicago Public Law & Legal Theory Working Paper, Nr. 384. http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2060614. Duncan, Greg, and Jeanne Brooks-Gunn, eds. 1997. Consequences of Growing up Poor. New York: Russell Sage Foundation. Graf, Gunter, and Gottfried Schweiger. 2015. A Philosophical Examination of Social Justice and Child Poverty. 1st ed. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. Hill, Malcolm, John Davis, Alan Prout, and Kay Tisdall. 2004. “Moving the Participation Agenda Forward”. Children & Society 18 (2): 77–96. doi:10.1002/chi.819.

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James, Allison, and Alan Prout, eds. 1997. Constructing and Reconstructing Childhood: Contemporary Issues in the Sociological Study of Childhood. London / Washington, DC: Falmer Press. James, Allison, Chris Jenks, and Alan Prout. 1998. Theorizing Childhood. Cambridge, UK: Polity Press in association with Blackwell Publishers Ltd. Macleod, Colin M. 2007. “Raising Children: Who is Responsible for What?” In Taking responsibility for children, edited by Samantha Brennan and Robert Noggle, 1st ed., 1–18. Studies in childhood and family in Canada. Waterloo: Wilfrid Laurier University Press. ———. 2010. “Primary Goods, Capabilities and Children”. In Measuring Justice – Primary Goods and Capabilities, edited by Harry Brighouse and Ingrid Robeyns, 174–92. Cambridge / New York, NY: Cambridge University Press. Mayall, Berry. 2002. Towards a Sociology for Childhood: Thinking from Children’s Lives. Buckingham ; Philadelphia: Open University Press. McAuley, Colette, and Wendy Rose, eds. 2010. Child Well-Being: Understanding Children’s Lives. 1st ed. London / Philadelphia, PE: Jessica Kingsley Publishers. Settersten Jr, Richard A, Megan M McClelland, and Alicia Miao. 2014. “Child Well-Being and the Life Course”. In Handbook of Child Well-Being: Theory, Indicators, Measures and Policies, edited by Asher Ben-Arieh, Ferran Casas, Ivar Frønes, and Jill E. Korbin, 1st ed., 1679–1711. Dordrecht / New York, NY: Springer. Trickett, Penelope K., Sonya Negriff, Juye Ji, and Melissa Peckins. 2011. “Child Maltreatment and Adolescent Development”. Journal of Research on Adolescence 21 (1): 3–20. doi:10.1111/j.15327795.2010.00711.x.’ Weisner, Thomas S. 2014. “Culture, Context, and Child Well-Being.” In Handbook of Child Well-Being: Theory, Indicators, Measures and Policies, edited by Asher Ben-Arieh, Ferran Casas, Ivar Frones, and Jill E. Korbin, 87–103. Dordrecht / New York, NY: Springer. Wolff, Jonathan, and Avner De-Shalit. 2007. Disadvantage. 1st ed. Oxford Political Theory. Oxford / New York, NY: Oxford University Press.

Section I: Theories and Concepts of Children's WellBeing

Gunter Graf

1 Conceptions of Childhood, Agency and the WellBeing of Children1 1.1 Introduction Historical, ethnological and social scientific research shows that different societies possess diverse conceptions of childhood. They differ in their assessment of when it begins, ends, how it should be divided and which dimensions are relevant when demarcating it from adulthood. Therefore, the often held conviction that childhood and the way we deal with children is a simple and natural fact of the way human beings develop has been seriously challenged – childhood and the social norms we associate with it are contingent and indeed the notion of the “social construction of childhood” has become widespread in the social scientific literature, particular in the influential field called “sociology of childhood”. However, the importance and normative implications of these insights are still unclear and there is considerable disagreement among theoreticians about what the strong social component in any conception of childhood means for the evaluation of the well-being of children and, from a moral point of view, the way children are treated in modern western societies. While some argue that the focus on protection and the emphasis of children’s vulnerability as key components of the way a good childhood is conceived in many contemporary states constitutes clear moral progress, others are sceptical and defend the view that children are one of the last oppressed groups in need of liberation. In this contribution, some aspects of these different approaches will be discussed, particularly focusing on the role of children’s agency for their well-being. In the first section I engage with key texts of the aforementioned sociology of childhood and the related social constructivist thesis of childhood. It will be shown that children are indeed social agents influencing their own lives and those of the persons in their environment in many ways and that power relations are an important category in considering the relationship between children and adults. In the second section, however, it will be argued that a strict interpretation of some of the typical claims sociologists of childhood make yield to radical and untenable consequences that must be refuted. Children are not small adults, a view that is usually also defended in the sociology of childhood, and they should not, with few exceptions, have an adultlike right to authority over their own circumstances. The way (most) children perform their agency is importantly different from the agency of mature adults, something that should be seen as relevant from a moral point of view. In the third, concluding

1 This research was funded by the Austrian Science Fund (FWF), Project: P 26480-G15. © 2015 Gunter Graf This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 License.



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section, it will be indicated that a more modest interpretation of the mentioned sociological view of childhood adds important dimensions to the discussion regarding the moral status of children, which are often overlooked in theories of political and social philosophy. Particularly if philosophers want to engage with pressing problems of the real world, contribute to the improvement of children’s lives and help develop a comprehensive concept of the well-being of children, there are clear merits and helpful insights provided by a child-centred perspective as defended in the sociology of childhood.

1.2 The Social Construction of Childhood Thinking about children in the context of political philosophy is often characterized by some basic and commonsensical assumptions about children (see Cohen 1980, Archard 2004, Sen 2007). It is taken for granted, for example, that children are vulnerable beings progressing with adult help through stages needed to turn them into mature and autonomous adults. They are contrasted, as a group, with adults and described as weaker, less knowledgeable and incompetent, all characteristics that lead to their inability to make good decisions. As a consequence of these assessments it is generally stated that protection and guidance are important concepts for doing justice to the special status of children, and of course it is adults who have to provide the relevant support. In any case, children’s decisions and actions are always seen as suspicious from a prudent point of view. Due to their lack of development, knowledge and stability of character, there is always the chance that they may do the wrong things for the wrong reasons and therefore adult supervision is morally justified and even required. In an important sense the adult point of view is thus privileged over the child’s perspective, assuming also that main aspects of the well-being of children should not be judged and defined by children themselves but by adult members of society. Children just seem to know too little about life and the world they live in to give their opinions too much weight. This does not mean, however, that children should, according to this view, never be consulted or included in decision-making processes, particularly in the private sphere or educational settings, since they have to practice their abilities and become familiarized with situations of choice and responsibilities. But their freedom and right to participation is a limited one: their choices are respected as long as they conform to certain standards, which are defined by adults. In other cases, they are regulated, modified or cancelled. But of course, such interferences are considered to be in the best interest of the child and therefore justified from a moral point of view since they secure the child’s well-being and development of autonomy in the long run. In this context it is interesting to note that there is little discussion in political philosophy about the concept of childhood itself and the aforementioned commonsensical assumptions made. In many cases, it is treated as a self-explaining,

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almost natural category in no need of particular explanation, and if insights are cited, they come from developmental psychology in a Piagetian and Kohlbergian tradition supporting the thesis that children should be best conceptualized via a process of becoming, with adulthood as the normative benchmark (Rawls 1971, Noggle 2002). This is in sharp contrast to other, increasingly popular and highly influential approaches dedicated to the study of children. Particularly in so-called “childhood studies” – and the related field of the “sociology of childhood” – a multidisciplinary focus can be found, combining mainly anthropological, sociological, historical and judicial knowledge about children (Jenks 1982, Mayall 2002, James/Prout 2005). There, one of the main fields of critical inquiry concerns the concept of childhood, its social dimension and the problematic features of many commonsensical assumptions about children. And since many concepts and claims of these research efforts have been very influential both in academia (not so much in philosophy, though) and in policy making at various levels, it is worth asking the question how this discipline conceives children, their agency and well-being and what philosophy could learn from these insights. In particular, there are three important points of the sociology of childhood that are of direct relevance for philosophical thinking about children: the social constructivist thesis of childhood, power structures regulating children’s lives and the emphasis on children’s agency (understood both in a social and a moral sense). In the following I will briefly present these broad issues and try to outline what is central to them. Since there have been many publications in this area over the last three decades, my presentation of the central theses is rather general and cannot discuss them in depth. However, it gives a fair account of them as they are currently discussed in the literature. Firstly, it should be noted that childhood is, according to many researchers in the sociology of childhood, and to use a phrase frequently found in the literature, “socially constructed” (Wyness 1999). This formulation emphasizes that the norms and values associated with the early years of human life vary strongly between different cultures as social scientific, ethnological and historical research clearly shows. Childhood, therefore, is understood as a culturally variable, interpretive frame for understanding a certain life period (James & Prout 2005, 3). And while no specific norms and values connected to this institution seem to be of universal validity (or so it is argued), as far as we know, all known societies have some understanding of childhood as a structural component. Similar to the distinction between sex and gender as introduced by feminist theory, the social construction thesis of childhood seeks to draw attention to the social and normative content of the concept and show that biological facts cannot adequately explain the way social roles are organized in a given society. In the case of children, this means that biological immaturity and childhood are two different things. To capture a central idea behind the motivation of the social constructivist thesis, David Archard introduced the helpful distinction between the concept of childhood and conceptions of childhood (Archard 2004, 27). While the concept of childhood only requires that children are distinguished from



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adults in respect of some unspecified set of attributes, in a conception of childhood these attributes are specified. “In simple terms, to have a concept of ‘childhood’ is to recognize that children differ interestingly from adults; to have a conception of childhood is to have a view of what those interesting differences are” (Archard 2004, 27). And since there are theoretically and practically many ways these specifications can be made, a variety of sometimes contradictory conceptions of childhoods can be found – both around the globe and throughout history. They differ in their assessment of when it begins, ends, how it should be divided and which dimensions are relevant when demarcating it from adulthood (Qvortrup 2005). This finding about the strong social component in any conception of childhood is generally connected by sociologists of childhood to the further thesis that the way children are seen and treated in a given society is changeable. Social relationships are not fixed by biological, psychological and social laws but can be reconstituted on a different basis – or reconstructed as it is often called – through various forms of social and political struggle. And just as women took many years to overcome unjustified oppression that was based on alleged biological “facts”, children are considered to be in need of liberation and equal recognition. This constitutes an ongoing development that still has far to go, even if children’s participation and involvement in different social and political processes is on the agenda of many institutions and there are many projects which try to give children a voice (Lansdown and UNICEF Innocenti Research Centre 2001; Percy-Smith and Thomas 2010; Biggeri, Ballet, and Comim 2011). A second and closely related theme discussed in the sociology of childhood concerns the social status of children as a group, and again, many authors draw on insights from feminism and gender studies and apply them to the case of children (Mayall 2002, Alanen 2005). Authors such as Berry Mayall characterize children as “a minority social group, whose wrongs need righting” (Mayall 2002, 9) and claim that the marginalization of children is often justified in a very similar way as it has happened in the case of women, only that generation has replaced gender as the axis of distinction in an unequal power relationship. Fragility, vulnerability, a lack of strength and inferiority in knowledge and working skills are in both cases categories justifying these groups’ dependency on another, dominant one. The idea that children are best described as a minority group is further sustained by the observation that children hardly have the opportunities to organize themselves on an aggregate, societal and political level (Qvortrup 1990, 84). Even if there have been changes in the last 30 years, in most cases, children’s interests are still represented and defended not by themselves but by adults speaking for them. Particularly in school, one of the most important institutions in a child’s life, unequal power relations are obvious - not just between a specific class and its teachers but more generally in that the institution as a whole sets standards of normality and development that cannot be questioned by the pupils (Mayall 1994, 3). Empirical investigations also show that children ‟see themselves as a group vis-à-vis the adult group, and as a group whose rights are both neglected and rejected” (Mayall, 2002, 21). This is a relationship recognized by almost

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 Conceptions of Childhood, Agency and the Well-Being of Children

every age group, from five-year-olds to adolescents (Axford 2008, 6, Mayall 2002, 136). Furthermore, the poor quality of some services for children and the continued prevalence of child poverty indicate the weak social position of children. But these disadvantages, or so it is claimed, are first and foremost caused by the way we organize our society including the norms that prevail and not by the “natural incompetencies” of children. The third topic I want to elaborate on is the notion of the agency of children to be found in the relevant literature of the sociology of childhood. Here it is emphasized that children have to be viewed both as social and as moral actors in their own right; as people who are embedded in a certain social context and who both have and fulfil socially ascribed responsibilities (Axford 2008, 6). This view gets contrasted with a traditional account of children’s agency, which is characterized by passiveness, vulnerability, incompleteness and incompetence. Children’s agency, as traditionally conceived, is therefore a very narrow concept. In fact, the picture emerging from traditional thinking about children is one which tends to emphasise what children are not able to do compared to adults and what, as a consequence, should be prohibited for children. Being blinded by such a narrow view of children’s agency, many sociologists of childhood argue that children have been overlooked as important social actors by researchers, policy makers and the general population for much of the 20th century – a state which still persists today. Children have been considered as precious and subject to high emotional attachments, but also as burdensome, in some sense even “useless” (due to their lack of economic contribution) and as dependents in need of being socialized, with school activity considered to be of preparatory value only (Axford 2008, 6, Zelizer 1994). However, a closer look at the empirical evidence suggests that children are clearly social actors starting from a very early age (Ridge 2002, Alderson 2008). To characterize them only as beings becoming such actors in the future misses crucially important points. Children take part in and actively form family relationships by defending their own points of view, expressing wishes, seeking justice and demonstrating strong attachments and feelings. They negotiate with others (adults and peers alike) and thereby influence relationships, decisions or the workings of a set of social assumptions of constraints (Mayall, 2002, 21). In their interactions with their peers they assume complex social roles, define codes of inclusion and exclusion and have a clear idea about different social identities and ways to influence them. Moreover, children participate in economically useful activities: not only do they buy their own possessions but they work in different ways and settings (in home labor as well as in different forms of the labor market) and see money as a means to autonomy, independence and recognition by their peers (Liebel 2004). Besides these roles as social actors, sociologists of childhood usually also argue – and this should be of particular interest to political philosophers – that children should be seen as moral agents as well, capable of understanding and negotiating complex moral issues in their own lives and in interactions with others (Frankel 2012). They “confront issues



The Social Construction of Childhood 

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of justice, equal distribution and sharing. They respond to each other’s actions and feelings, and meet approval or disapproval in their own actions”, as Mayall puts it (Mayall, 2002, 88). In this context, the representatives of the sociology of childhood usually indicate that traditional thinking about moral development, particularly shaped by the work of Piaget and Kohlberg, has been seriously challenged and is now widely regarded as too narrow a concept (Frankel 2012). As it is well known, Piaget developed a universal, ordered stage approach to child development and argued in the context of morality that certain cognitive abilities must be developed in order for a child to understand why actions are right or wrong. This is the case because he saw genuine moral judgements anchored in abstract reasoning, characterized by applying formal moral principles to concrete situations, an idea later developed in detail by Kohlberg. However, when acknowledging the social context within which each child exists, and considering children’s everyday lives and experiences, there is clear evidence that they possess considerable moral competencies from an early age that must be acknowledged (Alderson 111–130), even if “the child as moral agent is one we have been taught to find difficult, even a contradiction in terms” (Mayall, 2002, 87). Here it is also interesting to note that young people find that adults routinely reject or ignore their moral competence and participation rights. In other words, they are not taken seriously for what they are and do. In any case, as a consequence of the considerations by the sociologists of childhood and this new “competence paradigm” (Hutchby/Moran-Ellis 1998, 6), one central and flourishing field of research and policy implementations inspired by this strand of thinking about children concerns children’s participation (Percy-Smith/Thomas 2010). There is a clear tendency to assume that children from diverse social contexts have to be empowered and that they should be put in a position where genuine participation is possible. This means that children should be seen as equals in decision making processes, respecting their points of view and giving them the control and power to defend their interests. A general subordination to the allegedly higher competences of adults is rejected (Alanen 2005). In summary, central issues discussed in the recent sociology of childhood literature on the concept of childhood seem to challenge basic assumptions held by many political philosophers about the nature of childhood and the way a good society should treat its children. Worse, there seems to be a serious accusation that many ethical theories defending the idea of rational autonomy as a prerequisite for full inclusion and participation give the theoretical justification for a society systematically excluding and even oppressing and subordinating its children. Furthermore, it is claimed that thinking about children, particularly in political contexts, has to include children’s own accounts about their lives, values and circumstances. There is, according to Mayall, an irreducible child standpoint with normative weight that needs to be taken seriously and respected in its own right: “[…] those inhabiting childhood have a particular take or standpoint on their status in relation to adult status […] a child standpoint (analogous to a woman’s standpoint) is important for contributing

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 Conceptions of Childhood, Agency and the Well-Being of Children

to a proper account of the social order” (Mayall, 2002, 8). To put it differently, most theories in political philosophy are adult-centred and dismiss the child’s point of view as relevant for political purposes, because children are considered – misleadingly, as many sociologists of childhood argue – as incompetent and not in a position to decide for themselves.

1.3 Children as Equals? Without doubt, there are many ways different societies view and treat their children and denying that conceptions of childhood are shaped by many contingent social factors seems to be plainly wrong. Furthermore, it is also convincing to argue that children are social actors, and indeed there is strong empirical evidence that they possess considerable moral competencies starting from an early age (Goodwin 2002, Alderson 2008). But what follows from these insights, which are central to the sociology of childhood for the moral and political status of children? Does this really mean, as seems to be suggested by many child-centred researchers, that children should be treated as the equals of adults in the sense that their point of view has the same normative weight as that of adults? Should, consequently, their decisions and actions have to be respected in the same way as those of mature fellow citizens? Or in other words: do children have a right to authority over their own circumstances? It seems to me that the answers to these questions have to be negative, and that the arguments provided by sociologists of childhood are clearly insufficient to sustain the conclusion that children have, as a rule, a right to participate on an equal basis with adults in democratic decision-making. However, in a somewhat more modest interpretation – that children have a right to be taken seriously and that their point of view has to be respected and adequately taken into account when determining their well-being – there is a lot political philosophy can learn from a systematic and critical discussion of the concept of childhood (and the many existing conceptions) as outlined in the preceding section. But before describing the relevant points in section three, let me say a few words why and where the arguments in favour of the liberation of children, understood in a strict sense, go wrong. To begin with, it seems to be highly plausible – and this is also at the centre of the criticized commonsensical thinking about children – to make the attribution of some rights dependent on the possession of certain competencies. For example, it is common to make a distinction between liberty rights and welfare rights, where liberty rights are rights protecting free choices (voting, religious worship, speech, thought association etc.) and welfare rights protect and promote fundamental elements of human well-being (health, education, housing etc.) (Archard 2004, 91, Brighouse 2003). Liberty rights, which allow persons to act on their own judgments and to live a life according to values they identify with, presuppose some abilities and skills related to what can be termed “rational autonomy”, compromising inter alia elements



Children as Equals? 

 27

such as knowledge, experience, stability of character and the ability to assess the consequences of one’s actions and to relate them with one’s identity in time. And in these respects and as a matter of empirical fact, children, especially small ones, have deficits compared to adults. Moral judgements, even if present in the daily interactions of children to an astonishing extent, are therefore different from those of adults, still developing and in need of further refinement. And even if political philosophers might sometimes overrate the values of rationality and impartiality at the expense of moral sentiments and attachments (as feminists frequently argue) it seems unacceptable to state that they should play no role at all when assessing a person’s moral agency. Furthermore, moral sentiments, too, do not appear from nowhere – they have to be fostered and stimulated and are not unrelated to cognitive content. The possession of a coherent conception of the good, and a moral standpoint from where one can live a life one has reason to value are of high moral significance, and every human being needs time to develop them. Here it is also crucial to note that the emphasis put on the social construction of childhood has limits. Despite the profound differences in the conceptions of childhood found in different social, cultural and historic contexts, it must be acknowledged that there are some universal features characteristic of the way humans develop during the first years of their lives and saying that children are immature definitely has a content going beyond ideological assumptions. All children, by virtue of their immaturity, have similar needs and limitations. Infants are dependent on others for their physical care: for food, shelter, hygiene and safety. An abandoned infant cannot survive for very long. Children also need emotional attachment and, as with their physical care, how and who forms emotional bonds with the young child can be subject to a great deal of variation but the forming of strong emotional attachments to close caregivers is apparently a universal feature of human society. […] the child can also be considered as socially and culturally immature. Children may not be born as blank slates, but teaching young humans the whole range of cultural practices from how to eat their food to living ethically or morally is a shared concern of all human societies. (Wells 2009, 2).

Furthermore, the acquisition of a variety of skills and abilities (e.g. walking, talking, recognizing objects) proceeds according to standards with only small variations in different cultures and social settings. Now, these points are certainly also relevant when it comes to a person’s ability to make decisions for herself. Even if the mentioned new “competence paradigm” in regards to children were true, there is clearly a need to define different competence levels relevant for one’s ability of self-government. Suggesting that children are, as a rule, equally competent as adults, just seems to be wrong. Where these competence levels are located and how they have to be identified is a difficult question and one that cannot be separated from the concrete cultural and social background one is referring to. However, there are good arguments that age is a good and overall fair measure for attributing different rights to people since (a) there is a fairly strong correlation between age and competencies and (b) it is manageable and difficult to manipulate which regulations according to competency

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 Conceptions of Childhood, Agency and the Well-Being of Children

tests are not (Archard 2004, 85–91). Furthermore, the relationship between age and certain competencies provides a strong case for limiting some cultural practices like child marriage and female circumcision (the one of males is a more complicated case) even if the children in question give their consent, since they pose a threat to children eventually reaching a stage where genuine self-governance is possible (Feinberg 1980). A related point to note is that it does not follow from the factual varieties of childhoods that they are of equal moral value. On the contrary, they point to the need to compare them and to criticize questionable practices (Nussbaum 2000). In fact, this is what sociologists of childhood try to do with many aspects of contemporary childhoods in the western world, and in order to achieve this, a relativist position is insufficient. It seems also highly questionable that respecting the choices children make in the same way as we normally do with adults would improve their overall level of wellbeing, something implicit in much of the literature addressing the alleged low social status of children. Historical evidence suggests that whenever experiments were made restricting children as much as possible from adult and educational control, the consequences were problematic. They developed to rather egocentric beings, were extremely intolerant of the demands of adults and had difficulties respecting rules conducive to a harmonious co-existence (Purdy 1992, 88–100). Psychological and educational research also indicates that parental control combined with high responsiveness to the child’s needs and the willingness to give reasons for establishing rules, setting limits and giving (reasonable) punishments is generally the best way for children to develop self-confidence, self-efficacy and an orientation towards achievements in life (Purdy 1992, 100–106), valuable traits from the perspective of most ethical theories. In summary, giving children – individually or as a social group – a general and comprehensive right to self-determination does not seem a congruent and defendable idea from a moral point of view, even if there are some voices in the literature explicitly defending it (Cohen 1980, Godwin 2011). But then one has to ask in what way the claims and expressed preferences of children should be taken into account. Here, a proposal made by Harry Brighouse is helpful (Brighouse 2003). He suggests that there are basically two ways a child’s voice can be assessed, namely either authoritatively or consultatively: Someone’s view is regarded as authoritative when it is regarded as the view that must be taken as defining the person’s interests for the purpose of decision-making. […] By contrast, to regard a view as consultative is to treat the person who expresses it as having a right to express her own view of her own interests, but not to treat that expression as sufficient grounds for action, even if only her interests are at stake (Brighouse 2003, 692–693).

Brighouse’s point is that while a competent adult’s views are authoritative with respect to their interests (because they act from a mature conception of the good they identify with and are normally better positioned than others to protect their own



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interests) the case of children is different, due to three different characteristics that make them unique: First, they are profoundly dependent on others for their well-being, because they cannot negotiate the obstacles in the social world in such a way that their needs will be met. They are often not the best available judges of what will promote their own welfare, or their future agency interests […]. Second, they are profoundly vulnerable to other people’s decisions, both because they are dependent, and because they are raised, typically and for very good reasons, in families in which adults unavoidably have quite extensive de facto power over what happens to children. […] Third, unlike other persons who are dependent and vulnerable, children have the capacity to develop the capabilities to meet their own needs, those very needs for which they are dependent on others. (Brighouse 2003, footnotes omitted).

In general terms, dependency, vulnerability and the ability to develop into autonomous beings thus seem to be important categories in theorizing childhood and in justifying paternalism. As a consequence, there is always a need to balance current and future interests of children, and since in many cases they lack the knowledge and abilities to make appropriate choices themselves, interference from adults who are in an appropriate position to do this is justified. However, a further remark is necessary: adults interfering with children’s perspectives and their decisions are only allowed to do so if they have good reasons to discern the interests of the child and protect or promote those interests with their actions. The power adults have over children must not be exercised arbitrarily and has to take the children’s voice into account according to their age and maturity.

1.4 Agency and Well-being Liberating children from adult control, in a strict sense, seems to be too radical and counterproductive an aim. But maybe the sociological view of childhood identified in the first section of this paper should not be understood in such a narrow sense, even if the rhetoric used points in this direction. It might rather be identified with the more modest, reasonable and valuable claim that there is a need to take children of all age groups seriously and to engage critically with the institution of childhood as it is de facto practiced in developed as well as in developing countries. Then, there are clear merits in this position that should also be taken seriously by any moral theory about children which wants to engage with the real world, contribute to the improvement of children’s lives and help us understand what child well-being means. First, there is the insight that children have to be seen as equal in worth to all other members of society. They are as children, and not just as the adults they will become, worthy of equal respect. In combination with the insights provided by the sociology of childhood concerning their complex and clearly existing (moral and social) agency, this means that they have to be seen as serious conversation partners in

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 Conceptions of Childhood, Agency and the Well-Being of Children

all matters affecting them. Their point of view has normative weight, even if it should not be automatically taken to give a comprehensive and conclusive definition of their interests and well-being. To suppose that they generally do not know because they as a rule have nothing valuable to say about their circumstances, is false and morally objectionable. Moral theories stressing the value of adult rationality and autonomy too much are in danger of missing this point and reinforcing an undifferentiated picture of children as incompetent – and indeed this is, in my opinion at least, happening in vast fields of political philosophy. Second, the sociology of childhood points to the many power structures regulating and controlling children’s lives. Both in the private and in the public realm, children’s lives are often heavily controlled and they often have no adequate opportunities to exercise their agency in an appropriate way. The worry raised that institutions such as schools actually still oppress many children and youths by applying strict rules without enough space for critical thinking and deliberation is a real concern. These observations become particularly salient when including the children’s perspectives in a normative theory about childhood and conceding that they have normative weight. Furthermore, the common argument that limitations of what children are permitted to do are obviously justified by reference to their incompetencies has to be scrutinized and examined in the context in question. General rules are difficult to establish and in danger of leading to age-discrimination, that is, children are deliberately and unjustifiably treated less favourably than adults. Third, the child-centred sociological approaches indicate that social exclusion is a normative key category for thinking about children as much as it is for adults. Taking children seriously as social actors with significant moral competencies offers also in this regard a valuable perspective that is easily lost when rational autonomy is the focus of attention. Social exclusion applies equally to the child’s relation with his/ her peers where multiple forms of recognition and misrecognition happen concerning the child’s position in regard to the “adult world”. Again, this does not mean that it is morally demanded that children should participate without restriction in all activities that are currently reserved for adults. However, restrictions are in need of justification and in many cases it is necessary to balance different considerations. Easy answers are generally not available even in fields such as work or sexual relationships, which are often judged as uncompromisingly inappropriate for children. Fourth, it must be emphasized that adults are only morally justified to “overrule” children’s actions and decisions if they act in the child’s interests and are in a position from where it is reasonable to assume that they can indeed contribute to the child’s well-being and well-becoming better than the children themselves. If these conditions are not fulfilled, paternalistic and controlling actions by adults are suspicious. There are of course many situations and circumstances in which children do not have attachment figures of the aforementioned kind. And while there are good reasons to regret this situation and to claim that societies should be organized in a way that this does not happen, the social reality is sometimes different. A moral theory

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characterizing children primarily by their missing autonomy might lead to blind spots in this regard. Take for example the phenomenon that more and more working children in developing countries organize themselves in unions, fighting not for the abolishment of child labour but for fair and non-exploitative forms of work and for the chance to speak for themselves on an equal basis with all other stakeholders. In such circumstances, it is almost cynical to talk about the need to place children under adult control because this would further reinforce their already weak social position. In such a situation, children are probably the best available judges of their interests, and their considerable successes show that they are able to organize themselves and to enforce their claims. Fifth, the “social construction thesis”, while in my opinion highly problematic in a radical interpretation, draws attention to a further aspect of many philosophical theories about children and their well-being emerging from the missing discussion of the concept of childhood itself. There is the danger that a primarily modern western urban white middle-class notion of childhood is implicitly assumed to be the ideal form, devaluating the way other cultures treat their children and integrate them into the social life. While not directly and necessarily leading to a relativist position (as it seems to be assumed by some proponents of the sociology of childhood), the existing varieties in conceptions of childhood challenge some commonsensical assumptions about children and their proper place in a good society.

1.5 Conclusion There are many different conceptions of childhood to be found, both throughout history and according to the geographical and cultural region one is looking at. One of the great achievements of the sociology of childhood is that we are now aware of these differences and that we know that children can fulfill varying social roles, determining how their well-being can be conceptualized best. Their biological immaturity does not lead automatically to the place that is attributed to them in modern western societies, which is to a large extent characterized by institutions preparing children for adulthood, without giving them considerable political and social power. Hence, in this sense it is true that childhood is socially constructed and also the insight that children are social and – in a certain interpretation – also moral agents is certainly valid. However, one must be careful with hasty conclusions for moral theory. Even if childhood is socially constructed, it is important to acknowledge that some constructions might be more adequate than others. From the fact of diversity does not immediately follow that all conceptions of childhood are of equal value. As I have shown above there are e.g. good reasons to restrict a child’ right to authority over her own circumstances due to considerations that are rooted in the way human beings usually develop. On a general level, their vulnerability, incompetence and ability to learn are important normative categories and it would be dangerous to argue them

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away or to deconstruct them completely. However, it is true that often enough we as a society neglect a critical examination of the way we have institutionalized childhood and the many power structures that are, in many instances unjustifiably, governing and regulating children’s lives and jeopardizing their well-being. Especially theories in moral, social and political philosophy should be sensitive to these issues. They have a duty to guide our actions towards a better and more just society for children and too many generalizations for the sake of theoretical simplicity endanger this endeavour. In this respect philosophy can indeed learn a lot from the current debates in the sociology of childhood and there is a need to further engage with each other. Indeed, this aspect of the discussion on the well-being of children also shows how important an interdisciplinary approach is in order to do justice to the many facts involved.

References Alanen, Leena. 2005. “Women’s Studies/Childhood Studies: Parallels, Links and Perspectives”, in: Mason, Jan / Fattore, Toby (ed.): Children Taken Seriously – In Theory, Policy and Practice. Jessica Kingsley Publishers, London and Philadelphia, 31–45. Alderson, Priscilla. 2008. Young Children’s Rights: Exploring Beliefs, Principles and Practice, Second Edition (Children in Charge Series 13). Axford, Nick (2012). Exploring Concepts of Child Well-Being: Implications for Children’s Services. Bristol: Policy. Archard, David. 2004. Children: Rights and Childhood. 2nd ed. London / New York, NY: Routledge. Biggeri, Mario, Jérôme Ballet, and Flavio Comim, eds. 2011. Children and the Capability Approach. 1st ed. Basingstoke / New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan. Brighouse, Harry (2003). “How Should Children Be Heard?” Arizona Law Review 45 (3): 691–711. Cohen, Howard. 1980. Equal Rights for Children. Totowa: Littlefied, Adams & Co. Feinberg, Joel. 1980. “A Child’s Right to an Open Future”, in Whose Child? Parental Rights, Parental Authority and State Power, W. Aiken and H. LaFollette, H., Totowa, NJ: Littlefield, Adams, and Co.: 124–153. Frankel, Sam. 2012. Children, Morality and Society. London / New York. Palgrave Macmillan. Goodwin, Marjorie Harness. 2002. “Exclusion in Girls’ Peer Groups: Ethnographic Analysis of Language Practices on the Playground”, in: Human Development, 392–415, DOI: 10.1159/000066260. Hutchby, I. and Moran-Ellis, J., eds. 1998. Children and Social Competence: Arenas of Action, London, Falmer Press. James, Allison/Prout, Alan, eds. 2005. Constructing and Reconstructing Childhood, 2nd edition, London, Falmer Press. Jenks, Chris, ed. 1982. The Sociology of Childhood – Essential Readings. London: Batsford Academic and Educational. Lansdown, Gerison, and UNICEF Innocenti Research Centre. 2001. Promoting Children’s Participation in Democratic Decision-Making. Florence, Italy: UNICEF International Child Development Centre. Liebel, Manfred. 2004. A Will of Their Own – Cross-cultural perspectives on working children. London/New York. Zed Books. Mayall, Berry. 2002. Towards a Sociology for Childhood: Thinking from Children’s Lives, Buckingham, Open University Press.

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Noggle, Robert. 2002. “Special Agents: Children’s Autonomy and Parental Authority”, in: The Moral and Political Status of Children, edited by David Archard and Colin M. Macleod, 1st ed. Oxford / New York, NY: Oxford University Press. Nussbaum, Martha. 2000. Women and Human Development – The Capabilities Approach. 1st ed. Cambridge / New York, NY: Cambridge University Press. Percy-Smith, Barry / Thomas, Nigel, eds. 2010. A Handbook of Children and Young People’s Participation – Perspectives from theory and practice. London: Falmer Press. Purdy, Laura Martha. 1992. In Their Best Interest? The Case against Equal Rights for Children. 1st ed. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press. Qvortrup, Jens. 2005. “A Voice for Children in Statistical and Social Accounting: A Plea for Children’s Right to Be Heard.” In Constructing and Reconstructing Childhood, edited by Allison James and Alan Prout, 2nd ed., 83–103. Falmer Press. Qvortrup, Jens, ed. 2005. Studies in Modern Childhood: Society, Agency, Culture. Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire ; New York: Palgrave Macmillan. Rawls, John. 1971. A Theory of Justice, Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press. Ridge, Tess. 2002. Childhood Poverty and Social Exclusion: From a Child’s Perspective. 1st ed. Bristol: Policy Press. Sen, Amartya. 2007: “Children and Human Rights”. Indian Journal of Human Development. 2007; 1(2). Wells, Karen. 2009. Childhood in a Global Perspective. Cambridge and Malden, MA, Polity Press. Wyness, Michael G. 1999. Contesting Childhood. London and New York, Falmer Press. Zelizer, Viviana A. Rotman. 1994. Pricing the Priceless Child: The Changing Social Value of Children. Princeton, N.J: Princeton University Press.

Tatjana Višak

2 Does Welfare Trump Freedom? A Normative Evaluation of Contextualism about how to Promote Welfare 2.1 Introduction Many of us in our various roles – perhaps as parents, citizens, consumers, teachers or politicians – want children to be well off and are prepared to act in ways that promote their welfare. Since we correctly conceive of childhood obesity as a pressing welfare problem, we try to limit and prevent childhood obesity and thereby promote child welfare. In this contribution I will focus on the welfare problem of childhood obesity and defend contextualism about how to prevent childhood obesity and thereby promote child welfare. Contextualism is the view that promoting welfare is not only – and perhaps not even primarily – a matter of individual choice, but importantly a matter of being situated in the right social and physical context. In section 2, I will introduce the case of childhood obesity. In section 3 I will point out that, according to all common accounts of welfare, childhood obesity is a welfare problem. In section 4, I will introduce contextualism about how to promote welfare. In section 5, I will defend contextualism as a way of preventing childhood obesity against its major normative challenge, which is the criticism that maintaining or creating the relevant contexts might diminish the child’s option freedom. In chapter 6, I will tentatively explore whether my defence of contextualism generalizes to adults and to the prevention of other welfare problems. Thus, I will not establish the superiority of contextualism above individualism here, which is an empirical issue. Instead, I will illustrate what contextualism amounts to as an empirical claim about how best to promote welfare. Furthermore, I will defend contextualism in the specific case of childhood obesity prevention against a normative challenge and briefly explore whether this defence of contextualism generalizes to other contexts.

2.2 Childhood Obesity According to the World Health Organization, Childhood obesity is one of the most serious public health challenges of the 21st century. The prevalence of obesity has increased at what the WHO considers an alarming rate:

© 2015 Tatjana Višak This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 License.



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The problem is global and is steadily affecting many low- and middle-income countries, particularly in urban settings. […] Globally, in 2010 the number of overweight children under the age of five is estimated to be over 42 million. Close to 35 million of these are living in developing countries.

According to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (2013), childhood obesity has more than tripled in the past 30 years. The percentage of children aged 6–11 years in the United States who were obese increased from 7% in 1980 to nearly 20% in 2008. Similarly, the percentage of adolescents aged 12–19 years who were obese increased from 5% to 18% over the same period. In 2008, more than one third of children and adolescents in the United States were overweight or obese. Childhood obesity is generally considered problematic, because of both immediate and long-term negative health effects. Obese youths are more likely to have risk factors for cardiovascular disease, such as high cholesterol or high blood pressure. In a population-based sample of 5 to 17-year-olds, 70% of obese youth had at least one risk factor for cardiovascular disease (Center for Disease Control and Prevention 2013). Obese adolescents are more likely to have pre-diabetes, a condition in which blood glucose levels indicate a high risk for development of diabetes. Children and adolescents who are obese are at greater risk for bone and joint problems. Obese children and adolescents are likely to be obese as adults and are therefore more at risk for adult health problems such as heart disease, type 2 diabetes, stroke, several types of cancer, and osteoarthritis (Center for Disease Control and Prevention 2013). Besides contributing to these illnesses, childhood obesity is strongly related to depression. While it might be more difficult to diagnose child depression than depression in adults, a survey of more than 1,500 9 to 10-year-olds found that 20% of those who were obese often felt sad – compared to only 8% of their healthyweight peers. The relationship between childhood obesity and depression is complex. Overweight and obesity indirectly contribute to depression in various ways. For instance, overweight can lead to feelings of loneliness, isolation, or poor self-esteem. But overweight can also be a symptom or consequence of depression. Feelings of emptiness, which may be caused by depression, can make children want to fill up on food, typically carbohydrates and chocolates. These stimulate the release of chemicals that can make them feel better in the short run. So, many of the overweight and obese children eat when they are stressed, tired, lonely, or when something bad has happened. What is more, some depression medications can cause weight gain. Depression and obesity have many shared symptoms, including sleep problems, sedentary behaviour, and unhealthy attitudes towards eating. These symptoms, in turn, can aggravate overweight and either directly or indirectly also depression. For instance, sleepiness makes one hungry, sedentary behaviour makes it harder to control weight and the same holds for unhealthy attitudes towards eating.

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 Does Welfare Trump Freedom?

2.3 Childhood Obesity as a Welfare Problem The field of ethics in which the development of accounts of welfare takes place is value theory. Value theory addresses questions about what is valuable or good. In particular, it explores what is intrinsically good, i.e. good not as a means but in and of itself. Money, for instance, is usually considered an instrumental or extrinsic good. It is not good in itself, but it is good for what it leads to. For instance, you can buy a coat with it. Is the coat good in itself? Arguably, the coat is not good in itself either. It is good for something else that it gives you: it prevents you from being cold in the winter. Is being prevented from being cold in the winter good in itself? Perhaps it isn’t. Perhaps the good thing about staying warm in the winter is that it prevents illnesses, such as having a cold. Having a coat thus contributes to your health. Is being healthy a good in itself? Some would argue that it is. Others would argue that it is not. Perhaps even health is only instrumentally good. Perhaps being healthy is only good to the extent that being healthy gives you pleasure and that being unhealthy causes suffering. Is pleasure good in itself? Pleasure might well be good in itself, just like suffering might be bad in itself. What the intrinsic goods are is a matter of controversy in value theory. When talking about intrinsic goods, it is common to distinguish between what is good for someone and what is a good simpliciter. A good of the first type is known as a ‘prudential good’. This is what should be captured in an account of welfare. The relationship between prudential goodness and a goodness simpliciter is controversial. In value theory, it is common to distinguish talk about the individual’s ‘welfare’ or ‘prudential good’ from talk about what characterizes a good life. Perhaps a good life requires more than only welfare. Here, we are concerned with welfare, since we are to determine whether childhood obesity is a welfare problem. What, then, is good for me? One of the classical accounts of welfare is hedonism. Hedonism is a mental state theory that defines welfare in terms of subjectively experienced pleasure and pain or, more broadly, enjoyment and suffering (Bentham 1996 [1789]; Mill 1998 [1863]; Feldman 2006; 92009; Crisp 2006; Tännsjö 1998). A key insight of hedonism is that it acknowledges the importance of one’s mental states as an aspect of welfare. But are mental states the only aspect of welfare? Against hedonism, it has been argued that if pleasant experiences were the only things that made our lives good for us, we would be as well off as we could be on a machine or on drugs that gave us endless pleasant experiences (Crisp 2006, Bradley 2008, Nozick 1974, Sumner 1996). That, however, seems implausible. One of the major rival accounts of welfare is preferentialism (Harsanyi 1982, Griffin 1986, Sobel 2009, Wessels 2011, Birnbacher 2005, Gesang 2000, Crisp 2006). According to preferentialism, having your preferences fulfilled is what is ultimately good for you. On that account, having money, having a coat, being warm or being healthy are not intrinsically good. Rather, they are only good to the extent that they contribute to the satisfaction of your preferences. Happiness, as well, might be



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prudentially good, because it is desired. A more intimate relationship between desiresatisfaction and happiness is conceivable as well. The relevant notion of ‘desire’ might be defined with recourse of the notion of happiness, such as: “We desire something if and only if correctly and vividly imagining it, under certain conditions, would make us happy.” (Wessels, 2011, 86). Furthermore, happiness might be defined in terms of desire-fulfilment, such as: “Being in a situation in which one desires to be means that one is happy.” (McNaughton 1953/54, Brandt 1966, Heathwood 2006). The key insight behind preferentialism is that different things seem to promote the welfare of different individuals. Preferentialism explains that this is due to their different desires. This insight lets us explain why what is good for one individual may be irrelevant or even harmful to the well-being of another – different preferences explain why religious worship matters to the well-being of many believers but not to most atheists, and why fertility matters to the welfare of those who want children but is irrelevant to the welfare of those who don’t. A major criticism against the desire account of welfare is that desiring things does not make them good for us. It is rather the other way around: we desire what is good for us (Crisp 2008. See also Aristotle (1984 [C4BCE], Metaphysics 1072a, tr. Ross): “[…] desire is consequent on opinion rather than opinion on desire.”). Further, if desiresatisfaction were all that mattered for our welfare, it seems that we ought to adjust our desires constantly to the chances of fulfilment. This would certainly bring us more desire-satisfaction. However, changing our desires whenever doing so would make it easier to fulfil them seems to make us lose ourselves (Wessels 2011, 132; Barry 1989, 280). The third group of the classical accounts of welfare are so-called ‘objective list accounts’. Objective list accounts of welfare stipulate lists of items that are considered to be intrinsically good for you. Typical proponents of objective list accounts hold that well-being consists in the possession of certain basic goods that are beneficial to all human beings regardless of what they desire or prefer (Moore 1903, Rawls 1971, Nussbaum 1988, Sen 1993, Hausman 2012, Parfit 2011). The degree to which one possesses those things determines one’s level of welfare. The things on that ‘objective list’ might be health, wealth, friendship, or other items. Eudemonistic accounts of welfare, such as Nussbaum’s capabilities account, conceive of welfare in terms of ‘nature fulfilment’. At some level, they might also present a list of items, the realization of which is considered to be relevant for welfare. Eudemonistic accounts of welfare and objective list accounts are typically classified as objectivist accounts of welfare and contrasted with subjectivist accounts, such as hedonism and preferentialism. However, that classification is highly unclear and controversial and should not bother us here (Sumner 1995, Crisp 2008, section 4.3, Haybron 2008, 177-78). The key insight of objective list theorists is that it seems counterintuitive to base the notion of welfare solely on the individual’s own perspective, such as their preferences. After all, people sometimes prefer what leaves them worse off. Adaptive preferences shed light on this problem of preferences that leave one worse off (Elster

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1982). Nussbaum (2001) gives examples of women in third-world countries who form adaptive preferences to accept low pay, remain with abusive partners, and prepare their daughters for marriage rather than education. These women are not getting what is best for them and their daughters; in fact, the deformation of their preferences is part of the injustice committed against them. In other cases, ignorance leads people to prefer what harms them. In still other cases, people are aware that what they prefer is bad for them, but lack the willpower to change their preferences – drug addiction is a paradigm example. A challenge for objective list accounts of welfare is determining what counts as a primary good in an objective way. Why, for instance, is education good for me? It seems that a justification of the goodness of education cannot avoid pointing out that it ultimately leads to happiness, or to desire-satisfaction. Furthermore, listed items are controversial. What if someone does not care about education and seems to be perfectly happy without it? Some alleged objective accounts of welfare are really about something else: they do not offer an account of prudential value. For instance, a definition of welfare in terms of ‘living according to one’s excellences’ conflates prudential value and perfectionist value. Perfectionist value is about how much one lives up to certain standards of perfection (Sumner 1996, 78). In sum, the three classical accounts of welfare are all based on some plausible insights, but have some counterintuitive implications. These are not new. In recent years, proponents of various theories proposed revisions in order to deal with alleged counterintuitive implications. Recently, hybrid or combined accounts of welfare have been proposed in order to combine promising aspects of different theories and avoid their shortcomings (Wessels 2011, Heathwood 2006). The debate about the most plausible account of welfare is ongoing. We do not need to decide on which of these is the correct account of welfare in order to see that childhood obesity negatively affects welfare. First of all, childhood obesity affects health and health is important for welfare. According to hedonism, health is extrinsically good for me to the extent that it gives me enjoyment and avoids suffering. According to preferentialism, health is extrinsically good for me to the extent that it helps me to get what I want. For instance, I might desire to be healthy or I might desire to do things that I couldn’t do if I were ill, or I might desire to avoid discomfort and pain. According to nature-fulfilment accounts of welfare, being healthy might be part of what it means to flourish as a human being. On such accounts, as well as on objective list accounts of welfare, health is not only extrinsically good for me, but an aspect of what is intrinsically good for me. It is an aspect of my welfare. Secondly, childhood obesity, due to its effects on health, might shorten lives and that affects welfare as well. On the most prominent account of the harm of death, known as the “deprivation view”, death is bad for us precisely to the extent that it deprives us of the welfare that we would have experienced had we not died (Bradley 2009, Kagan 2012). That view entails that even if I die unexpectedly and painlessly during my sleep and even if the state of being dead does not harm me, because I do



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not experience anything, the fact that my life ends might still be bad for me. It is bad for me if, and only if, my future life would have been good for me had I not died. Not everyone accepts this view about the harm of death (Belshaw 2012, Singer 2011) and those who accept it might accept it with various modifications (McMahan 1988), but I believe that, roughly, this is the correct view about the harm of death. Summing this up, I have sketched the most prominent accounts of welfare and pointed out that on each of these accounts, childhood obesity is a welfare problem. That is enough to establish that, if one cares about welfare, one should be concerned about childhood obesity. I will now turn to introducing and defending a particular approach regarding how to prevent childhood obesity and thus to promote welfare.

2.4 Contextualism About How to Promote Welfare To what extent does human welfare depend on living in the right kind of environment? Individualism about the pursuit of welfare is the view that welfare can best be achieved by granting individuals a maximum amount of option freedom. The idea is that when individuals are presented with a vast variety of options, they will choose the way of life that suits them best and that best promotes their welfare. According to this view, people should ideally experience conditions of maximally unbounded and unburdened choice. Contextualism about the pursuit of welfare does not deny that some amount of option freedom can be beneficial, but it holds that living in the right kind of physical and social context serves people’s welfare best. It is the view that people fare best “when the context constrains or guides their choices in certain ways, beyond the minimums imposed by the unalterable facts of human existence” (Haybron 2008, 263). The constraints that contextualists refer to “include both limits and burdens on our choices” (Haybron 2008, 263). It should be clear that contextualism is not in itself a normative view about what ought to be done. It is an empirical view, based on empirical insights about what actually affects people’s welfare. The relevant studies suggest that, just like nonhuman animals, humans have certain needs that are best served in particular kinds of environments. This is quite independent of what people think they need or what people happen to pursue. For instance, numerous studies show that exposure to greenery, such as plants and trees, promotes people’s physical and mental health, even though they might not care about plants and might not be aware about their effect (Haybron 2011). There might well be an evolutionary explanation for this effect. Furthermore, the underlying studies suggest that people are not particularly apt in knowing how well off they are and in promoting their own welfare (Haybron 2008, 225-250). Eating habits are a well-known example. We often choose to eat things that do not promote our health and welfare. Unbounded choice is no guarantee at all that we will choose what is good for us. Quite to the contrary: we often make choices that leave us worse off.

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In the following, I will illustrate the contextual influence on welfare by giving four examples of environmental factors that influence childhood obesity. This is meant to illustrate that some environments are conducive to childhood obesity, while others facilitate obesity prevention. a) Available food and food habits in family and school environment What children eat depends primarily on what they are offered in their family and, to a lesser degree, at school. The older the children are, the more other influences become important, in particular if they eat outside and have the money and opportunity to buy their own food. Nevertheless, the habits that they learn early on in their families, the accompanied information concerning food choices and the examples of the parents and caregivers as role models are likely to remain influential. Children develop a taste for certain foods that they are exposed to and some foodstuffs, such as sugar and chocolate, are even addictive. For these reasons, the social context of the child is obviously highly influential. Many parents complain that their children do not like vegetables or even that they do not like anything except for certain low nutrient foods, such as white bread, white pasta and sugary snacks. I do not doubt that children can develop a taste for these things and prefer them to more nutritious food, if they are given the choice. Parents may feel that they harm their child when they decline to give them these foods. They may fear that the child will refuse to eat anything else, or think that they benefit the child by offering its preferred food. Perhaps the parents want to avoid conflict and perhaps they remember their own satisfaction as a child when they were offered sugary snacks. Parents might eat these things themselves, which makes it very difficult to deny the children the same fun. Furthermore, children do not immediately become ill or fat on such a diet. Once the children are habituated to sweet snacks and learn how to successfully obtain them, it becomes even harder for the parents to change that habit. Since, however, unhealthy food habits eventually show their negative effects on the child’s welfare, family contexts that establish, maintain or support unhealthy food habits do not benefit but harm the child. Since avoiding unhealthy food habits is possible, spreading the required knowledge in the right way and at the right times and places would prove to be highly beneficial. b) Exposure to television Television viewing is another major contextual influence on childhood obesity. On average, according to data from a few years ago, 6 to 11-year-old American children spend 28 hours and 2 to 3-year-olds even 32 hours per week in front of a TV. That time is nearly entirely (97%) spent watching live TV (McDonough, 2009). 71% of children aged 8-18 have a television in their bedroom (Rideout, Foehr, Roberts 2010). In about two-thirds of households, the TV is “usually” on during meals (Rideout, Foehr, Roberts 2010). In about half of households the TV is on “most” of the time (Rideout, Foehr, Roberts 2010). Children with a TV in their bedroom spend an average of nearly one and a half hours more viewing TV per day than kids without a TV in their



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bedroom. Rules about watching TV do not exist in about half of the households with 7th to 12th-graders (Rideout, Foehr, Roberts 2010). Many parents actually encourage their toddlers to watch television. Overweight is more common among children who watch more TV. University of Michigan researchers found that just being awake in a room with a TV on more than two hours a day is a risk factor for being overweight for children between three and four and a half years old (Rich et al 1998). TV viewing habits during childhood are related to overweight in adulthood. In fact, among 3 to7-year-old children, TV time predicted their body mass index even better than diet (Lumeng et al 2006). Watching TV contributes to overweight in various ways. Most importantly, children watching TV are generally inactive. In fact, while watching TV the metabolic rate seems to go even lower than during rest. This means that a child burns fewer calories watching TV than just sitting quietly doing nothing. Furthermore, just sitting quietly doing nothing is something that healthy children tend not to do, when they are not in front of a screen. Besides being inactive, many children tend to snack when watching TV. Finally, children are exposed to a massive amount of TV ads promoting high-sugar, low-nutrient food and drinks, which are specifically aimed at children (Viner, Cole 2005, Jago et al 2005, McGinnis JM, Gootman JA, Kraak, 2006). Restricting TV time appeared to be successful in reducing excess weight gain in preadolescents (Caballero 2004). c) Access to nature Another relevant environmental factor is the children’s access to nature. Time spent in contact with the natural environment has been associated with better psychological well-being (R. Kaplan, 1973), superior cognitive functioning (Cimprich, 1990; Hartig, Mang, & Evans, 1991; Kuo, 2001; Tennessen & Cimprich, 1995), fewer physical ailments (E. O. Moore, 1981; West, 1986), and speedier recovery from illness (Ulrich, 1984; Verderber, 1986; Verderber & Reuman, 1987). Due to their greater plasticity or vulnerability, exposure to nature may particularly affect children’s functioning and welfare (Faber Taylor, Kuo, & Sullivan, 2001, 2002; Faber Taylor, Wiley, Kuo, & Sullivan, 1998; Wells, 2000). Children’s preferred environments include a predominance of natural elements (Korpela, 2002). For example, in a study in which urban children aged 9 to 12 were asked to make a map or drawing of all their favourite places, 96% of the illustrations were of outdoor places (Moore 1986). In spite of this, areas that invite outdoor playing are vanishing. For instance in the UK, since the 1970’s the area in which children may roam without supervision has decreased by almost 90% (Moss 2012). While only a generation ago more than half of the children regularly played in nature, now it is less than one child in 10 (Moss 2012). d) The role of food in emotional socializing A final environmental aspect I would like to suggest here is the children’s socialization with regard to dealing with emotions. As stated above, children’s way of dealing with emotions affects their likelihood of becoming obese and their likelihood of becoming

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depressed. Dealing with emotions in one way or other is something children learn. Babies and toddlers tend to express their emotions, such as joy, sadness, fear or anger very directly. Many adults feel uncomfortable with these expressions, in particular in case of sadness and anger. Their immediate reaction to crying is often to make it stop, the idea being that when the crying stops, the sadness stops. That, however, is not necessarily the case. By stopping the expression of the emotion, adults tend not to acknowledge the emotion out of fear that this would somehow sustain it. In case of anger it makes sense to discourage certain expressions, for instance if they directly or indirectly hurt others. Yet it would be better for the welfare of children if adults supported them in recognizing and effectively dealing with their emotions, including sadness and anger, rather than trying to do away with them. Instead, distraction by offering food is a common strategy for making babies and young children stop crying. Food of the high sugar, low nutrient variety is also used as a reward or consolation in many social settings. It is also introduced as part of many emotionally laden social rituals and interactions, thus contributing to emotional eating, overweight and depression. These observations about food choices and food habits, effects of television viewing, access to nature and emotional socialization are meant to illustrate contextualism. They suggest that the successful pursuit of happiness is not only – and perhaps not primarily – an individual affair, but rather a matter of living in the right social and physical context.

2.5 Defending Contextualism in the Case of Childhood Obesity Prevention Against a Normative Challenge Let us grant that contextualism is indeed the most effective way of tackling the welfare problem of childhood obesity – does it mean that parents should throw the TVs out of their children’s rooms? Should they switch off their own television in the presence of their children and stick to rules concerning TV-viewing? Does it mean that schools ought to ban junk food vending machines and to slow down the lifts in order to encourage pupils to take the staircase? Some might complain that this is problematic, because it diminishes the child’s freedom. It is true that creating social and physical environments that help prevent childhood obesity might not only create options for the child, such as ensuring access to attractive parks and playgrounds in the neighbourhood. It might also diminish options, such as the option of unlimited TV viewing. It might also make options more costly, such as the option of taking the lift. Creating the right contexts might include, but is not restricted to, what has become known as “nudging”. Nudging is characterized by subtle contextual measures such as writing the healthy meal on top of the menu list so that more people will order it, or placing the lift somewhat out of sight in order to encourage taking the staircase. However, nudging measures per definition

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do not affect the number and accessibility of the options. Choosing an unhealthy meal and taking the lift are still equally available and equally unburdened options. Contextualism, contrary to mere nudging, affects the number and accessibility of (significant) options. Thus, contextualism might clearly limit the child’s freedom if “freedom” is understood as “option freedom”. Is that a problem? Caring for children per definition means caring for their welfare. A limitation of the child’s option freedom harms the child only if it negatively affects its welfare. According to all common accounts of welfare, option freedom is not intrinsically good for the child. If option freedom is good at all, it is instrumentally good. While having the option of unlimited TV viewing might give the child some enjoyment or preference satisfaction in the short run, it is likely to stand in the way of these goods in the long run, precisely because it might well contribute to childhood obesity and the accompanying negative impacts on the child’s welfare. Furthermore, even in the short run, it is not unlikely that other activities can be found that the child learns to enjoy and desire at least as much. Thus, a limitation of the child’s option freedom in this case is likely to promote the child’s welfare. So far, I have assumed that option freedom as such is not an intrinsic good, but some might argue that it is. One might conceive of option freedom as an aspect of welfare. Perhaps it is an item on an objective list. If option freedom is an aspect of welfare, limiting it may negatively affect the child’s welfare. Yet limiting the child’s option freedom may still contribute positively to other aspects of its welfare. Benefits with regard to these other aspects, such as health, are likely to outweigh the harms with regard to option freedom. What is more, it is in fact unlikely that restricting the child’s TV time is detrimental to the child’s option freedom overall. After all, preventing childhood obesity and the accompanying mental and physical problems is likely to have a positive effect on the child’s option freedom all things considered. If option freedom is only instrumentally good, it may nevertheless be an important or even indispensible means for achieving some intrinsic good. That intrinsic good might be autonomy. Autonomy, one might argue, is good for the child, not only to the extent that it promotes enjoyment or preference satisfaction, but in itself. Autonomy, one might thus argue, is an aspect of welfare, perhaps an item on the objective list. Alternatively, one might argue that even if autonomy is not intrinsically good for the child, being autonomous is a good simpliciter. Option freedom might be considered valuable not for its own sake, but as a means to, or aspect of, autonomy. In order to assess that criticism, one needs to assess what autonomy is and how it relates to option freedom. Furthermore, one needs to determine the value of autonomy as compared to welfare. These are difficult tasks. Fortunately, we can bracket these tasks for the time being, since we are concerned here with the case of childhood obesity prevention. Limiting a child’s TV time does not infringe with the child’s autonomy, simply because a child is not capable of an autonomous choice on that matter. On any plausible account of autonomy, choosing autonomously requires a certain awareness of one’s various options including their

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consequences. If you ask a child whether it wants to drink a certain liquid, and it wishes to do so, not knowing that the liquid contains some lethal poison, one cannot say that the child autonomously chooses to drink the poison, or even to die. The child is simply not capable of making an autonomous choice on that issue, because it lacks an understanding of the relevant facts and their consequences. The same is the case with regard to the choice concerning unlimited TV viewing. The child might opt for unlimited TV viewing, but cannot assess the consequences of that choice, and thus cannot choose autonomously. Autonomy is not an all-or-nothing matter. A child might well autonomously choose whether to drink apple juice or orange juice and whether to watch one children’s movie rather than another. So, even if autonomy is prudentially good or a good simpliciter and even if option freedom is important for autonomy in some way, it cannot be the case that providing an individual with options that she lacks the capacity to assess increases her autonomy. Considering all this, I conclude that the concern about the child’s option freedom does not count against the maintenance and creation of the above-mentioned physical and social contexts that facilitate obesity prevention and thereby promote the child’s welfare.

2.6 Is Childhood Obesity a Special Case? My defence of contextualism against the concern about limiting option freedom drew on the fact that we are talking about children, who are not capable of autonomous choice with regard to the relevant issues, such as whether or not to limit viewing time. One might wonder whether contextualism, which might limit option freedom, is defensible when adults are concerned. First of all, adults might be capable of autonomous decisions regarding the relevant issues. Secondly, while some adults in their specific roles – such as parents, teachers or politicians – might have special duties to care about the welfare of children, the same can perhaps not be said about responsibilities of adults for themselves or of adults for each other. A third potentially relevant difference is that children are particularly dependent on the social and physical contexts in which they find themselves, while adults seem to have greater freedom to choose and to change contexts. This raises difficult normative issues concerning the acceptability of limiting the option freedom of adults in order to promote their welfare. I will not pursue these issues here, but want to point out a possibility that seems least problematic. Adults – alone or in collectives – can, of course, autonomously decide to maintain and create beneficial environments and accept limits to their option freedom for the sake of improved welfare. Furthermore, when we are individually or collectively considering changing the social and physical environment of others, we can take into account that these changes – even if they happen to increase option freedom – do not necessarily promote these individuals’ welfare.



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So, it seems morally unproblematic to autonomously limit one’s own optionfreedom for the sake of one’s own welfare. Furthermore, it seems morally right, when influencing other people’s option freedom, to at least consider the effects on these people’s welfare. One might thus consider the empirical question of whether and in what circumstances increased option-freedom diminishes people’s welfare. While this can be granted, the threat from Brave New World scenarios still looms on the horizon: Is it morally acceptable to paternalistically limit people’s optionfreedom in order to promote their welfare? First of all, in order to be an act of paternalism in the strong sense of the word, those whose option freedom we limit paternalistically must possess the capacity of making autonomous decisions on the relevant issue. Even for adults, empirical studies raise doubts about their autonomy in a variety of cases. Food choices are a well-known example. What is more, research suggests that the lack of autonomy in certain situations cannot be fully remedied by providing information, since it is a result of persistent cognitive and emotional biases (Haybron 2008, 225-250). Secondly, I think that the attractiveness of limiting adults’ option freedom for the sake of promoting their welfare depends a great deal on what exactly welfare consists of. In my exploration of childhood obesity as a welfare problem, I sketched the common accounts of welfare and mentioned that they all have counterintuitive implications. None of these accounts of welfare seems to satisfactorily match our commonsense understanding of welfare. Reverting to the commonsense understanding of welfare is equally ineffectual, because there is no such thing as a coherent commonsense understanding of welfare. If we had a plausible account of what really made an individual’s life good for him or her, the resistance to limiting option-freedom for the sake of welfare would lose at least some of its force. For instance, the fear of being force-fed drugs that give one pleasant mental states is only relevant if welfare consists in having pleasant mental states. That, however, is not a plausible account of welfare. Thirdly, the fear that brainwashing might bring about the circumstance that I were perfectly well off pursuing some meaningless activity can be taken away by the reminder that the individual resulting from such brainwashing would not be me in the relevant sense. Therefore, brainwashing would not make me better off. It would rather exchange me (in the sense that matters) for someone else. Last but not least, the attractiveness of limiting option-freedom for the sake of welfare depends on what matters for a good life simpliciter, except for one’s own welfare. Some might say: “Being well-off is fine, as far as it goes. But what about being virtuous, achieving something, caring for others and making the world a better place? Don’t these things matter as well? Welfarists believe that welfare is the sole ultimate good. Achievement is valuable if it brings about welfare for oneself and others. Being moral is a matter of bringing about welfare, for oneself and others. The details differ, but that is what all welfarists agree about. Welfarists welcome limitations of optionfreedom for the sake of welfare. While I agree with the welfarist position, this is not the place to defend it.

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The attractiveness of the contextualist’s idea that welfare should trump freedom in a variety of cases depends, among other things, on the relative value of welfare and freedom, on empirical facts about the capacity for autonomous choice in the relevant context, and on the plausibility of the underlying account of welfare.

2.7 Conclusion I have applied contextualism about how to promote welfare in the case of childhood obesity prevention and defended it against the normative concern that creating and maintaining the right contexts may diminish the individual’s option-freedom. I have argued that caring for a child means caring for its welfare and pointed out that option-freedom is at best a means to welfare and should not trump it in this case. I have also pointed out that an appeal to the importance of autonomy is not helpful. After all, even if option-freedom is a prerequisite for autonomy, this is not a case of limiting autonomy, because the child is incapable of autonomous choice on the relevant issues. I have explored whether concern about limiting option freedom is a plausible criticism against contextualism in cases that concern the welfare of adults. The plausibility of this criticism depends on the relative value of welfare and freedom, on empirical facts about the capacity for autonomous choice, and on the plausibility of the underlying account of welfare.

References Aristotle. 1984/C4BCE. Metaphysics. 1072, tr. Ross. Barry, Brian 1989. “Utilitarianism and Preference Change”. Utilitas 1. Belshaw, Christopher. 2012. “Death, Value and Desire.” In The Oxford Handbook of Philosophy of Death, edited by Ben Bradley, Fred Feldman, Jens Johansson, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Bentham, Jeremy. 1996 [1789]. An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation. Edited by James Henderson Burns and Herbert Lionel Adolphus Hart. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Birnbacher, Dieter. 2005. Philosophie des Glücks. E-journal Philosophie der Psychologie, www. jp.philo.at/texte/BirnbacherD1.pdf Bradley, Ben. 2009. Well-being and Death. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Brandt, Richard B. 1966. “The Concept of Welfare.” In The Structure of Economic Science, edited by Sherman Roy Krupp, NJ: Englewood Cliffs. Caballero, Benjamin 2004. “Obesity prevention in children: opportunities and challenges.” Int J Obes Relat Metab Disord. 28 (3): 90-95. Centre for Disease Control and Prevention. 2013. www.cc.gov/healthyyouth/obesity/facts (accessed 24-7-2013). Cimprich, Bernardine E. 1990. Attentional fatigue and restoration in individuals with cancer. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. Crisp, Roger. 2006. “Hedonism Reconsidered.” Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 73, 3: 619-45.

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Elster, John. 1982. Sour grapes – utilitarianism and the genesis of wants. In Utilitarianism and Beyond. Edited by Amartya Sen, and Bernard Williams. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Faber Taylor, Andrea, Kuo, Frances E., Sullivan, William C. Sullivan 2001. “Coping with ADD: The surprising connection to green play settings.” Environment & Behavior, 33: 54-77. Faber Taylor, Andrea, Kuo, Frances E., Sullivan, William C. 2002. “Views of nature and self-discipline: Evidence from inner city children.” Journal of Environmental Psychology, 22: 49-63. Faber Taylor, Andrea, Wiley, Angela, Kuo, Frances E., Sullivan, William C. 1998. “Growing up in the inner city: Green spaces as places to grow.” Environment & Behavior, 30: 3-27. Feldman, Fred. 2006. Pleasure and the Good Life: On the Nature, Varieties, and Plausibility of Hedonism, 2nd edition. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Gesang, Bernward. 2000. Der Nutzenbegriff des Utilitarismus. Erkenntnis, 52: 373-401. Harsanyi, John C. 1982. Morality and the Theory of Rational Behavior. In Utilitarianism and Beyond. Edited by Amartya Sen and Bernard Williams, pp. 39-62. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Hartig, Terry, Mang, Marlis, Evans, Gary W. 1991. “Restorative effects of natural environment experiences.” Environment & Behavior, 23: 3-26. Hausman, D. 2012. Preference, Value, Choice, and Welfare. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. Haybron, Daniel. M. 2011. Central Park: Nature, context, and human well-being. International Journal of Well-being, 1 (2): 235-254. Haybron, Daniel M. 2008. The Pursuit of Unhappiness. The Elusive Psychology of Well-being. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Heathwood, Chris 2006. “Desire Satisfactionism and Hedonism.” Philosophical Studies 128: 539-563. McMahan, Jeff 1988. “Death and the Value of Life.” Ethics 99: 32-61. Jago Russ, Baranowski Tom, Baranowski Janice C., Thompson Deborah, Greaves Kathleen A. 2005. “BMI from 3-6 y of age is predicted by TV viewing and physical activity, not diet.”  Int J Obes, 29(6): 557-64. Klesges Robert C., Shelton Mary L., Klesges Lisa M. 1993. “Effects of television on metabolic rate: potential implications for childhood obesity.” Pediatrics, 91(2): 281-6. Korpela, Kalevi 2002. “Children’s environments.” In Handbook of environmental psychology. Edited by Robert B. Bechtel & Arza Churchman, (pp. 363-373). New York: John Wiley. Kuo, Frances E. 2001. “Coping with poverty: Impacts of environment and attention in the inner city.” Environment & Behavior, 33: 5-34. Lumeng Julie C., Rahnama Sahand, Appugliese Danielle, Kaciroti Niko, Bradley Robert H. 2006. “Television exposure and overweight risk in preschoolers.” Arch Pediatr Adolesc Med. 160(4): 417-22. McDonough Patricia 2012. “TV viewing among kids at an eight-year high.” Nielsenwire. October 26, 2009. Available at: http://blog.nielsen.com/nielsenwire/media_entertainment/tv-viewingamong-kids-at-an-eight-year-high/. Accessed 18 August 2012. McGinnis J. Michael, Gootman Jennifer Appleton, Kraak Vivica I., eds. 2006. Food marketing to children and youth:  threat or opportunity?  Washington, D.C.: National Academy Press. Moore, Robin C. 1986. Childhood’s domain. Play and place in child development. London: Croom Helm. Moss, Stephen 2012. Natural Childhood. The National Trust. http://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/ servlet/file/store5/item823323/version1/Natural%20Childhood%20Brochure.pdf Rich Michael, Woods Elizabeth R., Goodman Elizabeth, Emans S Jean, DuRant Robert H. 1998. “Aggressors or victims: gender and race in music video violence.” Pediatrics. 101(4 Pt 1): 669-74.

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Rideout Victoria J, Foehr Ulla G, Roberts Donald F.  2010. “Generation M2:  media in the lives of 8–18 year-olds.”  Kaiser Family Foundation. Available at: http://www.kff.org/entmedia/upload/8010. pdf. Accessed 30 June 2010. McNaughton, Robert 1954/55. “A Metrical Concept of Happiness.” Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, 14. Mill, John Stuart 1998 [1863]. Utilitarianism. Edited by Roger Crisp. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Moore, George Edward 1903, Principia Ethica, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Nozick, Robert 1974 Anarchy, State and Utopia. New York: Basic Books. Nussbaum, Martha 2006. Frontiers of Justice: Disability, Nationality, Species Membership. Harvard: Harvard University Press. Nussbaum, Martha 2001. “Adaptive Preferences and Women’s Options.” Economics and Philosophy, 17, 67-88. Rawls, John 1971. A Theory of Justice. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Sen, Amartya. 1993. “Capability and Well-Being.” In: The Quality of Life. Edited by Martha Nussbaum and Amartya Sen, pp. 30-53. New York: Clarendon Press. Parfit, Derek 2011. On What Matters, Vol. 1. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Tännsjö, Tobjorn 1998. Hedonistic Utilitarianism. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. Tennessen, Carolyn M., Cimprich, Bernardine 1995. “Views to nature: Effects on attention.” Journal of Environmental Psychology, 15: 77-85. Singer, Peter 2011. Practical Ethics. 3rd ed. New York: Cambridge University Press. Sobel, David 2009. Subjectivism and Idealization. Ethics, 119, 336-352. Sumner, L. Wayne 1996. Welfare, Happiness and Ethics. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Ulrich, Roger S. 1984. “View through a window may influence recovery from surgery.” Science, 224: 420-421. Verderber, Stephen 1986. “Dimensions of person-window transactions in the hospital environment.” Environment & Behavior, 18: 450-466. Verderber, Stephen, Reuman, David, 1987. “Windows, views, and health status in hospital therapeutic environments.” Journal of Architectural and Planning Research, 4: 120-133. Viner Russell M., Cole Tim J. 2005. “Television viewing in early childhood predicts adult body mass index.” J Pediatr.;147(4):429-35. Wells, Nancy M. 2000. “At home with nature: The effects of nearby nature on children’s cognitive functioning.” Environment & Behavior, 32: 775-795. Wessels, Ulla 2011. Das Gute. Frankfurt am Main: Vittorio Klostermann. West, Marcia Jane 1986. Landscape views and stress responses in the prison environment. Unpublished master’s thesis, University of Washington, Seattle. World Health Organisation (http://www.who.int/dietphysicalactivity/childhood/en/) Assessed: 22.5.2014.

Tim Moore

3 Keeping them in Mind 3.1 Introduction Over the past 30 years, a growing number of theorists have problematised longstanding theories of childhood, arguing that they fail to fully account for children’s lived experience, the part they play in shaping and being shaped by the worlds around them, and their unique cultures and standpoints (Lee 1999, Corsaro 2005). Theories have emerged that homogenise children’s experiences and either understate or overstate their vulnerability, capacity and agency. This paper presents these different (and often contradictory) conceptualisations and suggests that the process of reflexivity might help researchers (and theorists, practitioners and others) account for their approach and identify and respond to any challenges that arise. This paper draws from my PhD study which invited 12 experienced children’s researchers to reflect on their practice and how it was influenced by their own experience, by the academic field in which they work, and the broader social and cultural environments that shape what they know and how they know it.

3.2 Competing Conceptualisations and the Challenges of Researching Children There is general consensus that childhood is a social construction which has been conceptualised in different ways and at different times, both within the general population and within academia (Alderson 2013). These conceptualisations have been influenced by the social, cultural, political and economic contexts within which children and childhood theorists exist and have evolved and devolved over time (Corsaro 2005). Rather than moving seamlessly from one conceptualisation to another, theorists and the community at large have often held aspects of different conceptualisations at once: often with little consideration of how the contradictions and limitations of different theories might best be negotiated (Cunningham and Morpurgo 2007). Most conceptualisations characterise childhood teleologically and as a period of ‘becoming’: a period of pre-humanity within which the child passively learns, grows and develops towards adulthood (Qvotrup 2001). Children have commonly been seen as a blank slate on which adults forge the child’s future character, knowledge and worldview (Thane 1981). Children are thus passive recipients with little influence over their development, let alone the worlds around them or the adults they encounter (Cunningham 2005). Their value has generally related to them in the future: who they will be and what part they will play (Archard 2004). © 2015 Tim Moore This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 License.

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In many conceptions, childhood is seen as a period of innocence, naivety, incompetence and vulnerability (Qvortrup 1994): a period during which the child must be protected, educated and socialised so that they might become the best citizen possible as they enter adulthood. Unable to reflect on their experience, to act in their own best interests or to provide a perspective that is different to one that could be more articulately offered by an adult, children have been largely seen but not heard (Roche 1999). Rather than seeing children as innocents, other conceptualisations have suggested that children are born innately evil, or more likely, with a potential for evil influenced by their nature, by exposure to adult knowledge, adult manipulation or abuse, or adults’ neglect of their duty to provide children with idyllic childhoods or with stern development of character and responsibility (Fawcett 2008). At other points in time, children have been seen not as those who are corrupted but as those who corrupt: gang members, cyberbullies, teen sex offenders, provocative Lolitas, or rebels without a cause (Jackson and Scott 1999). Adults have been held responsible for failing to provide children with these priceless childhoods and the consequences that having troubled or troubling children have for the society at large (Zelizer 1994). At times adults have been held responsible as a collective, as a community, as a broad family network or, within Beck’s risk society (Beck 1992), as individual parents. At others, children themselves have been held accountable, particularly as they pass through the latter stage of childhood: adolescence. To varying degrees, troubling children have been held personally responsible for their behaviours (particularly through the adolescent stages of their childhoods) (Hobbs 1982), but the responses to their indiscretions have varied over time: they have been harshly punished, fiercely protected, assertively educated and re-educated, actively excluded, or violently removed from abusive or neglectful parents or communities in the belief that someone else might do a better job and redress these failings (Brendtro, Brokenleg, and Van Bockern 1990). In reviewing the literature, I would argue that there have been 12 dominant conceptions at play. I have summarised them in the table below.



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Table 3.1: Construct

Characteristics

Vulnerability

Competence

Agency / Participation

1. The Evil Child

Children are born evil and need to have evil educated and / or punished out of them

Children are vulnerable to immorality and poor adulthoods if innate evil is not redressed

Children are not competent to act in their own best interests or in ways that are not antisocial

Children’s value is in the future, influenced by adults and negatively influencing society. Children are passive recipients

2. The Child as an Empty Vessel

Children are born without innate evil or innocence but passively acquire knowledge and temperament

Children vulnerable Children are as a result of poor immature and parenting and incompetent negative adult involvement

Children are passively influenced by adults and society – no real attention is paid to how they influence or are agents within it

3. The Innocent Child

Children are born innately innocent

Children are vulnerable when exposed to adult knowledge, exploitation and harm

Children are immature and incompetent. Innocence and naivety promoted

Children are passively influenced negatively by adults and society. They have no agency

4. The Childhood is a Romantic Child preferred state and one that is lost as they grow into adulthood

Children are vulnerable to corruption and to their childhoods being stolen by adults

Children are competent in understanding their worlds but not necessarily the adult world within which they live

Child’s play and children’s cultures are recognised. The influence they have on each other is recognised but not on adults / community

5. The Evangelical Child

Children need to be saved from the adult world around them and from exploitation

Children corrupted by employment, sexual abuse and maltreatment by adults. Great concern for poor children

Children have their own natures but these are nonadult and of lesser value

Childhood is contextualised within families. Children’s rights are managed by adults who determine their participation

6. The Delinquent Child

Childhood marked Children are by potential evil vulnerable to (external rather than delinquency internal)

Children are unable to curb influence of adults

Childhood scrutinised and controlled by adults for the good of children. They have no positive influence

7. The Studied Child

Children shaped by their environments

Children are Children have vulnerable to poor developing health, psychologicalcompetence but and educational less so than adults outcomes

The State is responsible for children and for educating them. They have little agency

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Table 3.1:continued Construct

Characteristics

Vulnerability

Competence

Agency / Participation

8. The Psychological Child

Children developing within and as a result of their interactions with the environment and others

Children are at risk of poor outcomes, caustic environments that lead to poor outcomes

Competency is developed from childhood incompetence to adult competence

Children assimilate and accommodate knowledge and competence through interacting with environment. They have some agency

9. The Socialising Child

Children socialised to take on the conventional values and norms through social conditioning

Children are at risk of poor outcomes throughout life if not socialised properly

Increasing recognition of children’s competence however children less competent than adults

Increasing recognition of agency although not all socialisation theories recognise children’s influence

10. The Agentic Child

Childhood as a discrete period of life in which children make sense of their worlds and interact within it

Children are vulnerable as a result of structures and entrenched power differentials

Children are competent, have their own knowledge and can reflect on their place within society

Children are active agents influencing and being influenced by others and the worlds around them. Children are co-constructors

11. The Child as the Holder of Rights

Children are humans Children are and hold rights. vulnerable due to their relative immaturity and incompetence – they have a right to be protected, to have their developmental needs met and to participate in processes that affect their lives

Children are competent but less so than adults. They have a developing capacity to act in their own best interests but adults care-take their rights until they become adults

Children influence and are influenced by the worlds around them. They have a right to participation – but often need adults to enable this to occur. Children’s rights sit alongside parental rights (with some clashes)

12. End of Childhood

Delineation between children and adults is blurred. Children are exposed to adult knowledge and culture (often to their detriment) and adults fail to let go of their engagement with ‘childish’ activities and cultures

Children are assumed to be competent but may be required to do things that they are not prepared for / be responsible for things out of their control

Child-adult interactions are confused. Children heavily influenced by the media, by markets and by others who act to manipulate them. Children have limited capacity to protect themselves from manipulation

Children are vulnerable to being displaced, to being neglected by adults, to commodification and sexualisation



My Study 

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3.3 My Study In 2009-12, I conducted an exploratory qualitative study that provided a group of experienced researchers the opportunity to reflect on their practice and the practice of research with children in Australia; to consider how they understand children and childhood, and how their research is underpinned and influenced by the assumptions they hold. The study asked 8 experienced children’s researchers to consider how factors in the research environment influenced their research practice: which challenges have they encountered and overcome in the often complex and ‘messy’ world of children’s research? The study included semi-structured interviews in which researchers were invited to consider how they conceptualised children and the impacts that conceptualising children in these ways influenced their research practice. Ultimately, my study posed three questions: –– What are the underlying assumptions, beliefs and values held by researchers about children that underpin their research with children? –– How do these assumptions, beliefs and values influence the broad research process? –– How might reflexive practice be used to understand, account for and help guide the practice of research with children? To place their reflections in context, researchers’ writing was also analysed in terms of the key themes emerging from interviews. My study was therefore a reflexive one, as it provided researchers an opportunity to reflect on practice and to consider how their conceptualisations of childhood influenced their work.

3.4 Reflexivity as a Process Through Which Theoretical and Procedural Challenges might be Navigated The practice of research with children is primarily related to the development of knowledge, but is also a political and social endeavour. Through the development of new theories about who children are, what needs they have, what contributions they make, and how they understand and respond to the world, children’s positioning is reconstructed, and the ways that such theories influence practice are problematised and reoriented. But reflexive theorists also argue that the practice of research and the theorising that follows is also political and social, and is highly influenced by those managing that process and those relationships, either to the benefit or detriment of children. Reflexivity has been proffered as a process through which many of the ontological, epistemological and axiological aspects of the self, of intersubjectivity and the colonisation of knowledge can be uncovered, explored and accounted for. Some have

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argued that it is a way of increasingly problematising self-knowledge, of monitoring the self and the influence that one’s own biases, beliefs and personal experiences have on qualitative methodologies and the creation of new knowledge (Rose 1997, Daley 2010). Although the concept is often used interchangeably with related concepts of reflectivity and critical reflection, there has been a growing consensus that reflexivity is more action-oriented and is characterised by an ongoing internal dialogue and critical self-reflection through which the researcher’s positionality might be made explicit and the impacts of this positionality be accounted for (Sultana 2007). In the feminist domain, commentators have stressed the value of exploring how one’s own gender but also their lived experience of sexism, of their socialisation of gender roles, expectations, sexual expression and repression, and how this influences the way that they understand the world and relate to others within it (England 1994). In cultural studies, researchers are challenged to consider how their insiderness (or outsiderness) influences the lens through which they investigate particular subjects, how their own cultural values and histories shape the way they relate to subjects and research participants and make meaning of the data they gather (Merriam et al. 2001). Other reflexive researchers, particularly those inspired by theorists such as Pierre Bourdieu, attempt to turn the research lens back onto themselves and their research practice: taking responsibility for their own situatedness within the research process, and how their own biographies and experiences affect the settings within which research is conducted, those who they engage in research activities and how they interpret data and present findings. In these ways, reflexivity is presented as a process through which the production of knowledge as independent of the researcher and the research context is problematised (Guillemin and Gillam 2004). Finally, reflexivity conducted at the team or academic field level has opened up opportunities to unsettle entrenched commonsense views and truisms that pervade what is known about particular subjects, and questions how these taken-for-granted theories or ‘facts’ have been reinforced uncritically (Barry et al. 1999). Feminists, for example, have used reflexivity to uncover the ways that predominantly male academics perpetuated gender assumptions and stereotypes and controlled the development of knew knowledge.

3.5 Re-Considering Vulnerability and Incompetence Reflexively As illustrated in the table above, childhood has popularly been characterised as a period marked by vulnerability. From this perspective, children as a group are conceptualised as needing protection either from their own inherent evil or innocence, from adults who exploit or maltreat them, or from systems and structures that disempower them. A number of writers argue that these conceptions continue to be played out in both popular and academic discourses. Such discourses promote the need for adults as individuals (including parents, teachers, and children’s workers)



Re-Considering Vulnerability and Incompetence Reflexively 

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and collectives (including societies, child protection systems, and welfare sectors) to intervene in children’s lives (Christensen and Prout 2002). Participants in my study universally recognised that children experienced some level of vulnerability and were reticent to adopt conceptions of childhood that understated this reality. They echoed the sentiments of Balen et al. (2006, 32), who observe that “failing to acknowledge childhood as a distinct phase in the life cycle, albeit arguably socially constructed, where differential competencies, responsibilities and vulnerabilities prevail, would be irresponsible”. A number of researchers in my study reflected on how their own childhood experiences, experiences as parents, and as teachers and youth workers influenced their thinking. Three observed, for example, that their experiences as parents helped shape, soften or realign their views on childhood vulnerability. On one hand, having raised children through infancy they reflected that they were aware of how dependent children could be and how they needed adults to keep them safe from harm. They said that having children helped them appreciate the level of this dependence and became increasingly aware of the protectiveness they had for their own children and, as a result of this, for children more broadly. They reflected that although they had come to parenting with a concept of children as resilient, this resilience was further revealed through the observed experiences of their children and their children’s peers: I always thought that kids were resilient but in having children it became clearer to me as to how resilient they can be when given the right opportunities and chances. I don’t know that I could have come to this view without having been surprised [by my children’s capacity to cope] (RF).

Researcher participants had varying views about the extent to which this vulnerability was inherent in the child, in their relationship with adults, or within the systems and structures in which they lived and negotiated the world. Children’s vulnerability is often posited in terms of their physical weakness; their lack of knowledge due to their limited education, experience and cognitive capacity; and the ‘normal’ risks associated with being a child (Kelley, Mayall, and Hood 1997). Researcher participants were generally appreciative of these limitations, particularly when considering younger children. One, for example, talked about a newborn relative of hers and its total reliance on its parents for food, stimulation and protection. Although she acknowledged that this small child was interacting with its parents, and ultimately affecting them, she recognised that its dependence on adults in general and its parents in particular was significant. She observed that children’s dependence afforded them adult intervention and concern. Amongst the researcher participants, however, there was a strong view that by universalising childhood, theorists have been unable to recognise that children of different ages and stages have different vulnerabilities (and resiliencies), and that by holding totalising assumptions about children and their ability to protect themselves and manage the risks around them, children were often further marginalised and

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oppressed. Researcher participants argued that researchers and theorists need to be upfront about which children they were theorising about, and how children of different ages, stages and experiences might have different needs and be conceptualised in different ways. Although there was agreement that children were often vulnerable as a result of their relatively limited physical, neurological and experiential development, there was also a view that much of their vulnerability emerged as a result of the way that children are positioned within society. As such, it was argued that vulnerability was inherent in both children and childhood. In this regard, participants echoed the observations made by Lansdown (1994, 35), who observes that this structural vulnerability exists “because of [children’s] total lack of political power and their lack of civil rights”. Lansdown (1994, 38) follows by arguing that: There is a tendency to rely too heavily on a presumption of children’s biological and psychological vulnerability in developing our law, policy and practice, and insufficient focus on the extent to which their lack of civil status creates that vulnerability.

However, some researcher participants argued that the relational aspect between adults and children should not be overstated and that children’s agency should be further appreciated when considering their positionality. A number gave examples of how children managed, negotiated and rebelled against this positionality; noting that through their play and in their interactions with adults more broadly, children had some control over how adults might be let into their worlds, be provided with status and recognition and ultimately whether they might be excluded. They stressed the value of not only listening to children but also watching them as they interacted with researchers during research activities, and reflecting on how children’s behaviour might also give some insight into adult-child relations and the content being explored.

3.5.1 The Influence of Vulnerable Conceptions When children are constructed as primarily vulnerable it becomes the responsibility of adults, systems and the State to ‘protect’ them from further harm and negative influence. Within many contexts, this has led to children being excluded from decision-making processes, in civic activities and from mechanisms (including research) through which they can co-produce new knowledge for fear that they may be harmed through their participation or rendered more vulnerable as a result. Ironically, this has meant that children have not been given opportunities to exercise their human rights nor inform the communities, systems or services with which they have engaged, sustaining them in vulnerable and oppressed positions.



(Re)considering Vulnerability Reflexively 

 57

Researchers in my study articulated a desire to redress this situation, particularly in the research context, but argued that this was often difficult as they encountered ethical tensions that they and others found difficult to navigate. Although they believed that ethics processes often excluded children, they were wary about removing them entirely, recognising that children were often vulnerable both emotionally and politically and that this should be navigated on an individual basis. They believed that it was important for individual researchers, research teams and ethics committees to have an ongoing dialogue (with children, where possible) to problematise their approaches to ethics and research and to create new opportunities for ethical practice. In recognising that children were often vulnerable, researchers argued for a better balance between children’s participation and protection within the research context.

3.6 (Re)considering Vulnerability Reflexively In their 2011 article, Jan Mason and her colleague Suzanne Hood reflect that research is never apolitical and research with children is conducted within a context in which the “political can no more be separated from the personal for children than for adults” (Mason & Hood, 2011, p. 494). By promoting children’s agency, researcher participants can challenge the social order through the process of renegotiation of adult-child relations – whether they are engaged as participants or by treating them as co-researchers. However, as others have observed, there is also a risk that the research process can sustain children in disempowered positions and privilege adultist assumptions about their competency, their vulnerability and their broad life experience. There was a view amongst researcher participants that reflexive practice needed to begin from the early days of designing and planning research projects. Firstly, researcher participants stressed the value of researchers (particularly those new to the field) spending time reflecting on how they consider children and their vulnerability. As seen, they advocated for conceptions of childhood that marked children as competent and encouraged researchers to consider how they might ‘get over’ limiting mindsets.

3.7 Negotiating Risks with Ethics Committees In line with Bourdieu’s notions of reflexivity, researcher participants believed that there was value in engaging in reflexive discussions within the broader academic field, unpacking notions of vulnerability and collaboratively navigating the ethical and methodological challenges that might arise. In particular, they stressed the value of developing an ongoing dialogue with ethics committees.

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Researcher participants were of the view that ethics committees generally held conceptions of childhood that posed them as vulnerable and at risk of increased vulnerability through the research process. As such, in considering practical ways forward, they believed that further dialogue needed to be entered into with ethics committees, particularly around understandings of vulnerability. Rather than seeing ethics as being primarily procedural, and ethics committees as gatekeepers whose sole role is to approve or disallow research, researcher participants argued for a reconsideration of the ethics process, advocating strongly for processes and procedures that responded to risk but allowed for children’s participation. They believed that it was the role of researchers who held contradictory conceptions of children and childhood vulnerability to work with ethics committees to consider questions such as: ‘how might children’s exclusion from research further disempower and exclude them?’ ‘How might vulnerabilities be understood within the research context and appropriate steps be put into place to ensure that those which become apparent are resolved at each point in the research process?’ And, ‘how might other conceptualisations of children and childhood be understood and be used to reframe ethical dilemmas and issues?’ For this to occur, they were of the view that ethics committees needed to engage in reflexive activities with those working with children and those with a good understanding of their lived experiences.

3.7.1 Managing Researchers’ Vulnerabilities In addition to recognising and reflecting on the vulnerabilities that children may encounter within the research process, a number of participants were of the view that it is important for researchers to consider how the research experience affects them also. They, and other writers, recognise that when entering the research process, researchers can often delve into “unexpected and uncomfortable territory” (Davison, 2004, p. 381) where their own emotional security might be affected. Coles and Neerosh Mudaly observe: Qualitative research with vulnerable populations exposes researchers to a range of challenges during the research process that may have an impact on the researcher. These include the relationship that develops between researcher and participant, the counsellor versus researcher role, being empathic and sensitive to participant distress, and frequent exposure to participant trauma during the research process. (2010, p. 60)

3.7.2 Encouraging Conversations about Vulnerability and Children within the Broader Research Field Researcher participants highlighted the fact that often their views, values and beliefs about children and vulnerability were different to, and sometimes opposed,



Negotiating Risks with Ethics Committees 

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those dominant in the academic field and within the broader community. They had used a number of strategies to help navigate their way through the conflicts, tensions and “roadblocks” (as one participant put it) that emerged as a result of these differing perspectives, but argued that further conversation with key stakeholders across fields would be of benefit. So too, they argued, was there benefit in sharing their experiences with others who were new to the game and who were encountering similar ontological and epistemological inconsistencies and ethical and methodological dilemmas. One participant argued that those who were working through these difficulties had an ethical and professional responsibility to engage others in discussions, so that children were both protected from possible and often unforeseen risks through their involvement or non-involvement in research processes: Yeah and that’s what we get, but I suppose that means that we frame research then as an ethical responsibility to each other and that’s an ongoing – it’s beyond the ethics committee. That’s an ethical interaction with people and you can’t ethically stand by and not do something. (SD)

3.7.3 Children’s Competence and Incompetence The second aspect inherent in many of the conceptualisations of childhood relates to children’s competence or incompetence. Participants in my study observed that within society broadly, and within the academic field in particular, children are still primarily and uncritically understood as being incompetent and unable to reflect upon or articulate their experiences, needs or wishes. Such rhetoric reflects strongly held views within early psychological and developmental theories that assert that as children lack experience and cognitive capacity they are unable to fully appreciate their situation, environments and life worlds. Participants, like a number of key education, psychology and sociology theorists, challenged such assertions, arguing that from a very young age children are able to observe the world and to make critical judgments about these experiences. They argue that exposure to behaviours, relationships and experiences have more influence on children’s ability to reflect upon issues than their chronological age. There are some things that I, as an adult, don’t fully understand because I haven’t been exposed to them. Yes, I can use my experience to develop hypotheses but I’m not speaking from experience. It’s the same with children. They can talk about what they know, what they have thought about and what they have observed – and they do it from a child’s standpoint. That’s what we need to capture because ultimately it’s going to be different [to that of an adult’s experience].

There was consensus among the group, however, that such notions did not reflect their experience or their ways of seeing children more broadly. One reflected:

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I completely disagree. I vehemently disagree [with the idea that children and young people are incompetent]. I just think that young people, both in their interviews and in their lives they describe, seem to be incredibly able. And as I said before, I think I was just very surprised at their ability to reflect on their lives and try and make narratives out of those that were clear to them and to be able to look back and review things and look at them differently as they grew in maturity. (DK)

Researcher participants’ views about children’s competence were often shaped by their own experiences of childhood, through their tertiary education and from their practice experiences, either prior to or as part of their research careers. Three participants spoke about their childhoods and how they remember having in-depth conversations with adults around them, and in feeling involved in decision-making processes about matters that were important to them. These experiences shaped these researcher participants’ views on children’s capacity and the value that children place on these encounters. As one noted: I think it was also my personal experiences as a child and a young person that made me absolutely convinced that children are capable of knowing about their own lives – of having a say on their own lives – even if they may not be in a position to make a decision, just as adults are often not in a position to make a decision, but the children have to be part of that. (SB)

These researchers reflected that they drew from their own experiences of thinking about, talking about and learning about complex issues while they were young. As such their developing concept about childhood knowledge informed not only the way they encountered children in the present but also opened up opportunities to reflect on their own childhoods and how this influenced current practice. Maybe I think in the course of working with the children [in research] one of the things that started - struck me as I heard them say things or make sense of things I would start to ask myself about: “Was I like that?” And, “Did I have that ability to verbalise things in this way because I couldn’t connect with my own childhood?” I started to question that about myself and that’s when I started to notice a lot more, because I think they’re sitting there and what is it that seemingly not very smart children were able to say things that were so poignant and so clear. It revealed things about me, about my childhood, and that was informative as well. (NM)

For the participants who had worked with children in different contexts and professions, their views were very much shaped by their practice experience with children and the many conversations and interactions that they had shared.

3.8 Reconsidering Children’s Competence As seen, many of the researcher participants were of the view that the way that children experienced and understood the world was significantly different to adults. Researcher participants challenged traditional understandings of knowledge,



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knowledge development and epistemology, arguing that they were adultist, and that these traditional understandings viewed adult knowledge as being more valid and of greater value than that of children’s. Rather than dismissing children’s knowledge as being non-adult knowledge, researcher participants argued that it held value for a number of significant reasons. As one participant summarised: What do I say about that? I say, as [children’s researcher] Mary Kellett says, that children are the most competent commentators on their own lives. They know more about themselves. Adults are people too. I mean, see what we ignore is that there are varying degrees of competence in adults. I will speak out on things that I’m not competent on. It’s the responsibility of other people to [scrutinise my input and determine its value]. (JM)

The implications of recognising children’s knowledge as being of value were discussed by each of the researcher participants. They argued that the ways that children understood and made meaning of their experiences was different but in no way less complex or sophisticated than adults. They argued that children understood what it was like to be a child and to experience the world as someone at that particular age and stage of life. As a result of holding this view about children’s knowledge, researcher participants described how they were reticent to perpetuate what they believed were adultist observations about children and childhood, and spent some time considering the implications for theory and practice. They argued that it was necessary for those researching children to be clear as to whether they were reporting on their observations about children’s experiences, or when they were reporting children’s views about their experiences. In the latter case, they argued that the researcher must spend time exploring the child’s inner world and present children’s thoughts within the context of their own childhoods and their current experience. This, they believed, required a level of self-monitoring and reflection and an articulation of how their views influenced their practice being clearly acknowledged in their writing. These views challenge the traditional notions of children as ‘human becomings’, and recasts them as humans who may have different ways of making meaning about and understanding the world, but whose knowledge is no less valid. Participants also stressed the value of children’s observations about the world not only because they illuminate children’s own experiences and considerations but also because they could provide fresh insights about the nature of society and the place of both children and adults within it. In her interview, for example, one researcher drew from feminist standpoint theory and argued that, like women, children were an oppressed and marginalised group who could reflect not only on their positioning but also on the ways that adults interacted with each other and with children: Standpoint theory gives us a lens through which we can understand children and to also understand ourselves as understood by children. Like women have provided powerful observations about being a woman and not being a man, children can tell us what it’s like to not be an adult, what they think it’s like to be an adult and what it’s like to be someone who’s not yet an adult in an adultist world. (JM)

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Without the childhood researchers we wouldn’t have a theoretical basis for looking at children, we wouldn’t... their goal of looking at children’s lives from children’s standpoint is so important and I would actually think that some of the people who criticise don’t understand standpoint theory or the importance of what they’re doing and in particular their work on generations. (JM)

3.8.1 Children’s Competence Greater than Suggested Researcher participants challenged the view that universally children could not grasp adult concepts or participate in discussions about topics often considered incomprehensible to children (particularly as they moved into adolescence): I think we often misjudge children’s capacity and competence either because we don’t provide them opportunities to demonstrate their skills or knowledge or we involve them in activities that don’t fit their needs or wishes. Because we’ve failed to explain a process or have been unclear about our expectations children haven’t responded – and we see that as their lack of competence in understanding rather than our incompetence in asking. (SB)

They argued that they could justify this position as a result of their experience and success as researchers. They contended that those who were more ambivalent about children’s competency were often so because they had not worked with children, nor seen first-hand what children were capable of knowing and articulating. Although they recognised that children were often more competent than adults gave them credit for, most researcher participants were reluctant to suggest that because certain children were competent in many domains of their lives that they were competent in them all. What researcher participants did acknowledge was that children’s reflective capacity did evolve and change but that this was no different to adults: It is true that children may not grasp particular concepts or ideas or, in fact, not have experienced the things that are being researched. But that is no different to adults. Children often have encountered and thought about many things – these are the things we should talk to them about because until we get these insights, our theories of childhood are going to be limited (SB).

By doing so, researcher participants recognised that there were limits to what children could understand and argued against placing children in positions where they were asked to comment on things outside of their experience or to explain things that they had not processed in the past. Although two of the researcher participants strongly advocated the reflexive capacities of infants and young children and their capacity to understand concepts such as research, consent and future harm, the group of researcher participants as a whole were of the view that some children may not have the cognitive capacity to understand what was being asked of them, or why and how their involvement might affect them in the future.



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Lastly, researcher participants highlighted the flaws in the conceptual opposition of childhood and adulthood inherent in many of the dominant paradigms relating to childhood (Mason and Hood 2011). As Jenks (1982, 10) notes: “the child cannot be imagined except in relation to an adult … it becomes impossible to produce a well defined sense of the adult... without first positing the child.” Alongside this challenge to children’s incompetency was a challenge to the notion that adults were always competent and children were not. As one noted: There are many things that I do not know, things that children know, a knowing that they are not given credit for or opportunities to articulate. (AG)

3.8.2 The Influence of Incompetent Conceptions When children are primarily cast as pre-human and incompetent, their exclusion from community and from its processes is justified. Epistemologically, research that is carried out by researchers whose work is underpinned by such assumptions often relies on adults who are conduits of children’s knowledge: making comment without engaging children directly. From an ethical point of view, children are often considered unable to act in their own best interests and therefore rely on adults (most often parents but others also) to agree to their participation and to determine how they might be involved. This often has led to a situation where children are again excluded when adults are reticent for children to participate – even when children are keen to engage in research when given the choice.

3.9 (Re)considering Competence Reflexively Considering and accounting for these ontological, epistemological and ethical challenges was viewed as being imperative in research with children and deserving of reflexive practice.

3.9.1 Being Aware of one’s own Theoretical, Ontological and Epistemological Position Researcher participants were of the view that one’s theoretical, ontological and epistemological positions had a profound influence on how, why and who did research with children, and what issues and experiences were explored and reported. They believed that children’s competence should be recognised, but realised that this view was not always supported by others. They argued that when academics were

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hesitant about children’s capacity they should be upfront about this in their work. As one participant said: I suppose I try to be patient with that view [about children’s incompetence] that’s there because I do understand it … [but] if in fact we don’t trust children’s accounts then we should be upfront about that and not attempt to do it. I think if we do trust children’s accounts, this is not about giving away our authority as researchers or as adults or as anything else, this is much more about, you know, there’s that whole idea that you can share power and still retain your authority [and credibility in an academic sense]. (AG)

Three of the participants believed that it was important, therefore, for researchers working with children to account for their positions, particularly in relation to children’s competence, i.e. their views about children’s ability to reflect upon and articulate in a research context. They asserted that this was particularly important when conducting qualitative research with children on topics not often considered considerable by children. One made the point this way: All I’m asking for is that [researchers become] … aware of what [their] theoretical constructs are, because we all have theory. And the positivists aren’t always aware of the constructs and criticise our work because they are working in a different theoretical space. (JM)

[My advice is to just] read carefully, to be aware of epistemology as well as methodology, where they’re coming from ideologically, um to talk to other people and, you know, use that tool of reflexivity to the utmost. Um, and to continue to question for the good of others. (JM)

3.9.2 Considering Methodologies and Methods As Oakley (1995), Ansell (2001) and others have suggested previously, researcher participants were mindful of the fact that what they perceived to be ‘child friendly’ practice and tools may not always be the best for children or best for the research. Researcher participants in this study argued that in an attempt to be ‘child-friendly’, researchers sometimes developed research methods that were overly simple and lacked rigour. This was based on their assumptions about children’s capacity to use existing research instruments, and the need for them to be activity-based and fun. Researcher participants talked about the need to critically assess the methods that they use with children – an assessment that could and maybe should be conducted with children themselves. In addition to considering whether they are engaging (which they believed was important), researcher participants suggested that they also should be assessed on their ability to elicit children’s views sensitively, meaningfully and rigorously, and to meet the research question itself. For those who had worked in the area for some time, this assessment was an iterative process, where old methods



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were assessed and new methods developed to strengthen and improve practice. As one participant noted: It’s about how can we get this better and every time we do something now we’re finding we’re building on what’s happened before, rather than starting again and that takes a little while I think. But it definitely has advantages. We can be creative but we can ensure credibility at the same time. (AG)

Researcher participants believed that as a field, we need to be open to criticism and feel open to criticise or challenge.

3.9.3 Reflecting on Power In addition to considering what the most appropriate methods were for engaging children, one participant proposed that it was important to use a political lens to consider the broader forces at play in determining how research with children is conducted. She writes in her PhD, for example: Underlying this argument is an assumption regarding the fixed competencies children are seen to possess which ignores the structural constraints and discursive resources both children and adults bring to participatory practices. (Hartung, 2011)

3.9.4 Considering Competence within the Field Recognising the relative immaturity of children’s research and the limited dialogue related to the ethical use of methods that occurs at the institutional level, a number of researcher participants called for more opportunities for children’s researchers to come together to develop more responsive and appropriate protocols to help facilitate ethical practice, rather than hinder it. I think that to me the key is then in actually building networks of researchers who can share ideas and experience and provide good training and good support for researchers who are going to be going out and working with children so that in practice they know how to deal with those really tricky things that arise when you’re in the field. (SB) Do we need to keep pushing through the barriers? We do. We need to keep identifying what they are and then getting success stories up basically and I think we need to look for opportunities too: where we can come together like the think tank where I met you in Sydney, because it does build our confidence about what we’re doing but it plugs us into other resources and opens the picture up constantly all the time; have you thought about this, have you thought about that, is this person able to... (AG)

In some institutions, groups of researchers working with children have started discussing some of these ethical challenges and have reflected more broadly in practice.

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References Alderson, P. 2013. Childhoods, Real and Imagined: Routledge. Ansell, N. 2001. “Producing Knowledge about ‘Third World Women’: The Politics of Fieldwork in a Zimbabwean Secondary School.” Ethics, Place & Environment 4 (2):101-116. doi: 10.1080/13668790123027. Archard, D. 2004. Children: Rights and childhood. 2 ed. London: Routledge. Balen, R., E. Blyth, H. Calabretto, C. Fraser, Ch. Horrocks, and M. Manby. 2006. “Involving Children in Health and Social Research.” Childhood 13 (1):29-48. doi: 10.1177/0907568206059962. Barry, Chr. A., N. Britten, N. Barber, C. Bradley, and F. Stevenson. 1999. “Using reflexivity to optimize teamwork in qualitative research.” Qualitative health research 9 (1):26-44. Beck, U. 1992. Risk society : towards a new modernity, Theory culture & society. London: Sage. Brendtro, L. K., M. Brokenleg, and Steve Van Bockern. 1990. Reclaiming youth at risk : Our hope for the future. Bloomington, Ind.: National Educational Service. Christensen, P., and A. Prout. 2002. “Working with ethical symmetry in social research with children.” Childhood 9 (4). Corsaro, W. 2005. The Sociology of Childhood Vol. 2. Thousand Oaks, California: Sage Publications. Cunningham, H. 2005. Children and childhood in western society since 1500. London: Longman Publishing Group. Cunningham, H., and M. Morpurgo. 2007. The Invention of Childhood: BBC. Daley, A. 2010. “Reflections in reflexivity and critical reflection as critical research practices.” Affilia 25. England, K. 1994. “Getting Personal: Reflexivity, Positionality, and Feminist Research.” The Professional Geographer 46 (1):80-89. Fawcett, M. 2008. “Historical Views of Childhood.” In Focus on Early Childhood: Principles and Realities, 7-20. Blackwell Science Ltd. Guillemin, M., and L. Gillam. 2004. “Ethics, reflexivity, and “ethically important moments” in research.” Qualitative inquiry 10 (2):261-280. Hobbs, N. 1982. The troubled and troubling child: Re-EDucation in mental health, education and human services programs. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Center for Advanced Studies in Child Welfare (CASCW) University of Minnesota School of Social Work. Jackson, S., and S. Scott. 1999. “Risk anxiety and the social construction of childhood.” Risk and sociocultural theory: New directions and perspectives:86-107. Jenks, Ch. 1982. The Sociology of childhood : essential readings. London: Batsford Academic and Educational. Kelley P., B. Mayall, and S. Hood. 1997. “Children’s Accounts of Risk.” Childhood 4 (3):305-324. doi: 10.1177/0907568297004003004. Lansdown, G. 1994. “Children’s rights.” In Children’s childhoods : observed and experienced, edited by Berry Mayall, vi, 184 p. London ; Washington, D.C.: Falmer Press. Lee, N. 1999. “The Challenge of Childhood.” Childhood 6 (4):455-474. doi: 10.1177/0907568299006004005. Mason, J., and S. Hood. 2011. “Exploring issues of children as actors in social research.” Children and Youth Services Review 33 (4):490-495. Merriam, S. B., J. Johnson-Bailey, M.-Y. Lee, Y. Kee, G. Ntseane, and M. Muhamad. 2001. “Power and positionality: Negotiating insider/outsider status within and across cultures.” International Journal of Lifelong Education 20 (5):405-416. Oakley, A. 1995. “Women and children first and last: Parallels and differences between children’s and women’s studies.” In Children’s childhoods: observed and experienced, edited by B. Mayall, 13-30. Falmer Press.

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Qvortrup, J. 1994. Childhood matters: social theory, practice and politics: Ashgate Publishing. Qvortrup, J. 2001. Childhood as a Social Phenomenon: An Introduction to a Series of National Reports. Wenen: European Centre. Roche, J. 1999. “Children: Rights, participation and citizenship.” Childhood 6 (4). Rose, G. 1997. “Situating knowledges: positionality, reflexivities and other tactics.” Progress in Human Geography 21:305-320. Sultana, F. 2007. “Reflexivity, positionality and participatory ethics: Negotiating fieldwork dilemmas in international research.” ACME: An International E-Journal for Critical Geographies 6 (3):374-385. Thane, P. 1981. “Childhood in history.” Childhood, Welfare and Justice, London, Batsford. Zelizer, V. 1994. Pricing the priceless child: The changing social value of children: Princeton Univ Pr.

Bill Gardner

4 The Developmental Capability Model of Child Well-Being ‟But, speaking generally, man is not meant to remain a child. He leaves childhood behind him at the time ordained by nature; and this critical moment, short enough in itself, has far-reaching consequences.” - Rousseau, Émile.

Capability theory is an important approach to understanding well-being, including the well-being of children (Biggeri, Ballet, and Comim 2011). Amartya Sen developed the capability approach to provide a characterisation of human well-being and freedom that was richer than what was present in philosophical utilitarianism or welfare economics. The approach that will be used here, which is sometimes called the “capability approach,” sees human life as a set of “doings and beings”–we may call them “functionings”–and it relates the evaluation of the quality of life to the assessment of the capability to function. (Sen 1989)

Capabilities are what a person is able to be or do, that is, her potential for functioning. In this essay, I want to rethink how the capability approach applies to children in light of recent social scientific theorising by James Heckman (Conti and Heckman 2012; Heckman and Mosso 2014), who has recently adopted capability language in his writing. Theorists of justice, including capability theorists, have not sufficiently appreciated the importance of the fact that human capabilities develop over time. I will show that a developmental reconceptualisation of capabilities has significant implications for how we think about children’s well-being, how we think about justice, and about how we should organise and carry out human services for children in light of these conceptions of well-being and justice.

4.1 Development and Capabilities Individual human capabilities develop. That is, they come into being over extended periods of time as an unfolding of human biology in response to environmental exposure, through deliberate processes of cultivation, and through unconscious learning from experience. Capabilities develop across the human life span, but the processes are most rapid in childhood. Indeed, the development of capabilities is the primary functional task of childhood. I will draw out the implications of a developmental perspective on capabilities by discussing the recent work of James Heckman, who like Sen is a Nobel laureate in economics. Heckman has recently refocused his career on the distillation of research © 2015 Bill Gardner This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 License.



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in child development into economic models for the developmental origins of human capabilities. I speculate that there were several motivations for this change. The first was the finding that controlling for cognitive ability measured in the teenage years eliminates most wage gaps among groups of young adults, suggesting that labour market outcomes are largely determined by capabilities fixed in childhood. Similarly, job-training programmes that sought to remediate wage and employment gaps for adults were largely ineffective. Heckman was also, however, outspokenly critical of Herrnstein and Murray’s argument in The Bell Curve (Herrnstein and Murray 1994) that a single factor of generalised intelligence, measured by IQ and fixed by genetics, accounts for correlation in test scores and social outcomes (Heckman 1995). Since then, Heckman has been engaged in an intellectual programme that explains social inequality in terms of a multidimensional account of human capabilities, that accurately reflects the contemporary science of human development instead of reducing development to genetics, and that points to how inequalities can be addressed through early intervention. According to Heckman, Skills are multiple in nature and encompass cognition, personality, preference parameters, as well as health. Skills are capacities to act. They include some of the capabilities defined by Sen and Nussbaum but focus on individual attributes and not aspects of society such as political freedoms. (Heckman and Mosso 2014)

Capabilities are of (at least) two kinds: skills or powers of an individual, such as the ability to speak a language, and opportunities afforded by an environment or society, such as a right to free expression. The extension of rights to women, oppressed races, and sexual minorities are emancipatory triumphs that expanded opportunity capabilities and as such they have enormous consequences for children. Heckman focuses on attributes of individuals in part because he wants to understand individual variation in life outcomes. However, his theory does not discount the importance of rights. Rather, his concern with individual developmental outcomes complements and expands on the concerns of previous capability theorists. Heckman’s list of capabilities varies slightly across publications, but is essentially health, cognition, and personality (Conti and Heckman 2012). Dimension

Definition

Health

Freedom from disabling injury, illness, or pain; capacity to achieve things with the body. Abilities in attention, memory, language, learning, reasoning, problem solving, and decision making, sufficient to cope with life tasks. Social and emotional competence: Abilities to experience, express, and manage emotions and the ability to establish positive and rewarding relationships with others, sufficient to cope with life tasks.

Cognition Personality

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These are high-level dimensions or domains of capability, each of which includes multiple discrete capabilities. Evidently, there are many other capabilities, so why does he focus on these? Heckman is carving the space of individual capabilities into the natural dimensions of the space of individual differences among children as understood by child developmentalists and paediatricians. I describe Heckman’s capabilities as kernel capabilities, meaning that they are prerequisite to the development of a wide space of other capabilities. Being able to manage negative emotions is a capability that is essential to functioning in many contexts, understanding the rules of chess is required for functioning in only a few. Kernel capabilities are important for two reasons. First, the normal life course in current developed societies can be divided loosely into a series of familiar stages: e.g., intrauterine life, infancy, early childhood, middle childhood, adolescence, and so on. These stages are bound by differences in biological status, culture, and social institution. Kernel capabilities matter because individual variation in these capabilities at early stages predict variation in capabilities and functioning in later stages (Campbell et al. 2014). Heckman has used a variety of data sets to show that employment and other outcomes are predicted not just by children’s cognitive attributes, but also by social attributes. [A] low-dimensional vector of cognitive and noncognitive skills explains a variety of labor market and behavioral outcomes… Noncognitive skills strongly influence schooling decisions and also affect wages, given schooling decisions. Schooling, employment, work experience, and choice of occupation are affected by latent noncognitive and cognitive skills. We show that the same lowdimensional vector of abilities… explains schooling choices, wages, employment, work experience, and choice of occupation [and] a wide variety of risky behaviors. (Heckman, Stixrud, and Urzua 2006)

Heckman has followed many child developmentalists (Conti and Heckman 2013; Moffitt et al. 2011) and emphasized the central role of personality and social development (e.g., self-regulation, including turn-taking, cooperation, empathy, and the ability to express one’s emotions) to function successfully, first in a school environment and later in a work environment (Heckman and Kautz 2012). The point is not that we need children to be docile in the classrooms, although they are certainly at risk if they are disruptive. Rather, the construction of a skill occurs through and in the context of social interactions: nurture from parents, tuition from teachers, and play with peers. Children’s social skills enable them to participate successfully in those interactions, being with others and learning from them is itself a critical skill domain. Social development and personality traits had been ignored in the human capital literature, which reduced that construct to cognitive skills. Interpersonal skills were also ignored by Herrnstein and Murray and insufficiently discussed in previous literature on children in the human capital approach.



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Children’s health was not featured in Heckman’s early work, presumably because young adults show little variation in (relatively good) health. Nevertheless, health outcomes are paediatric morbidity, risk factors, environmental exposures, and acquisition of unhealthy behaviours lay a foundation for the adult acquisition of chronic illness (Forrest and Riley 2004; N Halfon and Hochstein 2002; Neal Halfon and Conway 2013). Similarly, childhood mental disorders also predict significant social and educational attainment deficits in adulthood (Currie and Stabile 2006). Children’s cognitive and non-cognitive abilities affect later health outcomes (Heckman et al. 2014; Cutler and Lleras-Muney 2010). Conversely, socio-economic disparities in health are detectable from infancy onward (Braveman and Barclay 2009; Fletcher and Wolfe 2013). It is reasonable to assume that these health differences influence cognitive and personality development. A primary reason why early stage variation in kernel capabilities predicts later variation in capabilities and social outcomes is that kernel capabilities are prerequisite to or components of many other more specialised capabilities. Obviously, primary cognitive skills are requirements for learning advanced cognitive skills, in the way that calculus requires algebra. But developing cognitive skills also has a less obvious prerequisite in personality and social skills. Learning to read requires being able to function in a classroom, which requires the development of social skills such as the ability to control impulses or regulate negative emotions (Eisenberg, Valiente, and Eggum 2011; High 2008). Heckman models the development of capabilities as a dynamic process (Cunha, Heckman, and Schennach 2010). In contrast, the quantitative models underlying Herrnstein and Murray modelled social outcomes such as economic success as an additive function of genetic endowments and environmental factors. In light of current science, this oversimplifies the biology. There is important evidence that the effect of genes is not a simple lottery: how genes are expressed over the course of development is affected by the environments (Caspi et al. 2010; Nisbett et al. 2012; Shonkoff 2010). More importantly, Herrnstein and Murray’s and many other theorists’ models are static, that is, they model the outcome as the resultant of one-time inputs from genes and the environment, as if humans were formed all at once. Heckman’s econometric models, by contrast, are based on equations that track the motion of children’s multi-dimensional capabilities from one developmental stage to the next (Cunha, Heckman, and Schennach 2010). In each stage, children gain capabilities by adapting to the challenges posed in that stage. Development is therefore path-dependent: it extends across time and a child’s outcomes during an early stage affect her outcomes in later stages. Heckman and colleagues estimate these models using longitudinal data sets that track children through multiple stages of development to adult outcomes. They then estimate the relative effects of each early stage kernel capability on adult outcomes and have thereby identified what they believe are sensitive periods for the development of a specific capability. Based on his econometric results, Heckman

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argues that intervening early – during infancy, if possible – is the most cost-effective social policy to reduce poor adult outcomes (Heckman 2006). It is more difficult to compensate for the effects of adverse environments on cognitive endowments at later ages than it is at earlier ages. (Cunha, Heckman, and Schennach 2010)

It would be a significant mistake, however, to understand Heckman as claiming that intervention during a sensitive period is sufficient to create successful adult outcomes. Children from disadvantaged backgrounds who achieve compensatory gains in a kernel capability through early intervention must still succeed in advancing that capability during later stages. Without further social investment, they will likely continue to face an adverse environment in those later stages. Sustaining interventions to preserve early gains should follow early intervention. One reason why capability development has sensitive periods is that children are biologically and psychologically plastic during early stages of development (Heckman 2007). A second reason is that the capabilities acquired (or not) during early stages in development affect children’s abilities to acquire new capabilities in future stages, so an early developmental outcome can be amplified across the rest of the life span. The amplification of early outcomes across later development exemplifies the path-dependence of development. Success or failure in the acquisition of capabilities during stage t changes the probabilities that a child will succeed or fail when faced with new challenges in stage t+1. We can imagine a society in which a child’s failure during stage t would lead society to mobilise resources during t+1 to compensate and get the child back on the appropriate developmental path. This is how physical growth works: children who fall behind their growth curve as a result of temporary malnutrition exhibit accelerated ‘catch-up’ growth when proper nutrition is restored. Heckman finds the opposite. Doing well in stage t positions a child to take best advantage of opportunities for acquiring skills during stage t+1. So rather than compensating for early disadvantages, later developmental stages often amplify them. There are positive returns to talent, sometimes known as the “Matthew effect” (Merton 1968), in which good things come to those who already have. Higher levels of both cognitive and noncognitive skills raise the productivity of subsequent investment [in those skills]. (Cunha and Heckman 2007)

Developmental research has established that disparities in kernel capabilities begin early in life. This positive return to talent means that the trajectories of the development of children’s capabilities can reveal a diverging pattern, with inequality in capability increasing across stages. In summary, Heckman’s account of capability development contrasts sharply with that offered by Herrnstein and Murray. Herrnstein and Murray sought to explain and, perhaps, justify current class and racial inequalities as a meritocracy based on a single dimension of capability, general intelligence, which was determined by



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genetics and resistant to social intervention. Heckman believes that there are several kernel capabilities driving adult outcomes. They are shaped in part by genetics, but these capabilities are constructed through children’s own activity with adults and peers in a multiple stage trajectory. Because of the importance of early sensitive periods and the path-dependent quality of developmental processes, early individual differences in capability can be amplified into large disparities in adult outcomes. There is, however, promising evidence that well-targeted early interventions coupled with sustaining interventions like high-quality schooling can remediate many of these disparities.

4.2 Developmental Capability Well-Being and Justice The developmental understanding of the capabilities described above has implications for liberal and egalitarian conceptions of justice. To get a sense of this, I will consider how Heckman’s empirical work might affect three liberal egalitarians: a welfare economist, a Rawlsian, and a capability theorist. By “an egalitarian welfare economist,” I mean someone who is, like Heckman, concerned with the amount and distribution of the income and wealth produced in the economy. She is likely to be concerned by the increasingly skewed distribution of wealth and income (Piketty 2014) and the accompanying shift in political power toward the hyper-wealthy financial elite (Hacker and Pierson 2010). Heckman would respond to her concerns with an argument that inequality in wealth and income is to a considerable degree determined by inequality in human capabilities and those inequalities in capabilities result from inequitable trajectories of capability development. These inequalities are dramatic. Extensive data show that social variation in health is present at birth and increases across childhood (Almond and Currie 2011; Currie 2011; Fletcher and Wolfe 2013). David Autor finds that cognitive skills are substantially rewarded in the labor market across all 22 economies. The average wage premium corresponding to one “unit” (i.e., one standard deviation) increase in measured cognitive skills is 18%. In addition, cognitive earnings premiums differ substantially across countries… The United States stands out as having the highest measured return to skill, with a premium of 28% per unit increment to cognitive ability. Concretely, comparing two U.S. workers who are one standard deviation above and one standard deviation below the population average of cognitive ability, we would expect their full-time weekly earnings to differ by 50 to 60%. (Autor 2014)

However, because inequalities are built through an extended developmental process, there are opportunities to intervene. Through cost-effective interventions, we can create a new generation with a more equitable distribution of capabilities, and thereby a more equitable distribution of welfare. The policy implication of the developmental

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capabilities view is that instead of the (largely failed) project of redistributing inequitable wealth and income, we should commit to the enhancement of children’s capabilities so that fewer inequities arise. Enhancing children’s capabilities is a form of “pre-distribution,” as opposed to re-distribution. When we think of government’s effects on inequality, we think of redistribution – government taxes and transfers that take from some and give to others. Yet many of the most important changes have been in what might be called “pre-distribution” – the way in which the market distributes its rewards in the first place. Policies… have all shifted in favour of those at the top, especially the financial and non-financial executives who make up about six in 10 of the richest 0.1% of Americans. The moral of this story is that progressive reformers need to focus on market reforms that encourage a more equal distribution of economic power and rewards even before government collects taxes or pays out benefits. (Hacker 2011)

Now consider the position of a Rawlsian liberal, that is, someone whose primary concern is that the basic institutions of society should be set up such that citizens are free, equal, and live in a system of fair cooperation. One of the metrics that Rawls used to measure equality was the levels of citizens’ “primary goods.” Many theorists interpret primary goods as resources that citizens are entitled to. However, I am not convinced that there is much difference between a developmental capabilities approach and a Rawlsian ‘resourcist’ approach (Anderson 2010; Pogge 2010; Kelleher 2015). The list of these goods considerably overlaps with many lists of capabilities, such as Nussbaum’s. Moreover, although primary goods are commonly described as resources, one thinks of resources as discrete things that can be straightforwardly transferred. This is the case with the primary goods of wealth and income, but it hardly fits the last element on Rawls’s list of the classes of primary goods: (5) The social bases of self-respect, understood as those aspects of basic institutions normally essential if citizens are to have a lively sense of their worth as persons and to be able to advance their ends with self-confidence. (Rawls 2001)

But having sufficiency in kernel capabilities is an important component of having self-confidence in the ability to advance one’s end and having a sense of worth as a person. Perhaps Rawls saw this, because his fifth class of primary goods is similar to capability theorist Elizabeth Anderson’s norm of “democratic equality”: To be capable of functioning as an equal citizen involves not just the ability to effectively exercise specifically political rights, but also to participate in the various activities of civil society more broadly, including participation in the economy. And functioning in these ways presupposes functioning as a human being. Consider, then, three aspects of individual functioning: as a human being, as a participant in a system of cooperative production, and as a citizen of a democratic state. (Anderson 1999)



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The developmental capabilities model attempts to capture the childhood antecedents and determinants of the capabilities that adults require to function effectively in their social lives, in the economy, and as citizens. Kernel capabilities are also important determinants of whether one has sufficient income and wealth. From a developmental capabilities perspective, Rawls was mistaken to focus on primary goods to the exclusion of capabilities. Kernel capabilities should be included in a list of primary goods, that is, the “things that citizens need as free and equal persons living a complete life” (Rawls 2001). In Rawls’s scheme, a critical component of a system of fair cooperation is that social positions should be open to all under conditions of fair equality of opportunity. …fair equality of opportunity is said to require not merely that public offices and social positions be open in the formal sense, but that all should have a fair chance to obtain them. To specify the idea of a fair chance we say: supposing that there is a distribution of native endowments, those who have the same level of talent and ability and the same willingness to use these gifts should have the same prospects of success regardless of their social class of origin… In all parts of society there are to be the same prospects of culture and achievement for those similarly motivated and endowed. (Rawls 2001)

The developmental capability view should prompt a Rawlsian to rethink the notion of “native endowments.” Rawls was not a meritocrat and he argued that it was unjust that people should be rewarded or disadvantaged because of their random draws from “the genetic lottery.” I agree. However, the developmental capability approach clarifies that “native endowments” are socially constructed to a greater degree than Rawls may have understood. Dissimilarity of talent is, to that degree, an outcome of the system that reproduces society across the generations, not an exogenous fact. The principle of fair equality of opportunity states that prospects should be similar for those of equal talent and motivation. Heckman’s models indicate that “talent” is endogenous to the system to a greater degree than genetic determinists believe. But a developmental capability approach suggests that motivation may also be endogenous. Positive returns to talent mean that at any given developmental stage, those who enter the stage with greater capabilities have the expectation of achieving greater gains in capability during that stage. So if there is a trade-off between effort to improve capabilities and enjoying oneself – and this, at least, is how I experienced much of how childhood – then returns to effort favour those who enter the stage with greater capabilities. If so, then the motivation to acquire capabilities will be endogenous to the system and would, rationally, be greater for those at the high end of the capability distribution at early developmental stages. If so, it seems unfair to hold less talented and less motivated children accountable for their lack of motivation. Despite his metaphor of a “genetic lottery,” I believe that Rawls knew that talent and motivation were largely endogenous.

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  The Developmental Capability Model of Child Well-Being …native endowments of various kinds (say, native intelligence and natural ability) are not fixed natural assets with a constant capacity. They are merely potential and cannot come to fruition apart from social conditions… Among what affects their realization are social attitudes of encouragement and support, and institutions concerned with their early discipline and use. Not only our conceptions of ourselves, and our aims and ambitions, but also our realized abilities and talents, reflect our personal history, opportunities, and social position… (Rawls 2001)

In my view, Heckman’s dynamic modelling of the path-dependence of the development of capabilities is the best current empirical account of how personal history and opportunities determine our realised abilities. A full appreciation of how capabilities develop should lead a Rawlsian to include the social institutions that nurture children in the basic institutions of a just society. No other stance is consistent with substantive and not merely formal fair equality of opportunity. Fair equality of opportunity requires a commitment to social institutions that invest in children such that each child has a fair opportunity to achieve sufficiency in kernel capabilities. Finally, let’s consider the implications of the developmental capability view for someone who is committed to Sen’s capability approach to well-being. Sen developed the capability approach in part to answer the question of what egalitarians wanted to equalise (Sen 1980). The answer was “capabilities.” Applying this answer to children, egalitarians should seek to have children achieve a sufficiently high level of those capabilities picked out as relevant to justice. The developmental capability helps refine that goal in at least two ways. First, attempts to measure children’s capability well-being should include children’s kernel capabilities. There have been several lists of capabilities proposed, including an influential list from Nussbaum (Nussbaum 2003). Her list proposes a set of capabilities that are the essential ingredients of well-being, such as being alive or having control over one’s body, and human rights, such as being able to use one’s mind in ways protected by guarantees of freedom of expression with respect to both political and artistic speech, and freedom of religious exercise. (Nussbaum 2003)

Measuring capabilities is challenging because the set of possible capabilities is very large. Moreover, the time required to develop a specialised capability (for example, the ability to play in a string quartet) will compete with the time required to develop another (the ability to prove theorems in topology). Is someone with highly developed skills in a narrow domain more or less capable than someone who is moderately skilled in a range of domains? Such questions have no clear answers. To develop a theory of justice that connects to social reality through empirical science, we need to identify a tractable list of critical human capabilities. Further, these capabilities must be essential to justice. Elizabeth Anderson notes that Sen’s capability egalitarianism leaves open a large question, however. Which capabilities does society have an obligation to equalize? Some people care about playing cards well, others about enjoying luxury vacations in Tahiti. Must egalitarians, in the name of equal freedom, offer free



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card-playing lessons and state subsidized vacations in exotic lands? Surely there are limits to which capabilities citizens are obligated to provide one another. We should heed our first desideratum, to identify particular goods within the space of equality that are of special egalitarian concern. (Anderson 1999)

The developmental capability perspective identifies kernel capabilities should be central to any such measure. The capability approach asserts that having capabilities creates a wide space of potential functioning, which is one meaning of freedom. Failure to develop a kernel capability would inhibit the development of many other capabilities. Preventable impairments in kernel capabilities are thus restrictions of freedom and prima facie unjust. This suggests that interpersonal comparisons of capabilities should include a focus on kernel capabilities. Some current efforts to measure children’s well-being from a capability perspective have focused on capabilities that children themselves conceptualise and identify as important (Biggeri and Mehrotra 2011). This is in contrast to the perspective taken by Heckman, by most educators, and this essay, in which dimensions of capability are selected because of their roles in children’s future lives, as judged by adults. How can we justify the prescriptive view of capabilities adopted here? It will often be true that some children will not value their health, cognitive skills, or social skills in the manner than an adult will. But children have an interest in their future well-being and the data are clear that their future capabilities, along with social outcomes that are reasonable to value, depend on whether they are on trajectories toward acquiring kernel capabilities. For this reason, standard lists of capability dimensions in wellbeing measures (Stiglitz, Sen, and Fitoussi 2009) include being educated, which I interpret as meaning that one has acquired kernel cognitive abilities. I take Biggeri’s and Mehrotra’s point that children’s own accounts of their wellbeing should be included in capability measurements. Child-orientated accounts of their well-being deserve careful consideration just as patient-orientated measures of well-being matter in medicine (Epstein and Street 2011; Institute of Medicine 2001). My view is that child-orientated measures of well-being complement rather than compete a more traditional adult-prescriptive view of what capabilities are valuable for children. Second, the developmental capabilities approach identifies a policy of early intervention as a strategy to reduce inequality in capabilities. Specifically, egalitarians should study human development with the goal of understanding and then changing the institutions that promote inequity in developmental trajectories. If the metric of equality is capability, reducing inequality of trajectories in the development of capabilities is far more important than redistribution. Redistribution is important to a welfare economist because, as Nicholas Kaldor argued, questions of how the economy is organised to produce are separable from questions of how that production should be distributed (Kaldor 1939). In Kaldor’s view, economists should always argue for more efficient schemes that increase

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production, regardless of their distributional consequences, because any injustice in distribution can be corrected through redistribution after the fact. In all cases, therefore, where a certain policy leads to an increase in physical productivity, and thus of aggregate real income, the economist’s case for the policy is quite unaffected by the question of the comparability of individual satisfactions; since in all such cases it is possible to make everybody better off than before, or at any rate to make some people better off without making anybody worse off. (Kaldor 1939)

For a welfarist, inequalities of capability resulting from unequal trajectories pose substantial challenges for creating just societies. But they are not insurmountable, because resources can be transferred to compensate individuals with impaired capabilities. However, the production and distribution of capabilities are one and the same process. I can’t transfer my health, intelligence, or personality to you. As Coast points out for health, …the production of health cannot be separated into separate technical and allocative questions; allocation happens simultaneously with production, and cannot be compensated within its own evaluative space. (Coast 2009)

Redistribution may still have some value for an egalitarian capability theorist, in that redistributing resources among parents in generation k may lead to a more equitable distribution of capabilities in generation k+1 by improving the developmental trajectories of children who would otherwise be deprived. Whereas the welfarist should seek to improve trajectories as a cost-effective means to equalising wealth and income, the distribution of adult capabilities is an end-in-itself for an egalitarian capability theorist. Because kernel capabilities can only be produced through an extended developmental process, that process must be a central concern for the capability theorist. I conclude that equalising developmental trajectories should be a focal task for each type of liberal egalitarian. As Heckman puts it, The foundations for adult success and failure are laid down early in life. Children raised in disadvantaged environments start behind and usually stay behind throughout their lifetimes. Gaps in cognitive and behavioral traits emerge very early. The risk of disease increases more rapidly with age in disadvantaged populations. Inequality among families in early childhood environments is a major producer of inequality in the capabilities that promote successful functioning in society. In the absence of interventions to alter their trajectories, children growing up in disadvantage are at increasing risk – both socioeconomic and biological (Conti and Heckman 2012).

Conversely, if we can reduce the number of children who grow up with insufficient capabilities, we will reduce inequality in the next generation, relative to the counterfactual of current policy and practise.



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4.3 Implications for the Care of Children Let’s briefly consider some of the policy consequences of a commitment to reducing inequality in children’s developmental trajectories on kernel capabilities. As a child psychologist and professor of paediatrics, my interest in the concept of children’s well-being is motivated by a need to rethink the goals of children’s health care. Paediatricians are the caring professionals who most commonly see children in the critical years of infancy, toddlerhood, and early childhood. Currently, paediatric care is primarily structured as an acute care system delivering short-term therapies in response to injuries or illnesses. Paediatrics should also, however, take responsibility for medical services advancing children’s physical, cognitive, and behavioural development – that is, the kernel capabilities critical to childhood – so as to provide the foundation for adult capabilities and well-being (Gardner and Kelleher 2014). We envision paediatric care organised as Learning Health Care System (LHCS) that continuously gather data, evaluate it, and implement change to improve outcomes and save costs (National Research Council 2012; Greene, Reid, and Larson 2012). A paediatric LHCS should evaluate pediatric care on how well it prevents the onset of chronic illness and builds capabilities for adult flourishing. The pediatric LHCS should therefore focus on preventative medicine and child development. Developmental research has shown that the acquisition of health and robust adult capabilities depends not just on childhood physical health and cognitive development, but also on development of social behaviors that promote learning, self-regulation, workplace success, and healthy adult relationships. (Gardner and Kelleher 2014)

The capability approach requires a shift from a focus on acute care to a mode of care that seeks to detect children whose trajectories on kernel capabilities predict substantial restrictions in adult capabilities. Paediatric health systems should track the well-being of children using the capability dimensions and assess children’s trajectories on these dimensions. To achieve equity in adult capabilities, the health system should be accountable for the developmental trajectories of populations of kids and should evaluate the success of their practise on whether they improve these capabilities. The literature on childhood resiliency finds that some children develop successfully despite severely adverse circumstances, while others are highly vulnerable (Cicchetti 2013). By focusing on variation in developmental trajectories, the developmental capability approach individualises the concerns of justice. Sen pointed out that a disabled person may find it hard to function well even with an equal share of resources if he lacks the capability to convert resources into well-being (Sen 1992). Similarly, the resources invested in the health, education, and social development of a child must be titrated according to an assessment of the child’s current trajectory.

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To realise paediatric LHCSs, we will need new technology for measuring child outcomes. These systems must measure and track children’s progress on multidimensional indicators across the child’s lifespan. The Developmental Capabilities approach can provide a conceptual schema for the assessment of children’s trajectories and the measurements of children’s health and well-being. Evaluating care this way would change the kinds of care that are delivered. Paediatric health systems attending to developmental trajectories would increase their focus on preventative care. Where children are on trajectories toward insufficient capabilities, and where effective interventions exist, paediatricians would either act to improve the trajectory or seek to engage the family with the non-medical service that could best deliver help. The kernel capabilities emphasise sufficiency in cognition and personality, as well as physical health. To advance this holistic understanding of health, child health providers should substantially increase their behavioural health services, helping both children and parents to get care. Because trajectories depend on social and environmental factors as well as capabilities, health systems will also need to assess and address the social determinants of child capabilities in the communities of their patients. Children’s hospitals should, for example, be part of the fight for lead paint removal, better policing, and access to low cost housing for the populations they serve. To deliver care that addresses the spectrum of kernel capabilities, paediatricians must connect with and collaborate with all the other professionals and institutions with responsibility for the development and well-being of children. Paediatric health systems will need to share data and coordinate care with schools, social services agencies, juvenile justice, and other institutions that interact with children and families. Cross-agency collaboration benefits children by coordinating interventions across the settings of children’s lives and by providing seamless transitions for children and families across the preschool, school, and early adulthood boundaries. It also enables child service agencies to set benchmarks and target care to address overall child well-being, rather than just health-specific or school-specific outcomes. The commitment to achieving equitable capabilities for all children can provide a common mission for these diverse agencies. Committing paediatrics to the improvement of children’s developing capabilities expands the podiatric mission and requires reorganisation of paediatric health care systems. This cannot be implemented or sustained without changes in health system organisation. Health care systems in the US and Canada are largely funded through payment systems that favour acute care and a focus on delivering procedures instead of improving developmental trajectories. Payment reforms must be devised that would support health systems in tracking patients for years as they traverse developmental stages and that make them accountable for improving capabilities and trajectories.

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4.4 Conclusion Large populations of children in the developed world do not achieve sufficiency in health, cognition, and sociality, contributing to growing inequality in diverse social outcomes. If we accept the view that capabilities develop across the lifespan, and we believe that capabilities are what we want to equalise, then achieving convergent trajectories becomes a critical task for an egalitarian. Much theorising has been devoted to justifying schemes for the redistribution of goods. A developmental understanding of capabilities indicates that designing institutions promoting the equitable well-being of children is a more important task, where children’s well-being includes being on a trajectory to sufficient development of their kernel capabilities.

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Gottfried Schweiger

5 Justice and Children’s Well-Being and Well-Becoming1 5.1 Introduction Most theorists of justice would agree that they have to specify two things: the currency of justice – which goods should be shared – and the rule of justice – how those goods should be shared. I like to add three more things that every theory of justice should say something about: the social context in which those goods should be shared, the basic features of the agents of justice, and the ultimate goal of justice. If one wants to design a theory of justice for children, all of those five questions should be answered and I suppose they will be answered in at least slightly but decisively different ways than they are answered in relation to justice for fully grown and healthy adults. I will not explore the possibility of trade-offs between justice for children and justice for adults and how such conflicts can be resolved. My main claim in this chapter is concerned with the role that the concepts of well-being and well-becoming can play in answering those questions and in the design of a theory of justice for children. As I want to show, well-being and well-becoming can serve as the ultimate goals of justice, as they allow us to better understand the specific needs of children as agents of justice and their embeddedness in certain social contexts, and they can guide the selection of the currency of justice and the rule of their distribution. The answers I want to sketch in this chapter are developed from the perspective of a certain theoretical framework which I want to call the recognition approach (Schweiger 2012; Schweiger 2013). This approach is nowadays most often connected to the seminal works of Axel Honneth and its central assumption is that the proper experience of recognition and the protection from misrecognition – I prefer the notion of disrespect – is the fundamental claim of justice of all human beings (Honneth 1996; Honneth 2012). I view recognition and well-being and well-becoming as being intertwined in many ways and argue that a focus on the latter is well suited to guide the design and implementation of justice for children. The goals to protect the well-being and well-becoming of children and to protect their ability to experience recognition converge.

5.2 The Goals of Justice: Well-Being and Well-Becoming The ultimate goals of justice for children are their well-being and well-becoming (Graf and Schweiger 2015). Or to put it differently: a social context should be just, because

1 This research was funded by the Austrian Science Fund (FWF), Project: P 26480-G15. © 2015 Gottfried Schweiger This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 License.



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this protects the well-being and well-becoming of children. This claim does not imply that under the conditions of justice the well-being and well-becoming of children cannot be hurt and violated in other ways, for example by sickness, accidents or natural disasters. It also does not mean that justice prescribes all interpersonal interactions between children and adults and among children. A social context can be just, but the people within in it can still act immorally and hurt each other intentionally or by accident. Justice does not regulate all actions happening within a social context but is concerned with its institutional framework and that framework should be designed in a way in which it is best suited to protect the well-being and well-becoming of children. Such an orientation on well-being and well-becoming has not been spelled out in detail within the recognition approach, so I want to make at least a few remarks on why I think this is a route worth following. In a nutshell, a society is just insofar as it protects the ability of its members to experience those forms of proper recognition that are needed for their identity building and the realization of their autonomy. So, the recognition approach has a strong focus on autonomy and personal freedom – which it shares with many other theories of justice like the capability approach – and is concerned with their intersubjective and social conditions. This implies wellbeing and well-becoming in at least two important ways: First, autonomy is part of any conceptualization and realization of well-being and well-becoming. Second, they are concerned with these intersubjective conditions which the recognition approach views as important. Justice is not only concerned with autonomy but with its social embedding and its individual realization in a social context and in interaction with others. Well-being, well-becoming and autonomy – in the understanding of the recognition approach as personal self-realization and the realization of those life plans that one values – are all intertwined ecological concepts in the sense that they refer to the wider social embeddedness of human beings and their dependency on other humans and institutions. In a narrow sense, recognition is a part of well-being and well-becoming, but in a wider sense the three forms and modes of recognition that Honneth distinguishes – care, respect, social esteem – can be interpreted to describe what humans need for their well-being and well-becoming. So far the recognition approach has mainly focussed on adults and dealt with childhood primarily as an important preparatory stage, in which the experience of recognition is necessary for an individual to develop positive self-relations and to become an autonomous member of society. But justice for children goes beyond that scope and has to ask what children are entitled to as children as well. This is far more and entirely different than being able to realize themselves because self-realization and autonomy – as the recognition approach rightfully claims – only develop during childhood. The developmental perspective that conceptualizes justice for children from the envisaged product of an autonomous adult has to be integrated into a wider understanding of the actual wellbeing of children that they are entitled to. So the focus I choose here follows from the ‘nature’ of childhood and is an expansion of the current focus on the forms and

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modes of recognition that are demanded by justice for adults to also look at those dimensions which are important for children. I understand the well-being and well-becoming of children as multidimensional, comprising of subjective and objective dimensions (Axford 2012). They are therefore not only concerned with the subjective satisfaction or happiness, although these are certainly of importance. Furthermore well-being and well-becoming and their different dimensions are context-sensitive and context-transcending alike, meaning that they have to be determined always within a certain context, but they also have a universal core that reflects central features shared among all children. For example, shelter and clothing are important for all children because they are all sensitive and vulnerable beings, but social and environmental factors also heavily influence which shelter and clothing is needed and how it influences their well-being and wellbecoming. Before I go into more detail on which dimensions of well-being and wellbecoming should be distinguished and how they specify the currency of justice, I want to examine three points: the relation between well-being and well-becoming, their relation to autonomy and freedom, and their relation to the position of children as particularly vulnerable beings. Well-being refers to the current state of a person while well-becoming refers to the development from one state to another over time. Well-becoming can happen from a state of ill-being to one of well-being, or from a state of well-being to another one of well-being. I think it is important to stress that justice should be concerned with both and that neither sees children only as adults-to-be nor neglects that most children will become adults. Also, well-becoming does not only relate to the development from a child into an adult although it is reasonable to view this transition as being of particular importance. Humans are developing throughout their entire life and well-being and well-becoming are interrelated in every phase of it. The influence of behavioural patterns and environmental factors on later health, or the influence of the participation in the labour market on the socio-economic position after retirement, are both examples of this entanglement (Mortimer and Shanahan 2003). Furthermore, the relation between well-being and well-becoming is not straightforward in the way that well-being necessarily enables well-becoming, and both can come into conflict with each other. For example, obligatory education can lower the subjective wellbeing of a child although it is necessary for its well-being and enhances the chance of well-being as an adult. In this case, most would suggest that the reduction in wellbeing is justified by the favourable results in adulthood. But think of the case in which a child grows up in severe poverty and through this develops certain resilience skills that ultimately let her become a successful and rich entrepreneur. The hardship of poverty is not justified because of this favourable result, and this certainly should not justify the adoption of a policy in which all children have to grow up poor so that they can become resilient and hardened. First, in most cases poverty does not have such favourable results but rather negative ones (Eamon 2001). Second, it seems reasonable to apply a certain threshold of well-being that must be reached, and that



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falling under that threshold cannot be justified by any kinds of latter gains. Third, the preferences of the child have to be taken into account and it seems unlikely, though not impossible that it would choose to grow up in poverty just for the small chance of becoming rich someday (especially if the chance of being rich in later life is much higher if one is already born rich, so it would be reasonable to choose to be born rich rather than poor). But the line between a justified lowering of well-being in order to influence well-becoming and an unjustified one is not always easy to draw. And the causality between certain actions and external factors and the later well-being or illbeing is also often murky. Despite these difficulties, the evidence is overwhelming that childhood is a particular phase of development that has significant influence on the whole life course. The research is substantial and growing on the short and longterm effects of different living conditions, environmental factors and behavioural patterns and how these effects are transmitted. For that reason, justice cannot be only concerned with how children actually live but has to ask how this shapes the future prospects of those children. A society that aims to be just will strive for conditions that take into account the whole life course, so that justice for children connects with justice for adults. Most theories of justice – as well as those of morality – place a high value on autonomy and personal freedom. A just society should also be a free one, in the sense that it allows and protects the autonomy of its member to the greatest possible degree and leaves ample room for them to pursue and realize their own goals and life plans. To design justice for children with an orientation towards their well-being and well-becoming appears to come into conflict with the goal of autonomy in two ways: first, children are allowed less autonomy compared to adults in the sense that their cognitive skills and capacities are insufficient and still developing and that they are to a greater degree dependent on adults in order to make good choices. As such, justice for children will demand to limit the autonomy and personal freedom of children and be paternalistic in many ways. Second, well-being and well-becoming can be severely hurt by autonomous choices that a just society should still allow or even protect to make, for example, unhealthy life style choices like dangerous activities and sports. There are cases in which actions that endanger one’s own well-being and well-becoming are even morally good, for example to help others. As I will argue, autonomy is also important in the design of justice for children with an orientation towards their well-being and well-becoming although it is reasonably limited. As I have said, autonomy, the ability to make own choices and to realize one’s self, is itself an important dimension of the well-being and well-becoming of nearly all humans, and also for children. So to say that the goal of justice is the protection of the wellbeing and well-becoming of children does not rule out that autonomy has a place in it and that it is demanded by justice to give autonomy space to unfold. Furthermore, it is true that autonomy is a developing ability and that especially very young children are dependent on the guidance and care of adults, but it is also true that children have their own wishes and preferences and that they value their autonomy even at

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young ages. So it is also important for justice to give children the opportunity to make their own choices, even if this is limited by adults to protect their safety, their current and future well-being. But this autonomy is limited insofar as there are good reasons to interfere because it can be rightfully assumed that they do not have the ability to assess the effects of their choices. Again, it is not possible to draw the line here all too easily, and rules based on age limits are only a decent and workable though still imperfect approximation. Also, the orientation on well-becoming includes that one highly valuable goal of justice for children is that they grow up in an environment that allows and supports them to become autonomous beings when they are adults. The third issue I want to discuss is the relation of well-being and well-becoming and the vulnerability of children. All humans are vulnerable and in danger of being hurt, but children are so to a greater extent and in need of the protection of others. This is clear for very young children, and the vulnerability wanes over time although it never disappears. This greater vulnerability is also reflected by an orientation towards well-being and well-becoming. It places the physiological, psychological and social needs of children at the centre of attention and develops from here what children are entitled to and what society owes to them in order to grow-up healthily and protected from needless harm and suffering. Therefore, to protect the well-being and well-becoming of children implies first and foremost to protect them from being harmed and to design the institutions in ways that are sensitive to the different phases of childhood. But the vulnerability of children not only refers to their current state but also to their future and well-becoming. As already mentioned, there is overwhelming evidence that different forms of harm and hardship during childhood have long-lasting and severe consequences. This also means that children are not only vulnerable as children but that their future well-being is also vulnerable to violation. Again, this implies that protecting children is important, in order to protect adults. In conclusion, well-being and well-becoming can serve as comprehensive goals for the design of justice, taking into account central features of childhood and the particular status of children. It is therefore rooted in the peculiar ‘nature’ of children as agents of justice.

5.3 Choosing Dimensions of Well-Being and Well-Becoming and the Currency of Justice I will now turn my attention to choosing the currency of justice for children, which I will develop from my understanding of well-being and well-becoming as multidimensional. A currency of justice should satisfy at least two criteria: it should capture the important differences between persons, and it should be distributional. This implies that differences that are important to the well-being and well-becoming of individuals but cannot be influenced by the societal framework and set of institutions are not adequate subjects of justice and should not be used to determine



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its currency. I do not wish to explore here the deep and sophisticated debate on the currency of justice, but rather sketch out why capabilities and functionings appear to be the right choice if one is concerned with justice for children (Anderson 2010). Capabilities and functionings have the advantage of being sensitive to differences in the usage of goods and resources and they are sensitive to discrimination and other injustices that affect the conversion of resources into capabilities and functionings. A theory of justice for children should be concerned with what they are actually able to do and be. Capabilities and functionings are ends, whereas resources or goods are means and, therefore, a focus on capabilities and functionings is able to directly compare differences in what ultimately matters: the well-being and well-becoming of children. For children, resources are also very often only of indirect importance and mediated through their care-givers and other institutions. Income, wealth and voting rights for example are of no direct use for small children but do heavily affect their well-being and well-becoming. A capability approach seems more suited to capture these dependencies. But what capabilities and functionings are qualified to serve for comparisons in well-being and well-becoming and should be specified as the currency of justice? Before I explore this question, I want to begin by asking whether the currency of justice for children should be capabilities or functionings or both. Most capability theorists prefer capabilities over functionings because of the high value of autonomy and choice. Within the broader setting of political liberalism, such authors like Amartya Sen and Martha Nussbaum argue that people should have central capabilities but it should be left to their own choice whether or not they want to realize them as functionings (Nussbaum 2011). An example that is often used is that of the capability to be well nourished, which certainly is a central one, but that people should still have the option to fast and if one chooses to do so and therefore does not realize the functioning of being well nourished this does not poses a problem of justice. This argument has plenty of force but it also has its limitations that are well acknowledged by capability theorists: first, the problem of adaptive preferences which can not only lead people to adapt to unjust circumstances and the deprivation of even central capabilities, but also effects whether people want to realize certain capabilities as functionings (Khader 2009). Think of a society in which women have the right to vote and all necessary access to do so safely but most decline because of their ideological conviction that women are not capable of political decision-making. Most would agree that justice should also be concerned with such an issue and one should not be satisfied with simply providing the capability to vote but to make the participation of women actually happen. It is also the functioning that counts. In the case of children, a focus on functionings is further supported by the abovementioned limited capacity to act autonomously and rationally. Children do not just need the capability to have education, but should realize it and acquire the functioning of being educated because this is relevant for their current and their future well-being. The same goes for other important capabilities such as being healthy, being socially included or having shelter, nourishment and clothing. Another practical reason why

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functionings are of importance is that they are measurable – at least a lot more easily than capabilities – and comparable (Alkire 2008). There is also a fluent passage between capabilities and functionings and they both have a certain plasticity. There are many stages between having the capability to be well nourished to the realization of the functioning to be well nourished, and both can be satisfied in various ways. Having this capability can mean having immediate access to food that is in the refrigerator, it can mean having access to a supermarket and having the funds to buy food there; to be well nourished can mean to have just eaten one’s favourite sandwich, or it can refer to a person who is actually hungry because she has not eaten for a few hours but is healthy and in general has enough to eat, and good meals. On closer inspection, the boundary between capabilities and functionings becomes less clear. These arguments support my view that they are both of importance for well-being and well-becoming and that a theory of justice for children does not need to make a general decision on which one is more important. Rather, if a set or list of capabilities and functionings is chosen it has to be made explicit whether and for whom the benchmark is a capability or a functioning. For example, for an eight-year-old child’s education should be interpreted in terms of a clearly defined functioning – the eight-year-old should actually go to school – while for a sixteen-year-old it could be interpreted in terms of a capability – a sixteen-yearold should have the opportunity to go to school but is also free to choose a training on the job to become a plumber. But how to choose the dimensions of well-being and well-becoming that should be used as the currency of justice? I support a pragmatic and empirically informed approach as it was used by Mario Biggeri and his colleagues, who distinguish eighteen dimensions of children’s well-being following expert opinions, in relation to existing lists and conventions, and a participatory process with children (Biggeri and Mehrotra 2011). Still, no method to select capabilities and functionings will be perfect and no list will be exhaustive. Justice should inform and guide the societal framework and the design of its institutions and for that it is neither necessary to draft a full list out of theory, nor can empirical evidence be enough, but has to be interpreted before the normative goals of justice. If we want to design justice in the context of the education system, a more refined and tailored list of capabilities and functionings is needed than if justice is discussed on the level of a whole society. In particular I want to highlight four points that seem crucial: 1. First, the selection of capabilities and functionings has to be context-sensitive in the sense that it reflects the context in which the child grows up and lives. The functioning to be socially included is important for all children, but there are crucial differences for example between developed welfare states and developing countries, and justice should reflect those differences in that it neither demands too little nor too much. This demands also an ‘ecological perspective’ on children’s well-being and well-becoming and how they are influenced by the different environments – as important conversion factors – in which children are



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embedded. Choosing capabilities and functionings without taking into account the social embedding of children could also lead to an overly individualistic approach. 2. Second, the capabilities and functionings have to be developmental-sensitive, which means that they have to account for the particular phase of childhood and the different developmental stages of children. As previously mentioned, autonomy becomes more important as children grow older, implying a shift from a focus on functionings to a focus on capabilities, for example when it comes to choices of education or their social inclusion. It is also needed to define successive development goals that should be reached over time and that can be monitored. For the developmental perspective, the concept of evolving capabilities and functionings appears well-suited (Ballet, Biggeri, and Comim 2011). They should allow us to capture the well-being and the influence on the future well-becoming in the sense of providing children with those capabilities and functionings that lead to having certain important capabilities and functionings in later life. 3. Third, children should be included when it comes to choosing the capabilities and functionings of being heard and being able to participate are of certain importance. While the first one is a methodological issue, the second one refers to the place of participation and autonomy in a list of central capabilities and functionings of children. For adults it is not questionable that these are of utmost importance and that a just society strives for them, but this is also true for children. They are entitled to the possibility to make choices for themselves to a certain extent and to act as citizens with rights and duties. 4. Fourth, the subjective dimension of well-being has to be reflected at least partly by the selection of capabilities and functionings. This is a tricky and controversial claim because subjective well-being is something that can be influenced by so many factors that can and should not be controlled by the institutional setting of a society. A child can be unhappy because she does not get the birthday present that she wished for, or feels rejected because she got a bad grade on a test or because she had an accident that means staying in hospital for a few days. All these influences pose no violation of justice but can significantly reduce subjective well-being. Why then not leave justice to be concerned only with capabilities and functionings that can be measured objectively as Elizabeth Anderson argues, for example (Anderson 2010)? I see three reasons here: on the one hand, subjective well-being is not completely random; its relation to objective dimensions of well-being are well known and studied (Aldgate et al. 2006). As such, subjective well-being can and is heavily influenced by capabilities and functionings that fall within the realm of justice, and it appears to be a valuable information to know how a certain implementation of justice, a policy or a distributional pattern influences the subjective well-being of children and how they feel about it. On the other hand, objective well-being and well-becoming is also influenced by the subjective well-being. Children need love, care and personal attention as well

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as needing positive self-relations and feelings and experiences of happiness in order to develop those objectively measurable capabilities and functionings. But, finally, subjective well-being is not only valuable as a means to support justice but in itself, for the individual as well as for society as a whole. A society in which every child has secured access to all capabilities and functionings that are necessary for their objective well-being and well-becoming but in which despite that most or a significant portion of children have a constantly low subjective well-being and feel sad, rejected, lonely or unloved and cared for, cannot be deemed just,’ but rather fails those children. In conclusion, the currency of justice should be those capabilities and functionings that comprise the well-being and well-becoming of children. Such a list does not have to be final but should be drafted based on the best empirical evidence available, bearing in mind that children’s lives and futures are shaped by the environments in which they live and grow up and the different institutions and agents they interact with, with children being heard and involved, giving them space to make their own choices and with the goal in mind to support and protect their current well-being and to develop into autonomous adults and members of society, who also enjoy a state of well-being.

5.4 Pluralism and the Rule of Justice David Miller has argued that rather than specifying one rule or principle of justice, a tripartite approach is more reasonable (Miller 1999). He distinguishes the principles of need – which can be interpreted as sufficiency –, of desert, and of equality and grounds them in the different types of social relations in which people participate. The principle of need should be applied in such relations as the family and solidaristic communities, the principle of desert is the right one to follow in such instrumental associations as in the market, and the principle of equality is important for the realm of citizenship. These three share certain similarities, although developed from a different perspective, with the tripartite of the three modes of recognition – care, esteem and respect – that can also serve as the basis for a pluralistic approach to the rule of justice. In contrast to such a pluralistic approach, most capability theorists follow a sufficietarian route and are concerned only with the minimum floor of justice (Robeyns 2005). Furthermore, it is not clear if and how Miller’s considerations are applicable to children. In this section I want to argue that such pluralism is indeed a reasonable approach, but that this pluralism is not primarily rooted in the different social relations in which children participate but foremost in the different kinds of capabilities and functionings they are entitled to. I will pick out just three types of capabilities and functionings that are relevant to justice: to be healthy, to be able to realize one’s own choices, and to not be exploited.



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All three subdomains and thresholds have to be specified in order to be applicable to guide the design of an institutional framework, but for my purpose I will discuss them only on a very abstract level. First, all children are entitled to certain capabilities and functionings without differences and the functioning – not only the capability – of not being exploited is one of these. Here the rule of equality should be followed and it cannot be superseded by the specific context in which a child participates. Every child should realize this functioning whether in the context of her family and friendships, in those of her school or in any other one. Second, also the capability or functioning of being healthy is not context-sensitive in the sense that the social context can determine how it should be distributed among children. But other differences are of importance, for example maturity and age, influences that cannot be societally controlled or where this control comes into serious conflict with other claims of justice, and the limitation of resources and knowledge. This means that older children should be allowed to risk their health if they wish to do so (risky sports, unhealthy eating patterns etc.) and the functioning of being healthy converts into the capability to be healthy, it also implies that such differences in health that result from accidents or genetic variation are not unjust and that claims of justice are restricted by the health status that is actually possible to achieve by a reasonable allocation of resources (it is not reasonable to invest all resources into research on one very rare and painful disease if that leaves no resources to cure less severe diseases). So, in general terms the functioning of being healthy should be the target which justice should aim for and which should guide the design of the institutional framework; every child is equally entitled to health. But on closer inspection it becomes clear that the rule of equality also implies a rule of sufficiency: every child is entitled to sufficient resources and conversion factors to be healthy (e.g. health care, health literacy, healthy food and space for exercise and play). Third, the capability or functioning to realize one’s own choices cannot be granted to all children equally because it is very likely that different choices and their realization are in conflict with each other. Furthermore, some choices are very likely never to be realized because the child has not the sufficient resources, capacities or due to other limitations. So why view this capability as an important one to begin with? On the one hand, there is no doubt that the capability to realize one’s own goal is of importance for the well-being of children, because a life of continuous failure and rejection is not a good one and also negatively influences other important capabilities and functionings. On the other hand, within the notion of capabilities and functionings themselves, the importance of realizing one’s own goal is inherent: a capability is exactly the ability to realize a functioning if one wishes to do so and this personal freedom is highly valued. In this regard, the capability to realize one’s own goal is embedded and an important part of such other capabilities and functionings as autonomy, mental health, participation and inclusion, or – more specifically – leisure activities and friendships. A society in which children’s capabilities and functionings were adequately protected but in which they are unable to realize those goals and choices they value, would be unjust

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because it would not be a free society. Take for example grades in school that a child wants to achieve. It would seem unjust to grade all children equally if they display a difference in effort and achievements, and also the idea of sufficiency seems odd in that case, considering that there is no certain threshold of grades that all children are entitled to. If a child wants to get a certain grade she has to achieve it, in the interpretation that she deserves that grade. Such an idea of desert on the level of grading is embedded in the idea that all children should reach a sufficient level of education – again not only the capability – and that this sufficiency also serves the idea of a comprehensive equality of opportunity in later life. The importance of the idea of desert lies also in that the development of positive self-relations such as selfesteem, self-confidence, and self-respect is to some part dependent on the experience of social esteem for the realization of one’s own choices and for being responsible for them (Honneth 1996). This differentiating character of desert is an important part of autonomy in general and also capabilities and functionings. In regard to children, this rule of justice may appear of less importance than for adults, where desert plays an important role in the justification of the distribution of income, wealth and positions. But also during childhood and for the well-being of children, some capabilities and functionings imply that they have to be deserved and that the institutional framework should be designed in that way that they are distributed accordingly. However, as previously mentioned, this is not bound to a specific social context and desert may be the right rule to be applied in private and public life alike. In conclusion, justice for children that wants to be comprehensive will incorporate a pluralism of rules of distribution that are applied to the certain capabilities and functionings that are important for the well-being and well-becoming of children. I have argued that the tripartite differentiation of David Miller can provide a good starting point, and one that concurs with the main assumption of the recognition approach that children have a claim for the experience of all three forms of recognition – care, esteem and respect. Such rules also reflect the developmental dimension of justice that is expressed in its orientation on the well-being and well-becoming of children. The rules themselves – sufficiency, equality and desert – are of importance for children and express their moral and political status.

5.5 Conclusions Well-being and well-becoming of children are highly complex and multi-dimensional concepts, which pose difficulties on the theoretical and practical level of their implementation in policies and the design of the institutional framework of a society. Still, they possess significant normative force, not only but especially in the context of childhood. Children are neither the fully rational and autonomous beings that regular theories of justice have in mind nor are they only adults-to-be and fully irrational and helpless without their own preferences and ideas of a good life. In this paper I have

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only been able to present a brief and in many aspects insufficient and incomplete sketch of how well-being and well-becoming can guide the conceptualization of justice for children. Such a theory will also be non-ideal in the sense that it has to be context-sensitive and to incorporate the best available empirical and theoretical knowledge about how children’s well-being and well-becoming is influenced by themselves and the various environments in which they grow up and live in. This knowledge – which I had no opportunity to discuss here – is also not fully coherent and conclusive and has to be interpreted before the normative idea of a just society and its goals.

References Aldgate, Jane, David Jones, Wendy Rose, and Carole Jeffery, eds. 2006. The Developing World of the Child. 1st ed. London / Philadelphia, PE: Jessica Kingsley Publishers. Alkire, Sabina. 2008. “Choosing Domains: The Capability Approach and Multidimensional Poverty.” In The Many Dimensions of Poverty, edited by Nanak Kakwani and Jacques Silber, 1st ed., 89–119. Basingstoke / New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan. Anderson, Elizabeth. 2010. “Justifying the Capability Approach to Justice.” In Measuring Justice: Primary Goods and Capabilities, edited by Harry Brighouse and Ingrid Robeyns, 1st ed., 81–100. Cambridge / New York, NY: Cambridge University Press. Axford, Nick. 2012. Exploring Concepts of Child Well-Being: Implications for Children’s Services. Bristol: Policy. Ballet, Jérôme, Mario Biggeri, and Flavio Comim. 2011. “Children’s Agency and the Capability Approach: A Conceptual Framework.” In Children and the Capability Approach, edited by Mario Biggeri, Jérôme Ballet, and Flavio Comim, 1st ed., 22–45. Basingstoke / New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan. Biggeri, Mario, and Santosh Mehrotra. 2011. “Child Poverty as Capability Deprivation: How to Choose Domains of Child Well-Being and Poverty.” In Children and the Capability Approach, edited by Mario Biggeri, Jérôme Ballet, and Flavio Comim, 1st ed., 46–75. Basingstoke / New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan. Graf, Gunter, and Gottfried Schweiger. 2015. A Philosophical Examination of Social Justice and Child Poverty. 1st ed. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. Eamon, Mary Keegan. 2001. “The Effects of Poverty on Children’s Socioemotional Development: An Ecological Systems Analysis.” Social Work 46 (3): 256–66. doi:10.1093/sw/46.3.256. Honneth, Axel. 1996. The Struggle for Recognition : The Moral Grammar of Social Conflicts. 1st ed. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. ———. 2012. The I in We. Studies in the Theory of Recognition. 1st ed. Cambridge / Malden, MA: Polity Press. Khader, Serene J. 2009. “Adaptive Preferences and Procedural Autonomy.” Journal of Human Development and Capabilities 10 (2): 169–87. doi:10.1080/19452820902940851. Miller, David. 1999. Principles of Social Justice. 1st ed. Cambridge, MA / London: Harvard University Press. Mortimer, Jeylan T, and Michael J Shanahan, eds. 2003. Handbook of the Life Course. 1st ed. Handbooks of Sociology and Social Research. New York, NY: Kluwer Academic Publishers. Nussbaum, Martha. 2011. Creating Capabilities : The Human Development Approach. 1st ed. Cambridge, MA / London: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press.

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Robeyns, Ingrid. 2005. “The Capability Approach: A Theoretical Survey.” Journal of Human Development 6 (1): 93–114. Schweiger, Gottfried. 2012. “Globalizing Recognition. Global Justice and the Dialectic of Recognition.” Public Reason. Journal of Political and Moral Philosophy 4 (1-2): 78–94. ———. 2013. “Recognition and Social Exclusion. A Recognition-Theoretical Exploration of Poverty in Europe.” Ethical Perspectives 20 (4): 529–54. doi:10.2143/EP.20.4.3.3005349.

Section II: Children's Well-Being and Well-Becoming

Amy Clair

6 Conceptualising Child versus Adult Well-Being: Schooling and Employment 6.1 Introduction This chapter seeks to provide a case for the greater consideration of children’s well-being in education policy by presenting a discussion of adult and child subjective well-being in relation to the comparable experiences of employment and education, focusing on evidence predominantly from the UK (notably England) and USA. It is argued that, while there is undoubtedly greater variation in employment than schooling, the established relationship between subjective well-being and employment can be transferred to education, and therefore be used to justify interest in education on the basis that work and school represent the main institutions that people engage with at these different stages of their lives. Schooling and education are an enormous part of childhood (Willms, 2003; Suldo et al., 2006); while employment dominates adult life, at least until retirement age (Harter et al., 2002). Although adults are not compelled to engage in employment in the same way that children are required to participate in education of some sort (for the majority this takes the form of attending a school), for most adults employment for financial reasons is nonetheless essential. There has been quite considerable interest in the influence of employment on adult subjective well-being (and vice versa) (Wright and Cropanzano, 2000; Lucas and Diener, 2003; Wright, 2006) but research investigating children’s subjective well-being has tended to focus on family influences, neglecting the role of schools (Suldo et al., 2006). Where educational influences on children’s subjective wellbeing are considered, it tends to be because of an overarching interest in improving educational attainment, i.e. an interest in their well-becoming, rather than any interest in improving children’s well-being in the present (Karatzias et al., 2002). The focus on well-becoming in relation to education makes this comparison particularly interesting, as it reflects the emphasis placed on successfully transitioning to employment in adulthood. The research regarding subjective well-being in relation to employment has facilitated arguments for improving working conditions on the grounds that both the employee and employer benefit (Cropanzano and Wright, 1999). As such, the comparability of employment and education for adults and children is of interest because it may provide an opportunity to argue more successfully for improved working conditions for children, i.e. a greater consideration of their wider well-being when creating and enforcing education policies than is currently the case. As such, this paper does not argue for the promotion of subjective well-being over academic © 2015 Amy Clair This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 License.

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achievement, instead arguing that the two go hand-in-hand (Best, 2008), and that if politicians are to take academic achievement as seriously as they often claim to (e.g. Gov.uk, 2012) then they also need to consider the impact of policy on subjective wellbeing. In this paper children are considered as those under age 18 (as in the UNCRC) and therefore employment is being compared to compulsory education. The definition of subjective well-being used is that outlined by Diener (1984) and Veenhoven (2008), i.e. that subjective well-being comprises an affective/emotional component (both positive and negative) and a cognitive component (life satisfaction).

6.2 Engagement The paper begins by discussing the engagement with employment and school literature in order to highlight evidence showing similarities between children’s relationships with school and adult relationships with employment.

6.2.1 Employee Engagement and Job Quality Employee engagement relates to “a positive affective/motivational reaction towards the job that is characterised by vigour, dedication, and absorption” (Xanthopoulou et al., 2009, 184; also Bakker and Demerouti, 2008) and is considered to have physical, emotional and cognitive components. Recent research has suggested that engagement with employment is significant for a number of important outcomes aside from, although likely to be related to, productivity such as health (Butterworth et al., 2011). Research conducted by Gallup (Harter and Agrawal, 2011) found that, contrary to the common belief that employment is always preferable to unemployment in terms of the impact on a persons’ subjective well-being, those in poor quality jobs and who are disconnected from their work report lower well-being than those who are unemployed. Controlling for a range of demographic factors, they found that 54% of disengaged workers reported themselves as struggling compared to 28% of engaged workers and 49% of unemployed respondents (Harter and Agrawal, 2011.). Only 42% of disengaged workers reported thriving compared to 71% engaged workers and 48% unemployed people (Harter and Agrawal, 2011, n.p.). Engaged workers were described in the research as “involved in and enthusiastic about their work” (Harter and Agrawal, 2011) while those who were not engaged were less likely to put in additional effort. Those who are “actively disengaged are emotionally disconnected from their work and workplace and jeopardise the performance of their teams” (Harter and Agrawal, 2011). This is relevant as it suggests that engagement is likely to lead to children persisting with school and schoolwork and learning more. An alternative

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definition of work engagement is a “positive, fulfilling, work-related state of mind” (Bakker and Demerouti, 2008, 209). These findings were similar to those in a longitudinal study conducted in Australia. Butterworth et al. (2011) found that “the psychological aspects of work are strongly associated with health outcomes” ( 1) with people in poor quality jobs reporting poorer mental health than those who were unemployed or not economically active. Similarly, those who moved from unemployment to poor quality employment displayed worsening mental health compared to those who remained unemployed (Butterworth et al., 2011). In this study, job quality was measured in terms of job demands and complexity, job control, and perceived job security, all of which, with the likely exception of job security, are transferrable to children in schools. Children are typically not able to withdraw from schooling in the same way as adults are able to withdraw, even temporarily, from employment to find more suitable work. Evidence suggests that one important contributor to feelings of engagement is the way in which employees are managed (Harter and Agrawal, 2011). Also felt to be important are employee personal (e.g. resiliency and ability to manage difficult situations) and job (e.g. feedback, training and support) resources, especially in stressful or difficult times (Bakker and Demerouti, 2008), such as at times of assessment if considering children in schools. These resources can vary within jobs, across time for example, as well as across jobs depending on their qualities and requirements (Xanthopoulou et al., 2009), and as such could plausibly be extended to consider children in schools by considering, for example, teacherpupil relationships which are known to be affected by policy (Reay and Wiliam, 1999). Similarly to the results found regarding positive affect and productivity discussed above, Bakker and Demerouti (2008, 210) found that “engaged employees have high energy and self-efficacy”, potentially making them more effective in their work. However, they stress that being an engaged employee is not the same as being a workaholic; engaged employees go above and beyond in their work because they want to and enjoy it, rather than feeling compelled to. Importantly, workaholism does not share the positive relationship with productivity that engagement does (Bakker and Demerouti, 2008) and so encouraging workaholic tendencies in children will not improve their well-being or academic achievement in the same way as encouraging engagement. This positive engagement effect is also thought to be ‘contagious’ within the workplace, spreading positive behaviours among staff (Bakker and Demerouti, 2008) and improving performance across employees (Xanthopoulou et al., 2009). Similarly, engagement and positivity has been found to be contagious between managers and employees suggesting that teacher subjective well-being may be important for child subjective well-being (Bakker and Demerouti, 2008). Therefore, engagement is associated with behaviours and traits beneficial for children in schools.

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6.2.2 School Engagement and Connectedness School engagement is a “multidimensional construct” (Fredricks et al., 2004, 60) often conceptualised as having three components (although not all are included in all studies). Behavioural engagement relates to participation in school-related activities, such as completing work but particularly extra-curricular activities, behaviour in class and school more generally, such as obeying school rules (Willms, 2003; Fredricks et al., 2004; Fredricks et al., 2005). Emotional engagement relates to affective reactions to the different aspects of schooling, such as classmates, teachers and the school as a whole (Fredricks et al., 2004). Cognitive engagement relates to a child’s commitment to and investment in educational success and the level of effort that they are prepared to give (Fredricks et al., 2004; Fredricks et al., 2005). School engagement has been of interest because it is considered to be policy salient (Finn and Rock, 1997; Fredricks et al., 2005) but interest often focuses on its potential to reduce negative educational outcomes, particularly drop-out and low academic achievement (Willms, 2003; Fredricks et al., 2004; Fredricks et al., 2005; Southcott et al., 2013). Indeed, engagement is often considered a predictor of achievement, however there is evidence to suggest that the causality in the relationship is potentially the reverse, poor achievement may encourage disengagement from schools, rather than the other way around (Willms, 2003). The association between engagement in education and achievement is particularly important in an educational environment such as that in England where children, it has been argued, are exposed to feelings of academic failure at a very early age in part due to the proliferation of standardised testing (Reay and Wiliam, 1999; Connor, 2001; Locker and Cropley, 2004). This is important because early engagement is associated with later engagement, and engaged students are more likely to enjoy learning and continue learning later in life (Finn and Rock, 1987; Fullarton, 2002). Lack of positive feedback in schools is thought to be a cause of disengagement, as is a discipline policy that is harsh or perceived to be unfair (Willms, 2003; Fredricks et al., 2004). As suggested above regarding the evidence of managers on work engagement, teacher support has been found to influence all aspects of school engagement (Fredricks et al., 2004). As such, the concept of engagement is applicable to both children in schools and adults in employment. As engagement with employment varies for adults, it has been found that school engagement varies depending on the task and setting (e.g. which class the child is in) (Fredricks et al., 2004). The level of each type of engagement may vary, for example, a child may be behaviourally engaged in that they attend the required classes and complete the minimum amount of work, known as “procedural engagement” (Nystrand and Gamoran, 1991, 262) or they may be engaged to the extent that they attend classes but also engage in additional classes and extracurricular activities, that is they may be engaged in a “substantive”

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(Nystrand and Gamoran, 1991, 262) way (Fredricks et al., 2004). Engagement may vary within students across classes and different aspects of school, especially as children get older and have different teachers for different subjects, or even within classes depending on the activity at that time (Nystrand and Gamoran, 1991; Fullarton, 2002; Fredricks et al., 2004). Measurement of engagement quite often focuses on narrow definitions such as engagement in extracurricular activities (e.g. Fullarton, 2002) which limits child engagement to the level they can afford to participate and what is available to them in the school that they happen to attend, and is arguably “not sufficiently sensitive to the nature and meaning of the activities to the individual” (Finn and Rock, 1997, 231). Perhaps unsurprisingly, Fullarton (2002) found that wealthier schools and students had higher levels of engagement. However, as well as being limited by the number of extracurricular activities available to them, it is also likely that government education policy limits school engagement by prioritising learning in the form of memorisation of information for recall in paper and pencil assessments, as such limiting understanding in order to prioritise often shallow displays of knowledge, as evidenced by the removal of coursework from many GCSEs in recent policy changes (Nystrand and Gamoran, 1991; Goldstein, 2001; Fredricks et al., 2004; Barker, 2008). Nystrand and Gamoran (1991, 262) argue that this is important as “significant academic achievement is not possible without sustained, substantive engagement, which transcends procedural engagement” while such an effect may also mean that research examining the relationship between behavioural engagement and achievement may overestimate the association as such assessments only test basic engagement (Nystrand and Gamoran, 1991; Fredricks et al., 2004). A similar concept to school engagement is that of school connectedness. Connectedness to school, also known as social membership or belonging, relates to “perception[s] of safety, belonging, respect, and feeling cared for at school” (McNeely, 2005, 289). It is therefore arguably very similar to the concept of emotional engagement, although it is typically discussed as a precursor to engagement. As with engagement, connectedness is thought to, and has been shown to, improve academic outcomes and reduce engagement in risk behaviours (McNeely et al., 2002; McNeely and Falci, 2004; McNeely, 2005). Connectedness has multiple definitions and is constructed of several different components: “belonging, social support, and engagement” (McNeely and Falci, 2004, 5). As well as feeling connectedness to school itself, children may also feel connectedness to their peers, known as “unconventional connectedness” (McNeely and Falci, 2004, 4) the effect of which on behaviour, etc. depends on the behaviour of the peer group. Similarly to engagement, severe punishment in schools is associated with lower school connectedness (McNeely et al., 2002).



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6.3 The Happy-Productive Worker Hypothesis As the concept of engagement has been found to be applicable to both children and adults, it is relevant for the purpose of this paper to investigate another of the dominant concepts in this area of the management field that can be applied to children: the happy-productive worker hypothesis. There has been a great deal of interest in the happy-productive worker hypothesis (Wright and Cropanzano, 2000; Lucas and Diener, 2003; Wright, 2006) which suggests that ‘happier’ workers will be more productive and perform better than those who are less happy (Wright and Cropanzano, 2000). The way happiness has been operationalised in such research has varied, developing initially from research into the effects of boredom, happiness has been frequently considered as job satisfaction. More recently, happiness in this context has regularly been considered as subjective well-being, or components of subjective well-being (Wright, 2006), as it came to be recognised that job satisfaction is not equivalent to happiness (Wright and Cropanzano, 2000). Similarly, productivity has also had varying definitions, depending on the type of work and reflecting both subjective and objective measures of productivity (Lucas and Diener, 2003; Xanthopoulou et al., 2009). The happy-productive worker hypothesis is of interest to both employers and employees alike, as employers are interested in ways of improving productivity and staff retention, therefore avoiding the costs of training new staff (Harter et al., 2002; Lucas and Diener, 2003; Wright, 2006). Likewise, employees benefit as they have been able to argue for improvements in their working lives stating “that increased pay and working conditions will be repaid in subsequent performance” (Wright and Staw, 1999b, 31). A link between subjective well-being and productivity seems likely due to the evidence that positive affect “is strongly associated with feeling energetic and active” (Lucas and Diener, 2003, 39). The following sections briefly discuss the existing evidence relating to the happy-productive worker hypothesis. The happy-productive worker hypothesis has typically “been operationalized by correlating employee self-ratings of job satisfaction with supervisory ratings of performance” (Wright and Cropanzano, 2000, 84), resulting in a range of correlations and significance levels, with some going so far as to say that “decades of research have failed to show a close link between job satisfaction and performance” (Wright and Staw, 1999, 1). The low correlations found in some research may be attributed to the use of a single-item rather than the composite measure of job satisfaction, often at the organisation level (Judge et al., 2001). However, more recent research that has used measures of subjective well-being, particularly affective aspects, has had more consistent and significant findings at the individual level, suggesting that this conception of the happy-productive worker hypothesis is supported by evidence, including from longitudinal studies (Cropanzo and Wright, 1999; Wright et al. 2002). These studies found that “well-being did account for a significant proportion of the variance in composite performance” (Wright et al., 2002, 149; also Harter et al.,

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2002). It is thought, however, that the relationship between subjective well-being and productivity is curvilinear, rather than linear, with declining returns for increasing subjective well-being after a certain point (Mishra and Smyth, 2012). There have been a number of potential reasons suggested for the relationship between positive subjective well-being and work performance. One is the halo effect which suggests that, rather than happy people being more productive, the happyproductive worker hypothesis instead reflects the fact that happy people are simply perceived more positively by others, thus potentially undermining the argument for improved working conditions (Staw et al., 1993). However, Wright and Staw (1999a) argue that if halo effects were the cause of the happy-productive relationship this would not undermine evidence of its existence, it would still be the case that positive affect led to improved performance by many measures. Findings from Staw and Barsade (1993) undermine the halo effect argument, suggesting that the happyproductive worker hypothesis cannot be dismissed in this way. Another explanation is the effect of affective state on mental performance. For example, depressed people have been found to “demonstrate poorer recall of difficult (high-effort) material and no loss in recall from low effort materials” (Harter et al., 2002, 5), while positive affect is associated with improved creativity and greater problem solving (Staw and Barsade, 1993; Staw et al., 1994). Similarly, it has been suggested that those who have high positive affect are more likely to attempt difficult tasks and persist at tasks for longer (Wright and Staw, 1999) and that affective states cause behaviours that either improve or hamper performance behaviours (Cropanzano and Wright, 1999). There has been some suggestion that increased negative affect or depression may be associated with improved decision making, however research does not support this, instead finding better decision making among those with high positive affect (Staw and Barsade, 1993). The suggestion and evidence that positive affect is associated with greater performance and persistence should be of real interest to education policy makers as well as employers. Instead of arguing for improved conditions, the happy-productive worker hypothesis could be used to argue that employers could improve productivity by making hiring decisions based on the positive affect levels of applicants (Cropanzano and Wright, 1999). This presumably would not be an option for schools, however evidence suggests that the benefits of selection based on affective well-being would reduce over time if effort was not made to maintain or improve positive affect (Cropanzano and Wright, 1999; Xanthopoulou et al., 2009). This is because positive affect has been found to be influenced by the work environment, and so cannot be considered as simply an individual characteristic (Xanthopoulou et al., 2009). This argument highlights the likely importance of school environment to children’s subjective well-being and the importance of its role in policymaking considerations.



A Brief Summary of Existing School/Subjective Well-Being Research 

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6.4 A Brief Summary of Existing School/Subjective Well-Being Research The research discussed above has highlighted a number of ways in which it may be possible to improve or better understand the subjective well-being of children in schools through considering evidence relating to employment, particularly the happy-productive worker hypothesis. The existing research investigating relationships between school and aspects of subjective well-being has suggested a relationship between child subjective well-being and school perceptions and feelings, as well as showing that having good relationships with teachers is related to overall life satisfaction (Suldo et al., 2006). Similarly, research in the UK conducted by The Children’s Society (2012) has confirmed the importance of schools to the subjective well-being of children. Existing research has demonstrated a relationship between life satisfaction and satisfaction with school, while there is a lack of coherence regarding the relationship between subjective well-being and academic achievement (Suldo et al., 2006). However, this has often been conducted at the macro level and cross-country variation seems plausible given the different attitudes to and associated pressures regarding achievement in different nations. Despite the existence of this previous research, further investigation is necessary, not only for the reasons mentioned above. Research has tended to investigate the influence of subjective well-being and school satisfaction on academic achievement in order solely to improve academic outcomes (Huebner and McCullough, 2000; Karatzias et al., 2002). While this is important, and avenues to improve academic achievement should be explored, this approach neglects children’s well-being in favour of their well-becoming, reduces them to passive agents, and neglects the responsibility to ensure that education policies and approaches not just improve academic achievement, but nurture the whole child and ensure that no harm is caused in the pursuit of improved achievement (Brennan and White, 2007; Best, 2008). This is especially pertinent given the lack of negotiating power children have in regards to how they are taught. A study that in some way bridges the two issues of employment and schooling is a study by Cotton et al. (2002) which applied the happy-productive worker hypothesis to a sample of university students. They found a possible link between courses that had little opportunity for originality and higher levels of stress, and a strong relationship between academic achievement, measured as GPA (Grade Point Average), and a measure of satisfaction (based on job satisfaction approaches) mediated by their work environment (operationalised as demands and control) (Cotton et al., 2002).

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6.5 Do Differences between Children and Adults Undermine this Comparison? There are, however, a number of factors that suggest a difference between children and adults which could potentially be used to undermine the comparison between school and employment as discussed in this paper. The following section gives a very brief overview. Children are almost universally considered to be incompetent compared to adults, who, it is argued are rational and sensible, and on this basis children are “systematically denied the dignity and status of adults” (Harris, 1982, 35; also Archard and Macleod, 2002). Their lives are subject to considerably more control than adults, and that control is exercised by adults, often with the suggestion that it is in their best interests not least because treating children as adults is potentially cruel (Harris, 1982). Children were previously often considered as simply the property of their parents, or people whose identity was subsumed by that of their parents, rather than people to whom their parents had an obligation to care (Archard and Macleod, 2002). This approach has meant that children have received comparatively little consideration or involvement in things that affect their lives compared to adults, as highlighted by the changes in education policy discussed here. In recent years the neglect of children in research and theoretical literature has started to reverse, with greater attention paid to children in their own right (Qvortrup, 1993; Archard and Macleod, 2002; Ben-Arieh and Frønes, 2011). This has led to the recognition of children as rights holders and almost universal rejection of the idea of children as property, at least in principle (Noggle, 2002; Brennan and White, 2007). It has also been argued that the distinction between children and adults is in fact a distinction between the competent and incompetent (Harris, 1982). The incompetent child versus competent adult argument is undermined by the existence of adults making irrational decisions, such as smoking, and the extension of adult freedoms to all that reach adulthood regardless of their competence and capacity. As Harris (1982) argued ‟Bold, quick, ingenious, forward and capable young people are by no means a rarity, neither, unfortunately, are dull-witted, incompetent adults” (37). Similarly, Noggle (2002) has argued that the differences between adults and children are more complex and nuanced. For example, the status of children in regards to their parents is special as parents maintain authority over children even when they have reached stages where they can be considered competent, and may even be more able themselves. Instead, treating children as equals to adults may offer some protection from abuse and exploitation by adults. The most severe way in which the adult control of children is exemplified is the enforcement of compulsory school (or equivalent) attendance, with enforced standards of compliance and topics of study at the control of the Department for Education (Harris, 1982). These tendencies have encouraged viewing children as adults in the making, and therefore to focus on their well-becoming as opposed to their well-being in a way that is not the case for adults,



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allowing education policy decisions that have negative consequences children in the present (Archard and Macleod, 2002). As such, it is not acceptable to ignore the potential impacts of schooling on children. Rights of children, particularly not to experience harm, are not meaningfully different from equivalent adult rights, but the difficulty for them is having the ability to act to protect their rights (Brennan and White, 2007). In this sense they have the same rights as adults but a different set of capabilities with regards to them (Sen, 1993). This difference is pertinent to the application of the happy-productive worker hypothesis to children in schools. Wright and Staw (1999b) argue that employees have “implicitly drawn on the [happy-productive] thesis in contract negotiations, often arguing that increased pay and working conditions will be repaid in subsequent performance” (31), while the same argument can be made for children in schools, their relative lack of power compared to adults means that they are not in a position to do so. As such, responsibility must fall to others to argue for them. If, as the evidence discussed above suggests, poor quality employment is worse than unemployment, is it plausible to argue that poor quality education is worse than no education? The importance of obtaining at least a minimum level of literacy and numeracy means that the comparison here is less direct. The known negative effects of certain education policies on children, for example, on their subjective well-being, their self-worth and self-confidence (Reay and Wiliam, 1999, for example) cannot be used to justify not participating in education. Obviously the more desirable alternative is to ensure that education does not have, or at least minimises, such negative effects and research suggests that this is possible. But this means taking into account the broader impact of education at a time when standards are promoted above all else. Much like being seen to be serious about tackling crime, politicians of recent years have striven to be seen as serious about ensuring educational standards. With arguably few notable exceptions, for example the Every Child Matters agenda (although this paid little attention to subjective well-being), this has meant a narrow focus on academic achievement measured by success in standardised tests, ironically ignoring the evidence of a positive relationship between the subjective well-being of children and their achievement in education (Kirkcaldy et al., 2004). Much is often made of the well-being and well-becoming distinction between children and adults. While it is true that policy and research tends to focus on wellbecoming for children to a greater extent than for adults (for example, research into adult engagement with employment does not include reducing engagement in risk behaviours as one of its desired outcomes, as is often the case for the study of engagement in schools) there are well-becoming considerations for adults in employment, for example, forgoing income in the present in order to have a decent pension or considering future career prospects when deciding where to work. The main difference between well-becoming considerations for children and adults is, arguably, the ability of adults to be involved in that compromise. If adults decide that children are not able to evaluate this compromise themselves then the obligation

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should fall on adults to ensure that the right balance is struck, that well-being does not suffer excessively to the detriment of well-becoming. These are just some examples regarding the difference between adults and children and employment and school. However, none of the differences undermine the argument that it is important to give children in schools the same consideration that we give adults in employment.

6.6 Can this Comparison be Used to Influence Education Policy? As education in the UK, particularly England, has become increasingly centralised, with the Secretary of State acquiring increasing powers in the past few decades, education has become more and more politicised (Chitty, 2009). This has led to competition between political parties about who takes education, often meaning academic attainment, most seriously, and who is doing the most to improve it. However, this has not meant who can do the most to improve examination results, as too much improvement is interpreted by some to be the result of grade inflation or the results of negative practices by schools, for example teaching to the test, rather than genuine improvement (Barker, 2008; Gov.uk, 2012). As such, there has been an intense focus among politicians in recent years on appearing to take a hard line on educational achievement and perceived low standards, resulting in the pursuit of greater standardised testing, competition and comparison between schools, setting and streaming, and changing GCSE and A-level assessments to ensure that they are not becoming ‘too easy’ (Chitty, 2009; Gov.uk, 2012). However, these changes have taken a narrow approach to educational success and attainment and it is debatable whether improved academic achievement is the result of this focus, instead the effects of these changes on achievement are at best not clear, while there is evidence that they have created a school environment which has clear negative effects on children’s subjective well-being (Reay and Wiliam, 1999; Connor, 2001; Connor, 2003; Locker and Cropley, 2004; Barker, 2008). This suggests that appearing to promote educational achievement is the reality, and this is done by pursuing ideologically driven policies which encourage and reward procedural learning and engagement (Tomlinson, 1994; Tomlinson, 2005; Barker, 2008). This has also had the effect of reducing teacher morale and job satisfaction, likely to have a knock-on effect on the children that they teach (Evans, 2000; NUT, 2013). A new approach would encourage substantive engagement and learning, promoting new knowledge and an enjoyment of learning beyond the ability to recall facts and information but would require a significant shift in policy, away from the direction that has been dominant since the 1988 Education Reform Act. This seems unlikely as what little interest there was in the effect of schooling on child well-being from the government has diminished under the current coalition government who have, for example, removed assessment of pupil well-being from Ofsted criteria

References 

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considering it a “peripheral issue” (Harrison, 2010, n.p.). But Harter et al. (2002) have argued that “The ability of the workplace to prevent mental illness and to promote wellbeing is compatible with the mission of the public’s health, as outlined by the surgeon general” (206), then the workplace of the child, the school, should be considered seriously in relation to children’s subjective well-being. Huebner and McCullough (2000, 331) have emphasised “that school experiences may be a significant source of stress and decreased quality of life for a significant number of high school students” (Huebner and McCullough, 2000, 331) while the evidence discussed above in relation to employment for adults stresses that the school environment as shaped by policy is likely to be a key factor in the subjective well-being of young people. This relationship is likely to become increasingly important given the recent publications showing high levels of mental health issues and declining subjective well-being among young people (Mindfull, 2013; The Children’s Society, 2013; YouGov, 2013) which is likely to be costly in the long-term (as well as being important in the present) both individually and more broadly (Cummins et al, 2009; Proctor et al, 2010). It should be noted that while this paper argues for considering children in schools in a way that is equivalent to adults in employment, that is not to say that the way adults in employment are considered or treated is ideal. It is acknowledged that there are still many shortcomings in this regard, for example the recent concern in the UK of the use of zero-hours contracts and their effects on employees (CIPD, 2013; The Guardian, 2013). However, it is hoped that by highlighting the evidence from employment which demonstrates a link between subjective well-being, engagement and productivity and the parallels between employment and schooling, a shift in policy towards greater consideration of children’s subjective well-being can be encouraged. Acknowledgements: This work was supported by the Economic and Social Research Council (grant reference ES/I009124/1). The author would like to thank Professor Kathleen Kiernan for her advice while working on this paper.

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Nystrand, M. and Gamoran, A. (1991) ‘Instructional Discourse, Student Engagment, and Literature Achievement’, Research in the Teaching of English, Vol. 25, No. 3, pp 261-290. Proctor, C., Linley P. A. and Maltby, J. (2010) ‘Very Happy Youths: Benefits of Very High Life Satisfaction Among Adolescents’, in Social Indicators Research, Vol. 98, No. 3, pp 519-532. Qvortrup, J. (1993) ‘Societal position of childhood: the international project Childhood as a Social Phenomenon’, Childhood, Vol. 1, No. 2, pp 119-124. Reay, D. and Wiliam, D. (1999) ‘‘I’ll be a nothing’: structure, agency and the construction of identity through assessment’, British Educational Research Journal, Vol. 25, No. 3, pp 343-354. Sen, A. (1993) ‘Capability and Well-Being’, in Nussbaum, M. and Sen, A. (Eds.) The Quality of Life, Oxford: Clarendon Press. Southcott, C., Stevens, E., Featherstone, G. and McCrone, T. (2013). Indicators to Identify the Disengaged (NFER Research Programme: From Education to Employment). Slough: NFER. Staw, B. M. and Barsade, S. G. (1993) ‘Affect and Managerial Performance: A Test of the Sadder-butWiser vs. Happier-and-Smarter Hypotheses’, Administrative Science Quarterly, Vol. 38, No. 2, pp 304-331. Staw, B. M., Sutton, R. I. and Pelled, L. H. (1994) ‘Employee Positive Emotion and Favorable Outcomes at the Workplace’, Organization Science, Vol. 5, No. 1, pp 51-71. Suldo, S. M., Riley, K. N. and Shaffer, E. J. (2006) ‘Academic Correlates of Children and Adolescents’ Life Satisfaction’, School Psychology International, Vol. 27, No. 5, pp 567-582. The Children’s Society (2012) The Good Childhood Report 2012: A review of our children’s well-being, London: The Children’s Society. The Children’s Society (2013) The Good Childhood Report 2013, London: The Children’s Society. The Guardian (2013) Zero hours: Nil points. Available at: http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/aug/09/zero-hours-nil-points?INTCMP=SRCH (Accessed 14th August 2013). Tomlinson, S. (1994) Educational Reform And Its Consequences, London: Rivers Oram Press. Tomlinson, S. (2005) Educational in a post welfare society, Maidenhead: Open University Press. Veenhoven, R. (2008) ‘Sociological Theories of Subjective Well-Being’, in Eid, M. and Larsen, R. (eds) The Science of Subjective Well-being: A tribute to Ed Diener, New York: Guilford Publications. Willms, J. D. (2003) Student Engagement at School: A sense of belonging and participation, results from PISA 2000. Paris: OECD. Wright, T. A. (2006) ‘The emergence of job satisfaction in organizational behaviour: A historical overview of the dawn of job attitude research’, Journal of Management History, Vol. 12, No. 3, pp 262-277. Wright, T. A. and Staw, B. M. (1999a) ‘Affect and Favorable Work Outcomes: Two Longitudinal Tests of the Happy-Productive Worker Thesis’, Journal of Organizational Behaviour, Vol. 20, No. 1, pp 1-23. Wright, T. A. and Staw, B. M. (1999b) ‘Reply: Further Thoughts on the Happy-Productive Worker’, Journal of Organizational Behaviour, Vol. 20, No. 1, pp 31-34. Wright, T. A. and Cropanzano, R. (2000) ‘Psychological Well-Being and Job Satisfaction as Predictors of Job Performance’, Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, Vol. 5, No. 1, pp 84-94. Wright, T. A., Cropanzano, R., Denney, P. J. and Moline, G. L. (2002) ‘When a Happy Worker is a Productive Worker: A Preliminary Examination of Three Models’, Canadian Journal of Behavioural Science, Vol. 34, No. 3, pp 146-150. Xanthopoulou, D., Bakker, A. B., Demerouti, E. and Schaufeli, W. B. (2009) ‘Work engagement and financial returns: A diary study on the role of job and personal resources’, Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology, Vol. 82, No. 1, pp 183-200. YouGov (n.d.) YouGov Survey Results. Available at: http://d25d2506sfb94s.cloudfront.net/cumulus_ uploads/document/360spgtkm1/YouGov-Mindfull-Results.pdf (Accessed 9th July 2013).

Alexander Bagattini

7 Male Circumcision and Children’s Interests 7.1 Introduction Male circumcision has, contrary to female circumcision, long been seen as a rather unproblematic procedure. However, nowadays male circumcision has increasingly become the focus of law and morals. In 2013 in particular, a huge number of philosophical papers, special issues and volumes were published on the topic. What had happened? Two events in 2012 are of major importance: the first one is the debate about the verdict of the Cologne county court in Germany, which claimed that the circumcision of a four-year-old boy had been illegal (according to German law) because the procedure had not been medically necessary. Meanwhile, the German Government discharged the verdict of the Cologne judges and rendered a new law in December 2012, according to which male circumcision is left to parental discretion (German Penal Code, §1631, d) if it is carried out under medically proper conditions. The other event was the release of a technical report and a policy statement of the task force on circumcision of the American Association of Pediatrics (AAP) in September 2012 (AAP 2012). According to the AAP, circumcision is not recommended as a standard procedure, yet the last word in this regard is left to the parents. In both cases (the new German law and the survey of the AAP) a position is taken that might not be utterly new but that is defended in the light of the latest scientific evidence. This position entails two claims: the first claim is what David Archard calls the liberal standard according to which parents only forego their right to make decisions on behalf of their children if they do not act in the best interest of their offspring (Archard 2004). The second claim is: contrary to female circumcision, male circumcision does not violate a child’s best interests. If both claims are true, it follows that circumcision should be left to parental discretion. This position has been held by the Benetars (Benetar & Benetar 2003) and has been defended quite recently by Joseph Mazor (2013). Most opponents of male circumcision question the second claim. While some authors argue that circumcision conflicts with a child’s interest in bodily integrity (Davis 2013, Lang 2013, Ungar-Sargon 2013, Hodges & Svoboda & Van Howe 2002), others address an assumed conflict of circumcision with future goods, such as the future person’s personal autonomy (Svoboda 2013, UngarSargon 2013). The guiding question of this paper is whether circumcision violates children’s best interests and should, therefore, be banned. The first two parts of this paper will basically focus on arguments by Joseph Mazor and by his critics. I will argue that Mazor succeeds in his defence of circumcision in the case of children’s interests in bodily integrity and sexual flourishing, but fails to properly address the © 2015 Alexander Bagattini This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 License.

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child’s interest in autonomy.1 The third part will address some arguments that are related to the question of whether circumcision leads to benefits that might justify the procedure, even if the autonomy condition is violated. Before proceeding with the general argument of this paper, some terminological points have to be made: first, this paper deals with male circumcision only. Yet for the sake of brevity I will use the general term ‘circumcision’. If I mention cases of female circumcision (female genital mutilation) I will make it explicit. Second, there are clear medical indications for circumcision such as pathological phimosis (Lissauer & Clayden 2011). This paper deals with cases of circumcision where there is no such indication. I will briefly consider if putative medical benefits (like an improved standard of hygiene) justify circumcision, but my main focus will be on non-therapeutic circumcision. Third, non-therapeutic circumcision is often conflated with religious circumcision (Earp 2013, De Wispelaere & Weinstock 2014); this is a failure as there are other motives for the performance of circumcision (Glick 2006). Furthermore, any argument pro or contra circumcision should not depend on the question of whether the parents want it for religious motives. If circumcision is morally right or wrong, then it is morally right or wrong anyway. This concerns religious and non-religious motives alike. Fourth, I will assume what David Archard calls the “liberal standard”. This means I will take it for granted that parents are typically in the best position to make decisions on behalf of the interests of their children and that parents forego this right when they do not act in the best interests of their offspring.2 I will, fifth, assume what can be called a sufficitarian conception of children’s best interests. This is why I interpret as the ‘best’ in the notion ‘best interest’ not in the sense of a maximum requirement but, rather, in the sense that parents have to provide an adequate upbringing for their children. This entails that parental interests might legitimately trump children’s interests as long as the latter are sufficiently represented.3 In the following I am going to discuss several interests of children that might trump parental interests in circumcision. If there are such interests, the state should guard children’s interests, even against parental prerogatives. I will start with

1 As I will argue in part 2.2, there is an interest of the person the child is supposed to become to make his own decisions about modifications of his body. 2 As I point out in a forthcoming paper, the liberal standard entails that the burden of proof for any claim against the parents (that parents do not act in the best interest of their children) is on the side of the claimant. In this forthcoming paper I raise the question if the burden of proof should be challenged, at least in specific medical contexts. But I defend that the burden of proof should be kept intact, as it is a part of the liberal tradition in education. (Bagattini, forthcoming) 3 To give an example: children have an interest in education, while parents have an interest in their careers or in leisure time. According to the sufficitarian account of children’s best interests, parents have to ensure an adequate but not a maximum level of education for their offspring. If this level is reached, there is no further moral duty of the parents to victimize leisure time or job opportunities on behalf of the education of their children.



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children’s interest in their bodily integrity and then proceed with children’s interest in future goods like sexual flourishing and autonomy. In the third part of the paper I will raise the question of whether there are any putative benefits that might justify circumcision.

7.2 Circumcision and the Bodily Integrity of the Child Children have, like all persons, an interest in their bodily integrity. Is this interest a proper candidate to override parental prerogatives in the case of circumcision? Sometimes this interest in bodily integrity can be overridden if more fundamental interests, for example the child’s health, are at risk. In such cases it seems to be legitimate to make decisions in the child’s best interest, even if this entails interventions in the child’s bodily integrity. Consider the case of tooth decay where medical treatment is unavoidable for a child’s health. In this case, like in analogue cases, medical treatment which entails an intervention in the child’s bodily integrity seems to be justified because it is in the child’s best interest. Furthermore, in the case of tooth decay there should be medical treatment for children even if it is not in the interest of the parents.4 It is important to note that this is a logical claim about the conditions when interventions with the bodily integrity of the child are justified, namely that the medical necessity of the intervention is indicated. In other words: the medical necessity of any intervention I in the bodily integrity of a child is considered a sufficient condition for I. This part of the story seems to be rather uncontroversial. It is still compatible with other justifications for interventions with the bodily integrity of a child, for example non-therapeutic male circumcision which is per definitionem medically not necessary. However, in their 2012 verdict the Cologne judges made a much stronger claim, namely that the circumcision of a four year old boy was illegal because it was not medically necessary. This is obviously equivalent to claiming that medical necessity is a necessary condition for any legitimate intervention in the bodily integrity of a child. We may call this the medicalized notion of children’s best interests (Conrad 2007). It is feasible to distinguish weak and strong medicalization; while weak medicalization allows for other criteria than medical ones, strong medicalization does not. The claim of the Cologne judges is clearly a claim in the ‘only if’-form, which means that they make use of the concept of medicalization in its strong meaning. Note now that proponents of circumcision typically do not deny the feasibility of

4 The parents might decide against any form of medical treatment analogue to the notorious cases of blood transfusion for the children of Jehova’s Witnesses.

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weak medicalization.5 What they actually argue against is that we should allow for strongly medicalized standards of children’s best interests. Joseph Mazor, for example, refutes the claim of the Cologne judges by giving a counterexample, namely the correction of cleft upper lips. In many cases this surgery is carried out for aesthetic reasons. It is, by that token, analogue to cases like the correction of protruding ears or breaches. There might be a medical indication for those surgeries in some cases, but in many cases they are carried out for non-medical reasons. In this way the example of the correction of cleft upper lips functions as an intuition pump. The basic idea is already known from the Benetars 2003 paper: if we ban circumcision because it is medically unnecessary, then we would have to ban many other interventions that we intuitively endorse (Benetar & Benetar 2003). However, banning surgeries like the correction of cleft upper lips seems to be counterintuitive. Hence the conclusion is: if we do not want to create counterintuitive consequences, we should allow parents to decide whether their children should be circumcised.6 This conclusion has been refuted by other authors (Lang 2013, Hodges & Svoboda & Van Howe 2013, Svoboda 2003). We can distinguish at least two arguments: one refutes the analogy between circumcision and the correction of cleft upper lips because of the alleged greater medical risks of circumcision, the other claims that Mazor understates the moral weight of surgeries like the correction of cleft upper lips. David P. Lang, for example, argues that Mazor does not properly address the risks of circumcision. His main point is that the latter does not distinguish between the Jewish traditions of milah and brit periah. While in the former case only the tip of the prepuce is removed, in the latter case the complete prepuce is removed (Lang 2013, 429). According to Lang, there are considerable risks in the case of periah that are understated by Mazor. He cites, for example, the work of Paul Fleiss who points out that the prepuce is an extremely complex tissue and not just, so to say, a negligible piece of skin (Fleiss 1997). This has been stated by other authors as well; in their wellknown paper “The Prepuce”, C. J. Cold and T. R. Taylor discuss a plethora of functions of the prepuce and its somatosensory innervation with different nerve endings (Cold and Taylor 1999, 37). Many authors, not only Lang, think therefore that the removal of the prepuce bears unjustifiable risks (Svoboda & Van Howe 2013, Svoboda 2003, Hodges & Svoboda & Van Howe 2003, Fox & Thomson 2004, Cold & Taylor, 1999), yet there are studies that point in a different direction. Krieger, Metha, Bayley et al. point out that the loss of the prepuce is not necessarily related to a loss of vital functions of the penis (Krieger, Metha, Bayley et al. 2008). Other studies point in the

5 This means, for example, that proponents of circumcision like the Benetars or Mazor could accept forced blood transfusion for the children of Jehova’s Witnesses. 6 In his argument Mazor uses the language of rights. According to Mazor, there is no right (of children) to bodily integrity that trumps parental prerogatives in the case of circumcision (compare Mazor 2013).



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same direction; if circumcision is carried out under medically proper conditions, the risks of the procedure seem to be as low as with any other medical procedure (AAP 2012, BMA 2006). Hence we are confronted with a controversial debate concerning the medical risks of circumcision. This makes it difficult, in my opinion, to cite this evidence in ethical arguments pro or contra circumcision. In other words: taking the medical status quo, I am sceptical that we can rebut the analogy between circumcision and other medical procedures like the correction of cleft upper lips for an argument against circumcision. Other authors, like Eliyahu Ungar-Sargon, point out that Mazor understates the moral weight of surgeries like the correction of cleft upper lips. According to UngarSargon, the correction of cleft upper lips has, as any other surgery for minors, to meet the following criteria: first, it must not be possible to achieve the benefits of the procedure in a less dramatic way, second, delay until the child is autonomous has to be ruled out, and third, the procedure must not impair the normal functions of the child’s body. For the moment I want to express my main concern about his criteria, namely that they entail standards for children’s well-being that are hardly compatible with liberal values. His third criterion, for example, clearly expresses a strongly medicalized notion of children’s best interests. If we do not want physicians (as experts concerning the normal functions of human bodies) to have the authority over medical treatment for children in any case, Ungar-Sargon’s third criterion does not seem to be applicable. To summarize: if we consider children’s interests in their bodily integrity per se, there is no direct argument for a violation of children’s best interests in the case of circumcision. As I pointed out, the medical evidence at hand is not strong enough for any conclusive argument that circumcision violates children’s best interests. Furthermore, I think that Mazor is right in rejecting a strongly medicalized standard for children’s best interests. The situation might change if new evidence (concerning the risks of circumcision) is available, but for now, any claim against parental prerogatives in the case of circumcision is in need of justification – as long as we consider children’s interest in their bodily integrity only.

7.3 Circumcision and Future Interests of the Child There is a strong bias towards the future good when people talk about children’s best interests. This means that people typically endorse that it is morally tenable to subordinate children’s current interests (say playing) in relation to children’s interests in their future (say education). This perspective on children’s interests leads to the problem that children might be considered mere instruments of the normative view of adults, namely what they think children should be like as future persons. Yet the subordination thesis has at least some prima facie plausibility. Some goods are vital for flourishing adult lives and it is highly unlikely that these can be achieved

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without any cost on the side of current interests. This restricts the scope of parental prerogatives as well. Consider the well-known Wisconsin vs Yoder case where the US Supreme Court stated that public schooling is inevitable for Amish children. When future goods, such as education, are concerned, there are normative limits for parental prerogatives. Are there any future goods that pose such limits on parental prerogatives in the case of circumcision? In the following I will take it for granted that children have an interest in sexual flourishing when they become adults and that they want to make their own decisions about their lives. I will consider both goods in turn and discuss the question of whether they impose limits on parental prerogatives in the case of circumcision.

7.3.1 Sexual Flourishing of the Future Adult Let us consider another argument by Mazor in which he deals with the impact of circumcision on the sexual sensitivity of the young man. One of the reasons that most people endorse when they reject female circumcision7 is that it leads to vital limitations of sexuality in the adult lives of circumcised girls. While some authors claim that this holds for male circumcision as well (Hodges & Svoboda & Van Howe 2002, Cold & Taylor 1999), Mazor rejects this claim. His argument starts with the assumption that the reduction of sexual sensitivity (and by that token of sexual pleasure) in the male penis is only moderate for circumcised men. If the procedure is carried out under medically proper conditions, the loss of sexual pleasure is only moderate for adult men. By ‘moderate’ Mazor means a reduction, as he says, “in the neighborhood of 10%” (Mazor 2013, 424), and backs his assumption with two empirical studies (Kim & Pang 2007, Payne et al. 2007). There are studies that give us another impression, namely that there are much higher risks for the sexual functioning and sexual pleasure of adult circumcised men. Yet for the sake of argument I will follow Mazor’s assumption that circumcision bears only the risk of a moderate loss of sexual pleasure for adult men. Still one might wonder if this is compatible with children’s best interests if we consider sexual flourishing (of adults) a vital part of such interests. Mazor asks us to imagine the following thought experiment: “Imagine that there is an operation that has some negligible health benefits for a child but that also moderately reduces the pleasure the child obtains from eating sweet foods. Further, imagine that

7 The common expression “female genital mutilation”, which is usually used instead of female circumcision, entails that the procedure is considered as a violation of children’s rights. Interestingly, there is a strong bias to consider female circumcision as a crime (violation of children’s rights), while this is not so for male circumcision. This has been critically remarked, for example, by S. K. Hellsten (Hellsten 2004).



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this operation can only be carried out in childhood. How should we think about the permissibility of this operation?” (Mazor 2013, 424). Mazor concedes that a full-blooded elimination of the child’s ability to sense sweetness would harm the child’s best interests. Yet he stresses the point that it does not seem unreasonable to assume that “moderately reducing the child’s ability to enjoy sweets would be beneficial given that it might reasonably be thought to induce the child to consume fewer sweets.” (Mazor 2013, 424). In the same way, Mazor argues that it is not unreasonable “to believe that a moderate reduction would lead to behavioral changes (e. g. less emphasis on sexual pursuits relative to other pursuits) and that some parents could see these behavioral changes as beneficial.” (Mazor 2013, 424). The point that Mazor wants to stress is, in my view, that the talk about sexual pleasure is value laden. People might, as he puts it, reasonably disagree about the value of sexual pleasure (Mazor 2013). It seems to me that Mazor has a point. If we want to keep in touch with the core idea of liberalism – the acceptance of value pluralism – then we should allow for disagreement about what matters for children’s best interests. Further, if we endorse what I called the sufficitarian conception of children’s best interests, then there is space for disagreement in cases where capabilities of children are in play. Although of course, according to the maximum conception of children’s best interests parents would have the duty to ensure that their children enjoy the maximum or full capability. The all-decisive question seems to be what we mean by ‘moderate’ reduction of sexual pleasure. There is some vagueness in the term that is not adequately captured by Mazor’s assumption that circumcision leads to a roughly 10% loss of sexual pleasure. After all, it is not clear if pleasure belongs to the category of fully quantifiable aspects of human nature. Furthermore, Mazor’s claim that circumcision leads to only a moderate loss of sexual pleasure is far from being uncontroversial. As already mentioned in part 1 of this paper, different studies come to the conclusion that circumcision bears considerable health risks – entailing a loss of sexual sensitivity or even sexual dysfunction (such as erectile dysfunction) (Money & Davidson 1983, Frisch et al. 2011, Goldman 1999). Yet if we keep the liberal standard in mind, the burden of proof for restrictions of parental prerogatives is on the side of the claimants. This means that opponents of circumcision need to back up their claims sufficiently. As controversy is still going on, Mazor is successful with his plea for circumcision in the case of a reduction of sexual pleasure until conclusive evidence is at hand that circumcision violates children’s best interests.

7.3.2 Autonomy Medical treatment must never be done without respecting the autonomy of the patient. This means that medical treatment is only eligible to be carried out on persons if they consent to it. As a matter of fact, children are not capable of giving their consent. This

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is at least true when we speak about babies and very young children and if we speak about informed consent. This confinement is feasible because circumcision is usually carried out on very young children or babies, meaning that circumcision is usually carried out before children can give informed consent to the procedure. In such cases, parents have to give their proxy consent to render the medical procedure in question eligible. It is an implication of the liberal standard that parents have the right to make such decisions on behalf of their children. Why not in the case of circumcision? Critics answer: because it is irreversible (Ungar-Sargon 2013, Svoboda 2013). This is why the decision should be postponed until the child reaches an age when he is old enough to give his consent. Interestingly, this suggestion was made by a group of dissident representatives of the German Bundestag before the actual law was passed (DB 2012). In this alternative draft to §1631d8, circumcision was supposed be allowed, but not before the child reaches the age of 14. However, another law was passed, according to which parents are allowed to give their proxy consent in the case of circumcision. Mazor is clearly in favour of this legislation, as he backs it up with the following argument: in the case of maths education we do not think that children are in the position to make autonomous decisions on this matter. Furthermore, we do not think we should wait until the child is old enough to make his or her own decision (about whether he or she wants to learn maths). It seems implausible to wait until the child is old enough because the costs for learning maths are considerably higher for the concerned adult person. Similarly, in the case of circumcision the costs of the procedure are considerably higher for the adult person, as the medical risks are higher for adults than for children. As it seems, no one would claim that children have a right not to learn maths if they do not want to. This is analogous to the fact that children do not have a right to wait with circumcision until they are old enough to consent to it (see Mazor 2013, 422). As in the case of the child’s interest in bodily integrity, Mazor uses an analogous argument. However, in the autonomy case, the argument is not as convincing as it is in the bodily integrity case. As Ungar-Sargon remarks, permanent “body modifications like circumcision are irreversible in a way that education is not.” (Ungar-Sargon 2013, 2). What is the problem with irreversibility? I think that Ungar-Sargon wants to stress the point that education, like maths education, still allows the child to make its own decisions in the matter as a grown-up. For example, the child is not ‘doomed’ to become a mathematician because it has learned maths in school. Contrary to that, the circumcised boy is not able to make other decisions on the matter. His opportunities are, so to speak, fixed. It is helpful to introduce Matthew Clayton’s distinction between autonomy as an end state and autonomy as a precondition (Clayton 2006).

8 § 1631d of the German Civil Code subsumes circumcision under the general custody of the parents if it is carried out under medically proper conditions. This means that according to German law, parents are free to decide in favour of circumcision for their children.



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On the one hand, autonomy as an end state refers to the full history of how a person has become an autonomous agent. Autonomy as a precondition means, on the other hand, that a person makes his/her own decisions about vital matters in his/her life. Clayton uses this distinction against the background of a Rawlsian conception of public justification (or public reason constraint). The basic idea is that autonomy as a precondition is a necessary part of any just allocation beneath free and equal persons (Rawls 2001). It seems to me that Ungar-Sargon makes a similar point when he distinguishes education from circumcision by means of the notion of irreversibility. To see this it is helpful to consider a possible reply by Mazor to Ungar-Sargon’s objection. Mazor might answer that in the case of maths education, opportunities are fixed as well. For example, the child is not able to erase its acquired knowledge. In other words, if any legitimate form of parenting requires autonomy as a precondition, why is maths education any better than circumcision? I am not sure if this is what Ungar-Sargon has in mind, but Clayton would clearly answer that maths education meets the public reason condition, while circumcision does not. If we want a fair allocation (amongst free and equal persons) of chances, opportunities and basic liberties in society, then we have to find what Rawls calls an ‘overlapping consensus’. This consensus has to be reasonable yet independent from any comprehensive doctrines. This is what distinguishes basic education (to which maths education belongs) from circumcision. While the former is part of what is in everyone’s interest, the latter is in the interest of persons with a specific world view. But if this is true, then no one should be forced into this world view because this would mean not treating this person as being free and equal. In my opinion this is a compelling line of argument that puts some pressure on the proponents of circumcision. The following question comes to mind: why can one not wait with ‘real’ (invasive) circumcision until the boy reaches an age when he can consent to it? Would it not be possible to introduce a proxy ritual (like baptism) instead of circumcision until this day?9 In my opinion the burden of proof is on the side of the proponents of circumcision. If they are not ready to give a sensible answer to this question (and this answer has to entail why being circumcised belongs to the basic liberties of persons), circumcision should be postponed until the young man is old enough to make up his own mind on the matter. I have some sympathy for the suggestion of the dissidents of the German Bundestag, who suggested the age of 14. In my opinion this is a proper age for consent in medical contexts, as we already use it. This way waiting with circumcision until the boy is aged 14 would be consistent with our current medical practice. To summarize: children’s interests are not clearly violated in the sense of bodily integrity. It is not entirely clear whether their interests in the sense of future sexual flourishing are violated or not, but for now it seems that circumcision does not

9 Clayton is famous for arguing against even the legitimacy of baptism because he takes it to be a form of illegitimate comprehensive enrolment. (Clayton 2006)

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considerably hamper sexual flourishing. However, it does violate children’s interests in terms of autonomy, since children cannot give informed consent, but only as far as autonomy is concerned can one clearly state that children’s best interests are violated by circumcision. Some proponents of circumcision might not be too impressed by this deontological line of argument. They might point out that some higher goods are only accessible when we sacrifice autonomy at least to some degree. In the remaining part of the paper, I will explore some of these consequentialist arguments.

7.4 The Benefits of Circumcision Are there any health benefits that might justify circumcision, even if it is a violation of autonomy as a precondition? For a long time it has been assumed, for example, that circumcision is good because it improves male hygiene. As Frisch et al. pointed out in a recent study, there is no direct relation between circumcision and the hygiene status of men. In countries where running water is accessible there is no considerable difference between circumcised and non-circumcised men concerning their hygiene (Frisch et al. 2011), yet there is considerable evidence that circumcision protects against several infectious diseases. Several studies provide evidence that circumcision protects against urinary tract infections (AAP 2012, Jagannath et al. 2012). However, this benefit of circumcision is primarily measurable for boys with specific anatomical defects, (Jagannath et al. 2012) and it is another question how decisive those benefits are for boys in the absence of those defects. Furthermore, even if there are some benefits in the case of urinary tract infections, it is far from clear that they justify medical intervention. Consequentialists might argue that the cost-benefit balance (between the benefits and costs of circumcision) has to be analysed first, while deontologists might stress that even medical benefits are only overriding when they are essential (e.g. life-saving). The same seems to be true for the case of penile cancer. There is evidence that circumcision has a protective effect against penile cancer (Larke et al. 2011), but as penile cancer is rare and circumcision entails risks, it should not be recommended as a general practice. Nor would this benefit justify overriding autonomy as a precondition. Sometimes public-health benefits (rather than individual health benefits of the concerned person) are considered overriding reasons in favour of the performance of circumcision. For example, some studies seem to establish that circumcision helps to prevent the risk of HIV infections. A widely recognized metaanalysis of the Cochrane Collaboration yielded that circumcision leads to a relative decrease of 38-66% of HIV in high risk populations (Siegfried et al. 2009) and that circumcision is the most cost-effective means at hands to contain HIV pandemics (Uthman et al. 2010). Yet the main problem with this analysis is that it focuses on the situation in Africa only, which is why it has already been doubted that the same result can be expected in developed countries (Kim et al. 2010). Furthermore, it has



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been pointed out that ethical concerns have been marginalized in favour of medical and economic reasons (Fox & Thomson 2010, Hodges & Svoboda & Van Howe 2002). To summarize: I am sceptical that there is any valid argument for circumcision based on health benefits. Either it is not clear that the same results cannot be reached in other, less invasive and risky ways or it is not clear if the costs of circumcision are definitely outweighed by its benefits. Hence in my opinion the health benefits of circumcision are not sufficient for overriding autonomy as a precondition condition. Other arguments for circumcision deal with putative indirect benefits of circumcision. There is certainly a risk of stigmatization for children in specific cultural backgrounds if they are not circumcised. In this case the benefit of circumcision would be to spare the child the painful isolation in its social group, which may be devastating for its proper development. (When I speak of proper development, what I have in mind is the formation of a stable identity, as there is a strong connection between the child’s attachment (Bowlby 1990) to its close social environment – especially the parents – and its formation of a stable identity. Because the latter is vital for the child’s proper development, interventions in the social environment of the child should only be made when the child’s best interests are at risk.) Several authors (for example Benetar & Benetar 2003, De Wispelaere & Weinstock 2014) have claimed that (in light of current medical evidence), cultural considerations should be decisive for the question of whether circumcision should be performed. (The Benetars mention two studies: Lawler et al. 1991 and Ganiats et al. 1991. Compare Benetar & Benetar 2003). Other authors add the point that critics of circumcision often tend to a medicalized notion of the benefits and costs of circumcision, while many parents endorse differing values (Sheldon 2003). Those values are often incommensurable with medical values, which in turn complicates a cost-benefit-analysis of circumcision. The question is how to balance medical risks against the cultural benefits of circumcision. The problem of incommensurability comes in because medical values are descriptive, while cultural values are often prescriptive. This is especially true for religious values. Furthermore, it seems difficult to reliably predict how shame and stigmatization may affect the child’s later life and how this might justify a violation of the autonomy-condition. In my opinion there are two reasons why there is no valid argument for the performance of circumcision on the basis of cultural considerations. First, if we accept a wholeheartedly liberal conception of parental prerogatives, it becomes difficult to criticize any rituals that are applied to children. To begin with: we do not accept female circumcision (female genital mutilation) because it is expected to lead to devastating effects on the sexual capabilities of grown women (Nussbaum 1999, 200010). Yet if we want to argue that parents should have the right to decide if circumcision is performed on their children because this is part of the cultural

10 The WHO distinguishes four types of female genital mutilation (WHO 1997). As Nussbaum points out, even the weakest type 1 of female genital mutilation impairs female sexuality.

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background of the parents, then we end up with a slippery slope concerning any confinements of parental prerogatives. How is this point related to the stigmatization argument? Consider the case of female genital mutilation where the child herself wants the procedure. Let us further assume that the child wants the procedure due to peer pressure. I take it for granted that circumcision would be wrong in this case, even if there were a stigmatizing effect of not being circumcised. Sometimes we expect that practices have to change, especially when these practices conflict with basic rights. Hence if circumcision is morally wrong because it violates the autonomycondition (according to which constant bodily modifications are only legitimate if the concerned person decides for it freely), then the risk of stigmatization cannot count as a reason against restricting parental prerogatives. It cannot count as a reason in this respect because autonomy is overriding. If religious practices are incompatible with autonomy, then those practices have to change. The second reason why cultural considerations do not establish that the performance of circumcision is justified is derived from the requirement to consistently interpret our practice. In medical contexts we already make use of a medicalized notion of children’s interests. This is not to say that medical contexts are completely ignorant to the cultural features of patients. However, such features are not considered sufficient, for example, for refusing life-saving treatment for children. The well-known and abovementioned case of Jehova’s Witnesses, who want to refuse life-saving blood transfusions for their children, exemplifies this point. To summarize, the risk of social stigmatization is no reason for (or against) circumcision. As I have already argued, circumcision directly conflicts with one of the core values of liberal society: autonomy. In the case of social stigmatization we should think about how to help children deal with it and how to convince the parents that the practice of circumcision violates the interests of their child. In any case, it is certainly an unconvincing line of argument to derive any sort of prerogatives from the threat of stigmatization, and this is true for the case of circumcision as well. It is sometimes argued that banning circumcision would bear the risk that parents will take their children to untrained providers of the procedure (AAP 2012). The worry is that banning circumcision could lead to some sort of ‘circumcision-tourism’ to other countries where circumcision is allowed. However, this line of argument is vulnerable for the same kind of reasons as the stigmatization-argument. If we allow circumcision because otherwise we would have to expect that parents would take their children to medical charlatans or to countries with worse medical standards, this would hold for other procedures as well. Yet this line of argument would hardly be accepted in the case of female circumcision. Hence the threat of ‘circumcision-tourism’ is not a relevant normative reason on the account of circumcision. On the face of it, there might be space for the following line of argument that acting in the best interest of the child requires saving the child from unprofessional medical interventions. Banning circumcision would lead to more children suffering from the effects of unprofessional medical interventions; therefore, banning circumcision would violate children’s best

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interests. As I have already pointed out, this argument is a failure, as it obliterates an important premise, namely that some practices violate children’s best interests as well. And problematic effects of morally critical practices do not justify such practices, as the case of female circumcision demonstrates.

7.5 Conclusion Circumcision is one of the most common, probably the most common, medical procedure worldwide (Doyle 2005). Maybe this fact, combined with our liberal conception of parenthood, the liberal standard, explains to a certain extent why circumcision has so long been considered a relatively innocent part of parental prerogatives. It is remarkable how, for example, most German media responded to the Cologne 2012 verdict on circumcision. Many articles focused on the situation of Jewish and Muslim communities in Germany. Far fewer articles considered the issue of whether children’s rights or children’s interests are in any way violated by the performance of circumcision. Yet the question of whether the performance of circumcision violates children’s interests entered the public domain. It is certainly one of the merits of the Cologne verdict that the performance of circumcision is no longer considered something that belongs to the private sphere, without any public regulation. Whatever you think on the matter, finally there is new legislation on the topic (§1631, d, German Penal Code) in Germany. As I have already argued, I am not happy with this legislation, as it does not pay proper tribute to children’s interests. Nonetheless, suboptimal legislation is in any case better than none. Furthermore, it is far from being clear that moral concerns about the legitimacy of circumcision are already sufficient for legal intervention in this practice; legal interventions always have to take account of the interests of all concerned persons as well as of the interests of the state. My main aim in this paper is to draw attention to the different facets of children’s interests and to how they are related to parental prerogatives in the case of circumcision. As I endorse the liberal standard, I believe that parents should in general decide what is in the best interest of their children. Yet as parents can fail in interpreting the best interest of their children, sometimes children must be protected against what parents think best for their children. Consequently I endorse the following claim: by default parents have the right to decide what is in the best interest of their offspring. This entails that parents have the right to overrule children’s opinions about their own interests. It entails further that this overruling authority of parents can be overridden itself if there is conclusive evidence or if there are fundamental normative reasons for the claim that parents do not act in the best interest of their child. Starting out from this perspective, I followed Joseph Mazor in that children’s interests in bodily integrity and sexual flourishing (as adults) can be overridden by parental prerogatives in circumcision and in other cases, as long as unreasonable

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risks for the child are ruled out. My main worry concerning circumcision is that it undermines autonomy as a precondition for permanent bodily modifications. Autonomy is a general and absolute good in the sense that all take part in it and that there is no way of relativizing it. True enough, the liberal standard (in education) is part of our liberal tradition, but moral egalitarianism is also part of this tradition. And moral egalitarianism is incompatible with excluding persons from equal rights such as the right to exercise their autonomy (in medical as well as in other contexts). Yet if children are circumcised before they can make up their own mind on the matter, they will never have the chance to take a stance. And this means to exclude the persons the children are supposed to become from having equal rights. As I pointed out in the last part of the paper, I do not see that there are any putative benefits that have the normative force to override this violation of children’s interests. Let me end by distinguishing between what I am saying and what not. I am arguing that circumcision is in conflict with essential values of the liberal tradition, i.e. with autonomy as a precondition (in the case of irreversible bodily modifications). Hence I defend the thesis that circumcision is morally objectionable. I do not conclude on a legal level that circumcision should be forbidden or anything in this direction. In order to make this claim, more would have to be said about the complicated triad of children’s parental and societal interests and how they should be implemented in the law. However, this would clearly exceed the scope of this paper.

References Archard, D. (2004) Children. Rights and Childhood. London, Routledge American Academy of Pediatrics Task Force on Circumcision [AAP] (2012). “Technical Report”. Pediatrics 130 (3): e756–e785 Bagattini, A. (2014) “Child Well-Being and the Family-Dilemma”. In Bagattini, A., Macleod, C. (Ed.) The Nature of Children’s Well-Being: Theory and Practice, Dordrecht, Springer: 191-209. Benetar, M. Benetar, B. (2003) “Between Prophylaxis and Child Abuse: The Ethics of Neonatal Male Circumcision”. In The American Journal of Bioethics, Vol. 3(2): 35-48 Bowlby, J. (1990) A Secure Base, London, Basic Books Clayton, M. (2006) Justice and Legitimacy in Upbringing. Oxford, Oxford UP Conrad, P. (2007) The Medicalization of Society. Baltimore, Johns Hopkins University Press De Wispelaere, J., Weinstock D. (2014) “The Grounds and Limits of Parents’ Cultural Prerogatives: The Case of Circumcision. In Bagattini, A., Macleod, C. (Ed.) The Nature of Children’s Well-Being: Theory and Practice, Dordrecht, Springer: 247-62 Deutscher Bundestag [DB] (2012) Drucksache 17/11430, 08.11.2012, http://dip21.bundestag.de/ dip21/btd/17/114/1711430.pdf (access: 03.06.2014) Doyle, D. (2005) “Ritual male circumcision: a brief history”. The journal of the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh 35 (3): 279–285 Earp, D.E (2013) “The Ethics of Infant Male Circumcision”. In Journal of Medical Ethics 39(7): 418-20 Fleiss, P. M. (1997) “The Case Against Circumcision”. In Mothering: The Magazine of Natural Family Living, Winter: 36-45

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Fox, M. Thomson, M. (2010) “HIV/AIDS and Circumcision: Lost in Translation. In Journal of Medical Ethics 36: 798-801 Frisch, M., Lindholm, M., Grønbæk, M. (2011) ‟Male circumcision and sexual function in men and women: a survey-based, cross-sectional study in Denmark”. In: International Journal of Epidemiology, 40(5), S. 1367–1381, Ganiats, T.G., Humphrey, J.B.C., Taras, H.L., Kaplan, R.L. (1991) “Routine Neo-Natal Circumcision: A Cost-Utility Analysis”. In Medical Decision Making 11(4): 282-89 Glick, L.B. (2006) Marked in Your Flesh: Circumcision from Ancient Judea to Modern America. Oxford; Oxford UP Goldman, R. (1999) “The Psychological Effects of Circumcision”. In British Journal of Urology International, Vol. 83: 93-102 Hellsten, S.K. (2004) “Rationalising circumcision: from tradition to fashion, from public health to individual freedom—critical notes on cultural persistence of the practice of genital mutilation”. In The Journal of Medical Ethics, 30: 248-53 Hodges, F.M., Svoboda, F.S., Van Howe, R.S. (2002) “Prophylactic Interventions on Children: Balancing Human Rights with Public Health”. In Journal of Medical Ethics 28: 10-16 Jagannath, V.A., Fedorowicz, Z., Sud, V., Verma, A.K., Hajebrahimi, S. (2012) “Routine neonatal circumcision for the prevention of urinary tract infections in infancy”. In Fedorowicz, Zbys. Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews 11 Kim, H., Li, P.S., Goldstein, M., Howard, H., Goldstein, M. (2010) “Male circumcision: Africa and beyond?”. Current Opinion in Urology 20 (6): 515–9 Krieger, J.N., Mehta, S.D., Bailey, R.C., Agot, K., Ndinya-Achola, J.O., Parker, C., Moses, S. (2008) “Adult male circumcision: effects on sexual function and sexual satisfaction in Kisumu, Kenya”. In: The Journal of Sexual Medicine 5(11): 2610-22 Kim, D., Pang, M.G. (2007) “The effect of male circumcision on sexuality”. In BJU International, 99:619–22 Lang, D. P. (2013) “Circumcision, Sexual Dysfunction and the Child’s Best Interest: Why the Anatomical Details Matter”. In Journal of Medical Ethics, 39 (7): 429-431 Larke N.L., Thomas S.L., Dos Santos Silva I., Weiss H.A. (2011) “Male circumcision and penile cancer: a systematic review and meta-analysis”. Cancer Causes Control 22 (8): 1097–110 Lawler, F.H., Bisonni, R.S., Holtgrave, D.R. (1991) “Circumcision: A Decision-Analysis of its Medical Value”. In Family-Medicine 23(8): 587-93 Lissauer T., Clayden G. (2011) Illustrated Textbook of Paediatrics, Fourth edition. Elsevier. pp. 352–353. Mazor, J. (2013) “The Child’s Interests and the case for the Permissibility of Male infant Circumcision”. In Journal of Medical Ethics 39: 421-28 Money, J., & Davison, J. (1983) “Adult penile circumcision: Erotosexual and cosmetic sequelae”. In Journal of Sex Research, 19: 289-292 Nussbaum, M.C. (2000) Sex and Social Justice, Oxford, Oxford University Press Martha, M.C. (1999) Judging Other Cultures: The Case of Genital Mutilation. In: Sex and Social Justice. Oxford, Oxford University Press Payne, K., Thaler, L., Kukkonen, T., et al. (2007) “Sensation and sexual arousal in circumcised and uncircumcised men”. In Journal of Sexual Medicine, 4:667–74 Rawls, J. (2001) Justice as Fairness. Harvard, Harvard University Press Shelodon, M. (2003) “Male Circumcision, Religious Preferences, and the Question of Harm”. In The American Journal of Bioethics, Vol. 3(2), 61-62 Siegfried, N., Muller, M., Deeks, J.J., Volmink, J. (2009) “Male circumcision for prevention of heterosexual acquisition of HIV in men”. In Siegfried, Nandi. Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews (2)

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Svoboda, J.S. (2013) “Circumcision of Male Infants as a Human Rights Violation”. In Journal of Medical Ethics, 39: 469-74 Ungar-Sargon, E. (2013) “On the Impermissibility of Infant Male Circumcision: A Response to Joseph Mazor”. In Journal of Medical Ethics, online first Uthman, O.A, Popoola, T.A., Uthman, M.M, Aremu, O. (2010) “Economic evaluations of adult male circumcision for prevention of heterosexual acquisition of HIV in men in sub-Saharan Africa: a systematic review”. In Van Baal, Pieter H. M. PLoS ONE 5 (3): e9628 WHO (1997): Female genital mutilation. A Joint WHO/UNICEF/UNFPA Statement, Genf

Mar Cabezas

8 Children’s Mental Well-Being and Education1 8.1 Healthy Bodies and Healthy Minds: Why do Children Need Mental Well-Being? Health has been defined, from the last sixty years on, in an extensive sense, referring not only to the lack of diseases, but also to well-being. In fact, as it is well known, the World Health Organization defines health as a “state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity” (Official Record of the World Health Organization, 2, 100). In turn, well-being is not understood just as a lack of discomfort, but as a positive balance between negative and positive emotions, moods, thoughts and circumstances. This definition of health can surely be criticised in many ways, for it is too wide to be accomplished, especially if one thinks of the idea of a complete state of wellbeing. Concerning children and adolescents, how do we measure when it is complete and when not? And in general terms, how do we establish a difference between diseases, a lack of capacity or a syndrome? Is there an upper limit in relation to how much well-being is needed to accomplish the required complete state? Would there still be some kind of hierarchy, or should every element involved in health be treated simultaneously? This definition takes for granted that the boundary between a pathological state and a healthy state is clear, when in many cases it is fuzzy and socially constructed. However, beyond all the potential problems and despite its vagueness, it is still functional. In fact, the assumption of this extended idea of health as well-being shows 1) the recognition of the – in some ways – artificial nature of the boundary between body and mind, and 2) the fact that we have understood that mental or psychological well-being is not simply achieved by suppressing negative input, or suppressing psychological suffering, anxiety, etc., but generating positive thoughts, coping styles and emotions. In other words, the WHO’s notion of health as well-being tacitly assumes that we have realized that negative and positive emotions and moods are not a continuum so that diminishing our negative emotions and thoughts does not directly mean an increase in our positive ones (Zaccagnini, 2010, 64). On the contrary, (mental) well-being requires an extra effort. Hence, if one accepts health as a right for children and if one accepts that wellbeing is more than being able to survive and not suffering any kind of disease, then implicitly it means that we as western societies have decided that personal development is also important for children. And, as a result of it, if health is

1 This research was funded by the Austrian Science Fund (FWF), Project: P 26480-G15. © 2015 Mar Cabezas This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 License.

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understood as well-being, both physical and mental, as well as social, then it seems fair for our institutions to have the obligation to provide the tools to ensure the development of these areas and to take care of children’s physical and mental health. This is clear if we look at what has been done in the public sphere in relation to children’s physical well-being. We have health care systems, vaccine systems, children learn at school about the function of their organs and their body, they learn – and are encouraged to follow – some minimum hygienic routines, such as hand washing to avoid infections and, what is more, they are provided with specific time to develop and improve their physical well-being through specific hours of sport and physical education. In fact, these have been part of the school curriculum for a long time. Along with this, schools canteens are regularly improving their quality in order to offer healthy menus adapted to children’s nutritional needs, so that the care of children’s physical health in public institutions goes beyond the individual cases when they need to go hospitals, providing the necessary information, education and habits. Thus, children have other chances to be and become physically healthy – beyond the habits their families may have. However, when it comes to mental health or mental well-being, the picture drastically changes. No one thinks that a child’s autonomy is being overrun when she is encouraged to brush her teeth or when she is told to wash an apple before eating it. However, we tend to become suspicious if a public institution suggests any habit of mental health. The idea that mental well-being does not need to be supported and taught is simply not realistic. If one lets something grow without any kind of guidance, it can turn out to be as risky as building a highway without traffic signals. One could surely survive and drive on that highway, but the probability of having accidents will be higher than the probability you would have if some traffic signals had been established and you had been taught how to read them. Indeed, the result of putting children’s mental well-being in the hands of hazard is highly evident in western societies today. The number of children treated for psychological and behavioural disorders has increased over the last decades. In the UK, more than 20% of adolescents aged 11-19 have tried to harm themselves2. In the US between 20% and 16% of children were bullied by peers, and 6% of the surveyed teenagers admitted to have suffered cyberbullying (Finkelhor et al., 2000). Less than a decade later the percentage of teenagers bullied at school had increased to 28% (Hinduja & Patchin, 2010, 207), which implies the use of aggression by some of them as a way of interacting and also the increase of suicidal ideations from the victims’ side. In this sense, it is not surprising that “pessimism is fast becoming the typical way our children look at

2 See http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/7365192.stm and the Anorexia, Bulimia & Care Organisation: http://www.anorexiabulimiacare.org.uk/



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the world” (Seligman, 2007, 7). Maybe we should wonder what we are actively or passively doing wrong which allows some children and adolescents to collapse into themselves like that. Even if we only want healthy children in the physical narrow sense of the term, that is, children with no physical diseases, at some point we would also need to provide mental education to children, for the truth is that we are not compartmentalized beings: the way we think has an impact in our health. Think about the psychosomatic syndromes, the addictions, the connection between stress and dermatitis, depression and the weakening of the body’s immune system, or the defensive/aggressive styles of thinking and heart diseases. Hence, as far as our physical well-being is influenced by our mental one, it seems reasonable that we should see mental education as a key to children’s complete wellbeing.

8.2 Some Changes in our Educational Systems: Three Promising Attempts? At this point the question is what has been done so far in this respect. Over the last two decades many experts in psychology, pedagogy and education have claimed that our educational system should respond to children’s new needs and provide them with tools for their mental well-being. If our goal is ensuring children’s well-being in order to avoid the luck factor and minimise the weight of the families they are born in, then it means that we want more than well-informed children with nurtured bodies. We want children who can develop their own talents, overcome adversity and, to some extent, live the life they want to for themselves. Many, and most notably Kenneth Robison, criticize the obsolete way in which our traditional educational system is built and how it creates an arena contrary in many senses to children’s well-being, for it was not conceived to provide the tools to flourish, but to get good grades. The fact that schools are built like factories as a consequence of industrialism is commonly critiqued (Robinson & Aronica, 2009), following 19th-century assumptions that do not reflect the real world children are living in today, even less the future world where they will have to apply their knowledge and skills. In short, unless a child is prompted to become an expert in a certain field, in her adult life she would probably never need to use the set theory’s mathematic rules, but each and every child at some point of their lives will have to face a loss, will have to manage anger, frustration, anxiety or anguish, or simply they will have to interact with groups of people they do not particularly like. We are not seriously taught – beyond the common sense sayings – how to cope with rejection or how to build healthy self-esteem. In this same line, beyond the promotion of competition, the United Nations insists in its conventions

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related to children’s rights on the importance of providing a holistic and balanced education in peaceful and respectful societies.3 At the same time, the interest in emotional intelligence, creativity and positive psychology in the last two decades has generated a waterfall of data, surveys and methods, whose spirit is to improve children’s mental well-being and well-becoming. In what follows I will briefly expose the three main general attempts to include psychological education programs in school, as well as their main thesis and achievements concerning children’s mental well-being. These three big attempts are focused on different abilities depending on what is considered crucial to develop and ensure children’s mental well-being and also well-becoming. Obviously the prevention programmes focused on a concrete risk will not be taken into account here, for they are establish to prevent potential harmful situations and not to generate a complete state of mental well-being. Probably the most successful ones with children and adolescents would be a) emotional education programmes, b) cognitive programmes, and c) social and creativity education programmes. a) Emotional education programmes. These programmes are based on a great number of empirical studies on emotional intelligence and its different applications since the successful work developed by Salovey and Mayer (1990) in the early 90s. They are focused on developing children’s and adolescents’ emotional competence, that is, the recognition of emotions when they occur, the skill of recognising emotions in others and the ability to regulate one’s own moods, given the fact that the development of emotional intelligence skills is positively connected to healthier behaviour, which improves children’s relations and well-being (Weissberg & O’Brien, 2004). The first skill not only increases self-knowledge, it also gives children the time to reflect on what they are feeling and how whatever they are going through makes them feel, which is highly relevant when it comes to interaction and potential aggressiveness. There many different styles of application in schools, from the recognition of emotions in facial expressions and drawings to the reading of specifically created tales which adapted to different children’s levels, where the main task is not to remember the narrative sequence, but to explain a character’s actions. This kind of self-knowledge is important because often, children cannot give a name to what they are going through. In fact, it is very common for them to react with anger when they actually feel sad, given the frustration and the lack of abilities to solve certain circumstances that simply do not make them feel well.

3 See for instance the article 29 of the United Nations’ Convention on the Rights of the Child: “Children’s education should develop each child’s personality, talents and abilities to the fullest. It should encourage children to respect others, human rights and their own and other cultures. It should also help them learn to live peacefully, protect the environment and respect other people.”



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The second skill is strongly connected to empathy and its application in schools, based on the positive correlation between subjective well-being and positive interpersonal relationships (Rubin 1999). The development of the ability to put yourself in someone else’s shoes (empathy), or at least to understand how this person feels in his own shoes (cognitive empathy) opens a door to improving communication and understanding. Practising this skill seems to help reduce the use of aggression, the intention of manipulation, increase the will to help others, reduce passivity toward others’ suffering, and diminish discrimination.This is especially interesting in cases of violence between peers (Hoffman, 1987), simply because at those moments the aggressive person is not thinking about someone else’s suffering, but about his own situation (Mehrabian, 1996). The third skill these programmes work with, emotional regulation, deals with the ability to face adversity with humour, to change one’s mood, to avoid reacting in exaggerated manners, etc. (Salovey, 2001). In short, it deals with the reflection on our feelings and moods. Besides, this seems to have a direct impact on children’s mental well-being, for children whose parents are depressed or conflictive usually lack these kinds of abilities too; it seems that providing them with more adaptive strategies could give them better chances of reversing the lottery factor and the negative tools passed on to them by their parents. b) Cognitive programmes. Although many of these programmes are hybrids and may combine tools and methods from different approaches, another second general category of programmes could consist of those using a cognitive approach and positive psychology. These programmes try to restructure the negative way the child thinks about what happens to her, so that those thoughts will not generate a negative emotion. That is, the main scope of these kinds of programmes is to make children aware of the intermediate step between what happens to them and their emotional reaction. To be conscious of the difference between what you think and how you feel – and the feedback between them – ease to change ruminations, negative, pessimistic, self-centred, and dramatic thinking styles into more realistic and positive ones. In this sense these programmes are based on identifying the mental pattern we normally follow, the style of our inner dialogue, to identify all those assumptions and generalizations that will not help the children and could become a slippery slope to future depressions. “At school age”, affirms Seligman, “children begin to think about the causal skein of the world. They develop theories about why they succeed and why they fail. They develop theories about what, if anything, they can do to turn failure into success” (Seligman, 2007, 12). Assuming that the way we think about a problem is the key question, these cognitive programmes are focused on avoiding learnt helplessness in children and improving their resilience. Obviously, the negative ones are not pathological styles per se. One could live with them perfectly well, but one’s well-being would probably be very limited. The use of negative thinking styles as a child put you on the edge of becoming depressed

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once you have to face adversity in the future. In other words, as some studies show, optimistic mental styles work as protectors for children, both in the present and the future.4 As M. Seligman brilliantly explains, the goal of cognitive programmes is “psychological immunization”(2007, 5). Analogically to physical health, the goal is not to ensure that children will never face a problem or suffer, but that they will be vaccinated to overcome it the best way possible. c) Social and creativity education. Lastly, there is another growing group of programmes, many times related to the first one, that are centred on the role of art and creativity. These programmes of creative and social education try to enlighten children’s curiosity and encourage them to explore their own talents through different activities that simultaneously improve their interpersonal skills. Many times painting, music or theatre are used as a tool to learn something else, to interact with other children, to improve their self-esteem, their ability to see things differently, to push their limits and avoid learned helplessness, and to put themselves in someone else’s shoes. The idea is to connect art with emotional and social skills in order to improve children’s mental and social well-being. One of the many programs established in the last years is the Australian Songroom, a programme that develops disadvantaged children’s resilience through music5. These three interrelated attempts to improve children’s mental well-being in schools through new educative programmes share positive results in improving children’s behaviour and self-reported well-being. The three of them try to change emotional repression into emotional regulation in order to turn the current tendency of having “crystal glass” children into mentally flexible children. However, there are some limitations that may play against them as well as some challenges that these attempts still have to face. Some of the main obstacles against these attempts are related to how they are done. Firstly, although they are successful programmes with respect to the results that those children achieve, they are not successful in an institutional sense. If we look at our education systems, cognitive, emotional, social and creative programmes are not included in the official public school curricula, for they are still not universally accepted as part of that minimum that a child should learn in her school years. As a result of this lack of consensus, they are neither established transversally during the entire educational process, nor are they sufficiently coordinated. Hence, the lack of coordination of all these programmes even at a national level and their short extent mean that they – along with their positive results – are not likely to be to maintained in a long-term perspective, thus reducing their potential positive impact on children and the development of their complete mental and social well-being. Having too many

4 See Scheier & Carver (1987) and Sánchez & Méndez (2009). 5 See http://www.songroom.org.au



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experiments, too many programmes and lacking essential institutional agreements neither favours children, nor does it make these programmes completely credible in the public eye. Besides, the fact that they are often part of research projects means that the duration does not depend on the children’s needs, but rather on what is needed to compare the results of the methods through time, which also implies having control groups not following the programmes, as experimental procedure requires. This leads to another question, namely whether children should be part of these new attempts or whether we should wait to apply them until a general consensus is achieved. Analogically to the fact that we do not allow the food industry to test their new creations in children’s canteens before they have passed all the quality controls, maybe social, creativity and emotional intelligence programmes – elaborated and sometimes also applied by researchers – should not be applied in school until they are proven to reduce aggressiveness, instead of being applied in order to make sure that they are successful. Secondly, although schools demand these kinds of educational programmes and perceive the need for some solutions in this respect, as it has previously been said, the fast proliferation of surveys, tests and their direct application in schools may not be playing in their favour. The fact that the method a child will receive in this area will depend on the approach the professionals support (behavioural psychology, cognitive psychology, positive psychology, emotional intelligence, mindfulness, etc.) does not help to establish some minimum bases of what should be done in public institutions with respect to children’s mental well-being. As a result, the information a child will receive in this area will depend on the school’s interest and the programmes they are offered. This is probably due to the youth of these emotional and positive approaches. At the same time, psychology as a science is also a very young discipline, so that these programmes have also to face the difficulty of meeting the requirements we sometimes expect. Thirdly, they entail other problems concerning teachers. Teachers, in turn, should also acquire the required skills to apply them and improve children’s mental wellbeing, or at least not to hurt it. To make the results of these programmes long-lasting, the techniques applied in them – such as positive talking, positive reinforcement, no generalizations and personal judgements toward the students – should be adopted transversally by every teacher, regardless of the subject they are teaching. Otherwise, they will not be so different from the traditional temporal prevention programmes and extra activities that a school may provide. In this sense, a serious debate between institutions, researchers and teachers should be the first step in order to ensure children’s mental well-being in schools in a positive sense, beyond the pathological one (a lack of mental diseases). As some authors defend, “the paediatrician’s biological child has nothing to do with the psychologist’s scientific child” (Cyrulnic, 2009, 7), which entails a serious problem if one defends a holistic view of children’s well-being. However, these programmes imply other philosophical problems and challenges one should be aware of.

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8.3 Psychology and Ethics in Mental Well-Being: Before a How You Need a What One of the reasons why these programmes are not completely successful may lie in the euphoric way they have been established. The euphoria with which emotional, social and creativity programmes have been developed and applied, as if they were the new panacea, is at risk of playing a role against them and losing the perspective needed with respect to their limits and assumptions when applied to children. Teachers, psychologists, social workers along with other experts demand some answers with respect to depression, aggression, demotivation etc., among children and young adolescents. However, the main answers have forgotten one side of the problem, i. e., the ethical one. If some children and adolescences feel miserable, act irresponsibly or use violence to solve problems, it is not only a question of behaviour and psychology, but also a question of ethics and values, of autonomy and responsibility, which seem to be two ignored ingredients of mental well-being programmes. Why and when have we decided that children’s mental well-being should only be in the hands of psychologists? The defenders of the emotional intelligence approaches normally quote Aristotle as a mentor for their purpose when he stated: “to become angry belongs to everyone and is an easy thing, as is also giving and spending money; but to whom [one ought to do so], how much, when, for the sake of what, and how – these no longer belong to everyone nor are easy” (Aristotle, 2011, 40). However, deciding how we should get angry is not a psychological question, but rather a normative one, a question of values (Nussbaum, 2001). It entails an idea of what we consider good, tolerable, acceptable and fair toward others. It is a question of moral reciprocity (Ignatieff, 1999), not a technical one. Psychology, as a science, is a formal knowledge: it only tells you how to achieve something, but it does not tell you where you should go or what you should achieve. Firstly you need to know what you should do (normativity). Secondly, you can explore what methods are the best to get there (psychology). If children are only taught the second part without making any explicit reference to the first one or if they are taught unconnectedly, they lose part of the picture. They are two faces on the same coin, both needed for children’s holistic mental well-being. Hence, to turn psychologists into the new priests may also be a mistake if we want to ensure that we have autonomous generations, if we accept that autonomy is basic for mental well-being. The purpose of these programmes is a question of values and actually these programmes are carried out whilst taking some values for granted. But this is something that we should make explicit, for they are not applied as aseptic methods. To teach children the cognitive, behavioural and emotional ways that lead us to behave in a non-violent way does not say anything about the fact that we believe that we should respect other people. But in fact these programmes are constructed assuming a culture of human rights, which is not openly mentioned. When they



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teach to solve problems “ecologically” – meaning by this without causing any harm to others or to oneself as one of the key rules – they are tacitly assuming a human rights ethic. Psychology and these programmes do not help children be autonomous if they do not tell them that they assume certain values as nonnegotiable; for instance, that violence is not allowed under any circumstance as a way to solve problems with classmates. Hence, children’s mental well-being will again be in someone else’s hands if they are not simultaneously taught to develop some ethical and critical thinking. If the values we assume and encourage to improve children’s mental well-being are not openly specified, discussed and eventually internalized by them, a child or a teenager from a conflictive area, such as Ceuta,6 may lack the tools to distinguish between the release and well-being he experiences in a creativity programme where he can develop his talents, socialize and deliver his daily tensions, and a meeting of young members of a fundamentalist cell where he is also encouraged, where his self-esteem is boosted and where he can easily feel part of a group. As a consequence, critical tools are also essential for children’s mental well-being in order to avoid manipulation and to teach them to take care of their own mental well-being and wellbecoming. If we want to teach children to regulate their emotional states, to be less aggressive toward peers etc., it means that we have decided that it is better to live in a society where other human beings are respected. But if this essential statement is not made openly and publicly in connection to the emotional intelligence programme, then we will be teaching how to obtain certain results by applying certain methods which could be used to either generate better relationships or to manipulate others in a more sophisticated way. Additionally, if a teenager with family problems ends up using violence toward a peer at school, seeing him as a scapegoat, and has the chance to start training his emotional intelligence skills as previously suggested, he would probably be less aggressive and may give up violence as a tool to interact with others. However, this does not mean that he feels better or that his well-being is restored, nor that he has solved the conflicts that led him to use violence. It may be true that positive states of mind make us more benevolent towards others and less aggressive. Teaching children to generate positive states of mind without making any reference to why the others deserve respect could lead to children acting correctly because it is convenient for them, because they have understood that violence disadvantages them in the interpersonal arena, but not due to any recognition towards others, which may not be the goal of complete mental well-being.

6 Ceuta, a Spanish territory in Morocco, has recently been the perfect scenario – due to the intercultural conflicts and the negative socio-economical environment – to recruit and train teenagers under 18 to commit suicide attacks for the Syrian jihadist movement. See http://www.bbc.com/news/worldeurope-22999619.

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In short, emotional intelligence needs a moral criterion. Think now about the first trained skill; learning to recognise emotional reactions. However, imagine that you find yourself reacting with disgust when you see at a friend’s party that he has invited a gipsy couple. You may be able to realise that you have a strong reaction and to identify disgust without confusing it with anger. You may know perfectly well that disgust implies a fear of being contaminated by the input that generated the reaction and that for that reason you avoid interacting with them. You may then be conscious of your xenophobic reaction, but this alone does not imply that you will change or that you would review your own beliefs, unless your moral criteria tell you that this is a non-tolerable belief. Likewise, you will not be prompted to empathize with someone if firstly you do not consider her as an equal on some level, if you are not minimally concerned about what happens to the other person. Without an ethical education, without a debate on moral criteria, one child can end up like Huckleberry Finn after letting his slave friend scape, namely without knowing why he has acted against what he considered the best decision and why he has felt that he could not deliver his AfroAmerican friend to the local authorities. Finally, think now about the cognitive and positive psychology programmes. Surely it is fundamental to know the different ways in which our minds interpret reality and the different mental maps and coping styles. Probably this will reinforce our critical sense and will help us see things differently before coming to a conclusion, especially once we are adults. However, with respect to children, if we just teach and practice the positive and optimistic mental maps without making any reference to values we could be reinforcing both good and wrong goals. If one just makes children see how biased the generalisation of “I will never be able to succeed, I always fail at everything I try” is, without saying anything else about the content, we will be encouraging a music student to practise the new piano lesson, and a juvenile offender who failed in his last attempt to steal at the grocery to try again. Likewise, many of these programmes are focused on being able to distinguish the environmental input, our thoughts about it and our emotional reaction, that is, what happens, and how we evaluate it with respect to our expectations, goals, etc. This is positive as long as it can teach children that it is not the others’ behaviour that annoys you, but your expectations toward them and your desire to be treated differently. However, this can be dangerous if a child has self-esteem problems and does not feel she deserves to be treated well. If children lack a criterion of what should not be acceptable, it may turn out to be a subtle way of maintaining the status quo. In short, sending the message that is not the others who make you suffer, but your thoughts about a given situation will of course diminish anxiety and anger and will make a child feel relieved. It will surely help her not to dramatize in certain circumstances, but when applied to others, it can be detrimental, creating very conformist children and adults. If your ballet teacher treats your group with



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rude manners, insults the girls who learn slower and even humiliate your friends, and one of the girls – lacking positive coping styles – cries and tells her mother what normally happens at ballet classes, probably the school will be aware of the teaching methods of the ballet teacher and will do something about it. On the contrary, if all the girls are trained to generate their own positive moods, to change negative thoughts into positive ones and to be optimistic, they will probably not complain about the teacher and, as a result, we may not be helping them – as children in particular in asymmetrically vulnerable situations – to recognise a problem or a potential harmful interaction, not even being aware of the unfairness that they are being exposed to, which is another kind of helplessness. Of course, optimism will protect them, but they will be tolerating behaviour in interpersonal relationships that should not be tolerated and could end up becoming used to living with those kinds of relations. In this sense, the development of self-esteem and optimism should also be connected to the idea of what you deserve, and not only to lifeguard mental styles. The same would happen if a child who lives in an abusive family environment was trained with these patterns. We may be putting that child in an even more invisible place, especially for those children living in borderline private situations that are neither criminal nor positive for children. Luckily, that child would have an emotional outlet through optimism, creativity and humour if she is part of one of those programmes, but this is only a temporary lifeguard, not the guarantee for children’s complete mental well-being. Cognitive psychologists tend to quote Epictetus’ words as a role model when he wrote that “men are disturbed not by the things which happen, but by the opinions about the things. (…) When we are impeded, or disturbed, or grieved, let us never blame others, but ourselves – that is, our opinions” (Epictetus, 2005, 8). However, they tend to forget that Epictetus was a slave, an adult and a stoic with no intention of fighting for his rights as a human being. Basically, he was speaking a different moral language when compared to the current human rights culture. Someone should confirm to that child that the situation she is living in is simply wrong and that she deserves otherwise. In other words, the optimistic patterns are indeed useful in stressful and emergency situations as protective lifeguards, but we cannot forget to give children the tools to recognise a broken ship and the tools for building safe ones as adults. Mental well-being has to do with being able to recognise, change or escape from a hurtful situation and not only to mentally survive it. The reformulation of negative experiences or irreversible situations thanks to positive mental coping styles may be good for SOS situations and also as a way of providing some perspective to highly demanding children who can easily feel frustrated, but we should be aware of the fact that pushing too much in one direction only can end in turning tyrannical, unhappy children into passive conformist ones, swinging from one extreme to another.

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8.4 Conclusion If children’s mental well-being is understood in positive terms, beyond a lack of pathologies, discomfort or anguish, then mental education should also be seen in positive terms, beyond ensuring the lack of suffering and negative patterns, making explicit and also cultivating the values that contribute to generating children’s mental well-being. Thus, moral, philosophical and emotional (or psychological) education should be planned in an interconnected way, combining the key structure and the contents of mental well-being. If we believe that democratic, respectful societies are better for humans’ well-being, we cannot forget to offer children an holistic education in that direction. Hence attitudes but also moral character should be part of those education plans in order to make children autonomous and responsible and, as a consequence, to provide them with all the tools needed to achieve complete mental well-being.

References Aristotle, 2011. Nicomaquean Ethics, London: Cambridge University Press. Cyrulnik, Boris. 2009. Resilience. Penguin Books. London 2009. Epictetus, 2005. Enchiridion and Selections from the Discourses of Epictetus, translated by George Long. 2005, Stilwell: Digireads. Finkelhor, David et al, 2000. Online victimization. A report on the nation´s youth, US: Department of Education and ERIC. Hinduja, Samer & Patchin, Justin W., 2010. “Bullying, cyberbulling, and suicide”, Archives of suicide research, 14: 206-221. Hoffman, Martin L. 1987: “The contribution of empathy to justice and moral judgment” in Empathy and its development, edited by Nancy Steinberg and Janet Strayer, New York: Cambridge University Press.pp. 47-80. Ignatieff, Michael. 1999. “Human Rights: The midlife crisis”. The New York review of books, 46 (9), 58-62. Mehrabian, Albert. 1996. “Relations among personality scales of aggression, violence and empathy: validational evidence bearing on the Risk of eruptive violence scale”. Aggressive behavior, 23, 433-445. Nussbaum, Martha C. 2001: The fragility of goodness: Luck and Ethics in Greek Tragedy and Philosophy, New York: Cambridge University Press. Robinson, Kenneth & Aronica, Lou, 2009. The element. How finding your passion changes everything. London: Pinguin. Rubin, M. M. 1999. Emotional intelligence and its role in mitigating aggression: a correlational study of the relationship between emotional intelligence and aggression in urban adolescents. Pennsylvania: Immaculata College. Salovey, Peter. 2001. “Applied emotional intelligence: Regulating emotions to become healthy, wealthy, and wise, in J. Ciarrochi, J. P. Forgas & J. D. Mayer (eds.), Emotional Intelligence in Everyday Life. New York: Psychology Press. 168-184. Salovey, Peter, Mayer, John. D., 1990. “Emotional Intelligence”. Cognition and Personality, 89, 185-211.

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Sánchez, Óscar, Méndez, Francisco X. 2009. “El optimismo como factor protector de la depresión infantil y adolescente”. Clínica y Salud, 20(3), 273-280. Scheier, Michael; Carver, Charles. 1987. “Dispositional optimism and physical well-being: the influence of generalized outcome expectancies on health”. Journal of Personality, 55, 169- 210. Seligman, Martin E. P., [1995] 2007. The optimistc child: A proven program to safeguard children against depression and build lifelong resilience, New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. Weissberg, Roger P. & O’Brien, M. U. (2004). “What works in school-based social and emotional learning programs for positive youth development”. Annals AAPSS, 591, 86-97. Zaccagnini, José L., 2010. “Amistad y bienestar psicologico. El papel de los amigos C”, Encuentro en psicología social. Monográfico homenaje a Alfredo Fierro, 5 (1), 63-72.

Matteo D’Emilione, Giovannina Giuliano & Paloma Vivaldi Vera

9 Will Children of Social Care Services Users be Future Users? Results of a Pilot Research in Rome

“What opportunities children have today and will have tomorrow, in line with what they can be reasonably expected to want, is a matter of public policy and social programmes” (A. Sen, 2006)

9.1 Introduction Ahid emigrated from Egypt almost 20 years ago. He is an occasional worker in the construction industry, passionate about philosophy. He told us that one day the eldest of his five daughters expressed the desire to have a school diary. Ahid would have done anything for his children’s happiness, but he could not find anything for less than 15 Euros, a sum he couldn’t afford. Later he found a diary that cost 7 Euros; it was not like the classic school notebook, but, he thought, would do just the same. We do not know whether his daughter liked the notebook, what we know is that Ahid is a father who tries to satisfy his children’s needs. We don’t know how this kind of father’s attention may have affected the child’s well-being (if not by asking the child himself), but we believe that parents’ actions and perceptions can be a good proxy for understanding the type of family environment children live in and how beneficial it is to their well-being. This paper illustrates some results of a primary data collection survey on the poverty of social care services users in a district of Rome, with a specific focus on households with children1. The research is based on an original model of multidimensional analysis of poverty that considers a broad set of life domains (house, community, health, emotions, knowledge, income). This model, called MACaD (Multidimensional Analysis of Capability Deprivation) was developed within the theoretical framework of the Capability Approach (A. Sen, 1979, 1997, 2007 and M. Nussbaum, 2000, 2011) and is focused on the measurement of the degree of individually achieved functioning in each life domain with respect to the possession of tangible and intangible goods according to a specific multidimensional index2. The aim is then to understand whether through a multidimensional analysis of the individuals/parents’ deprivation degree in terms of capabilities, it is possible to

1 The survey was developed in full cooperation with local administration, according to a specific agreement between our organisation (ISFOL) and the Social Services Department of District 10. 2 “Multidimensional approach to an analysis of individual deprivation: the M.a.c.a.d. model and the results of empirical investigation”, Forum for social economics, forthcoming. © 2015 Matteo D’Emilione, Giovannina Giuliano & Paloma Vivaldi Vera This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 License.

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effectively identify potentially hazardous situations for children. At the same time, we are well aware of how important it is to detect not only the so-called ‘risk factors’ connected to specific family or child characteristics (disability/longstanding illness, depression, longstanding poverty etc), but also promoting and protective factors (parents’ higher qualification level, social support, safe neighbourhood). This perspective takes into account the insights of some interesting studies which have demonstrated that the exposure of children to multiple risk factors can impact significantly on a number of results in terms of well-being and development of the child (Jones, Gutman, Platt 2013). Furthermore, we wish to contribute to the debate on how to measure multiple risks. As pointed out by R. Sabates and S. Dex in ‘Multiple risk factors in young children’s development’: “While there are discussions in the literature about how best to measure some individual risk factors, there are fewer considerations of how to measure multiple risks” (6).

The title of this paper therefore raises a provocative question that probably cannot be given a precise answer, but which could be useful in stimulating an accurate reflection on the future of children living in disadvantaged conditions, and the determinants of their well-being. To begin with, we must take into account the pressing nature of issues like the exposure of children to severe deprivation and social exclusion in Italy. According to UNICEF (Innocenti Report Card n.11, 2013), Italy is at the bottom of the list of advanced economies with regard to four out of five dimensions of children’s well-being: material well-being, health and safety, education, housing and environment3. The situation has significantly worsened compared to the same survey conducted in 2007 (Innocenti Report Card 7, 2007). Consistently with the UNICEF evidence, the latest data from ISTAT (the Italian National Statistics Institute) describe a situation in which families with children are more exposed in terms of relative poverty and are at risk of poverty and social exclusion (the potential poor): more than 16% of families with two children are poor in relative terms (13.5% of those with one child), over 40% of single-parent families and 46% of those with three or more children are at risk of poverty. Obviously, a low degree of education as well as unemployment are the two aspects that have the greatest impact in determining these situations. Although our survey is very context-specific and focuses on a specific target population (social care services users), it represents a good starting point to capture (dynamic) aspects of people’s lives, which are otherwise difficult to detect. The focus on households with children represents a development of our work, since we realized

3 The study ranks 29 developed countries according to the overall well-being of their children.

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that almost 60% of our sample is composed of families with at least one child and almost 30% of the families with children are single-mother households. From here the intention is to understand more thoroughly the differences between households with children and those without children, and what implications this might have in terms of policy intervention at local level. Moreover, as will be shown below, it allows us to face three fundamentally related issues regarding people’s well-being (or deprivation): “the recognition of the fundamental diversity of human beings” (Sen, 1979); the heterogeneity of situations, even in very select groups of people; the different ways people react (or don’t react) to difficulties. The paper is divided into three sections: the first one presents our Macad model and how it can be used in the analysis of the environment a child lives in; the second one focuses on the context in which the field survey has been developed and some of the results obtained; the last one tries to suggest how local policy can enhance the wellbeing of families with children.

9.2 MACAD Rationale: How the Model Works and How it Could be Developed Our model is based on the operationalization of the concept of functioning defined as “a state of being and doing” (Sen, A.K., 1993). This ‘state’ refers to an individual condition lived in a given time and characterized by a system of actions and relationships affected by cognitive, psychological and physical aspects. It refers to the perception of a problem and the way the individual deals with it. As a matter of fact, measuring capabilities means being able to measure the real freedom of people to choose between different functionings (or, in other words, between different kinds of lifestyles): in order to have a complete set of information on the substantive freedom and opportunities of individuals we needed a more specific survey that was complex to run, considering its direct relation to the concept of freedom. With regard to the selection of the list of individual life domains, we took into account the perspectives of both Sen and Nussbaum and chose not only those most directly linked to basic needs (food, health, housing, income, education), but also to thought, emotions, affiliation, etc. The choice of life domains was based on a broad literature review and on our experience over the years, which demonstrated that the selected domains were appropriate for our specific target group4.

4 It is worth noting that in the first pilot project conducted in 2010, at the end of the questionnaire, respondents were asked to assign a weight to each life domain according to its importance in leading a decent life.



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The following list describes the life domains considered and their definition in terms of capabilities: 1. Living in a house: being able to manage the house and bear costs, cleaning it and keeping it in order 2. Generating income: being able to manage and improve income sources 3. Being part of a community: being able to have a good relationship with the environment, maintaining relationships with friends and neighbours and participating in community life 4. Developing skills, improving education: being able to improve one’s educational and/or professional level, having the improvement of one’s education level as a life goal and being able to implement actions that are consistent with this goal 5. Being healthy: being able to take care of one’s own health, avoiding risk-taking behaviour. 6. Expressing emotions: general psychological well-being, ability to express positive and negative emotions, being empathic, being able to cope with difficulties and manage stress, self-efficacy perception.5 Each life domain is described by two types of indicators: a. status indicators that represent the availability of tangible and intangible resources and the availability of conversion factors6; b. functioning indicators that represent the degree of vitality of a functioning (between the two extreme polarities of ‘achieved’ and ‘not-achieved’). Furthermore, the central role that agency plays in determining the full achievement of a functioning should be stressed. As Croker and Robeyns (2010) highlight, citing some passages of A. K. Sen’s book Development as Freedom: With the concept of agency, however, Sen (1999: 11,53, 281) signals an “agent-oriented view” in which individuals and groups should decide these matters for themselves, “effectively shape their own destiny and help each other” (Sen 1999: 11), and be “active participant[s] in change, rather than...passive and docile recipient[s] of instructions or of dispensed assistance”. (Sen 1999: 281)

5 Our interest in subjective factors such as emotions, effectiveness, self-respect was inspired by Nussbaum and the OPHI work that identified five ‘missing dimensions’ (quality of work, empowerment, physical security, ability to live without shame, psychological well-being). For more information: www.ophi.org.uk 6 Those factors that influence the relation between the possession of a good and the achievement of certain functionings (Crocker and Robeyns 2009, p. 68).

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Thus, according to our model, assessing the level of deprivation in terms of capabilities means not only detecting whether an individual lives in a disadvantaged area/ neighbourhood (according to his/her perception about crimes or pollution), but also whether he/she has tried to solve the perceived problems, alone or with other people. The concept of agency, as defined by Sen, is a useful ‘tool’ in order to understand such a process. Our model is based on a multidimensional index which takes into account binary variables (‘1’ means deprivation; ‘0’ means no deprivation) that contribute to building the two types of indicators already mentioned7: status and functioning indicators. The general index consists of 28 status indicators and 20 functioning indicators (see Annex A). The interactions between these two types of indicators generate four different living conditions (fig.1) represented by four quadrants (A, B, C, D).

Figure 9.1: ‘Living conditions in a capabilities space’

7 The index is intended to highlight several poverty dimensions and is based on the “counting approach” (Atkinson 2003), developed among others by Alkire and Foster (2007) and Bossert, Chakravarty and D’Ambrosio (2009).



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The vertical axis represents the level of functioning achievement and the horizontal axis represents the availability of goods and conversion factors: 1. Quadrant A. Individuals have material and intangible resources in order to cope with difficulties. It means that social care services users could have the resources to come out from a social exclusion situation; 2. Quadrant B. Individuals are depressed in terms of availability of commodities but not in terms of functionings. It means that, as an example, if adverse or unexpected events (illness, divorce, loss of income, etc.) occur they can cope with it in a positive way; 3. Quadrant C. Individuals are depressed both in terms of functionings and availability of commodities and conversion factors. This is the worst condition where individuals lack of any type of resources, with fewer opportunities to change their social exclusion condition; 4. Quadrant D. Individuals are depressed in terms of functionings but not in terms of availability of commodities. It means that no material deprivation and a low agency level could coexist.

9.2.1 From the Capability Approach to Ecological Systems Theory: the Child at the Centre of the Development Process In a survey on poverty and deprivation with a focus on households with children, it is of fundamental importance to understand which are the effective resources available, what is the quality of close family relationships and what type of social relationships the family has, in order to draw attention to the protective and risk factors to which the child is potentially exposed. Indeed, serious and persistent existential crises involve the entire family and, at the same time, crucial family processes influence the recovery and resilience of all members, their relationships and family unity. In some critical life events, such as housing and economic difficulties following job loss of one or more members, the large and emotional burden of a disabled or chronically sick family member, poverty or immigration, what seems to be crucial is the quality of emotional ties and mutual interconnections inside and outside the family. The quality of close relationships within the family is the result of several factors, among others: the ability to provide empathetic support, the way different roles are perceived and played, rules and clear boundaries, the quality and quantity of time spent together. But also the quality of relationships outside the family is connected to a plurality of levels: the informal relationship network (family, friends, neighbours) and the formal relationship network (school, social services, associations). These internal and external relationships are highly interdependent: for example, the lack of internal cohesion may be related to a lack of relationships with the outside and,

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conversely, the quality of relationships that the family is able to establish with the outside, seems to be an indicator of positive and supportive internal relationships. In this regard, it is useful to briefly mention the main points of some of the developmental theories which can support the idea of the importance for each individual to live in a supportive environment, from childhood onwards. This promotes maturity, a sense of security, ability to cope with difficult situations, resilience and prevents psychopathology or social maladjustment. Winnicott, one of the leading exponents of the theory of object relations, can provide valuable support in this regard. He stresses the importance of having a good enough mother in order to have a healthy development. To him the “good enough mother” is a mother who adapts to meet an infant’s needs and can healthily dissipate her adaptations from the results of her child’s frustrations and its ability to cope with what it may perceive as her failures. The “good-enough mother” (Winnicott, 1964) and a good-enough holding environment contribute to ascertaining healthy development and this area of experience promotes an infant’s ability to then enter into a relationship between itself and its external world. Thus it is these environmental factors which can influence an infant’s acquisition of a healthy mental well-being, but if these are not employed during the early developmental stages, some form of psychopathology may occur (Joshi, 2008). Bowlby’s attachment theory builds on Winnicott’s theory and emphasizes the fact that early relationships with caregivers play a major role in child development and continue to influence social relationships throughout life. Bowlby devoted extensive research to the concept of attachment, describing it as a “lasting psychological connectedness between human beings” (Bowlby, 1969, p. 194). He shared the psychoanalytic view that early experiences in childhood have an important influence on development and behaviour later in life. Our early attachment styles are established in childhood through the infant/caregiver relationship. In addition to this, Bowlby believed that attachment had an evolutionary component; it aids in survival. “The propensity to make strong emotional bonds to particular individuals is a basic component of human nature” (Bowlby, 1988, 3). But while these theories are based on the dyadic or triadic mother-father-child relationship, over the past thirty years, many studies have been developed on the conditions that foster human development, linking the evolution of the individual to a progressively extended systemic dimension (intrapersonal, interpersonal, emotional, environmental, historical, cultural, socio-political). Bronfenbrenner, was one of the authors who most influenced the research on these issues, documenting the systemic interconnections that link individual development with the social context he lives in. His main thesis is that the possibilities for growth, development and well-being do not depend on a single cause, but rather on a complex network of environmental factors (micro-, meso-, exo-and macro-systems), which include individuals with their



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specific biological and psychological structure, environment, group, culture, society (Bronfenbrenner, 1979). This theoretical approach has many similarities with the A. Sen capability approach (CA), which is the framework used to conduct this survey. According to Sen, in fact, human beings are distinguished by three different dimensions: their personal and structural characteristics, external circumstances (environment) they encounter and their abilities to transform resources into functionings, which are appropriate to build their well-being. To achieve functionings constituting wellbeing, the individual must meet contexts that will give him a real freedom to grow or to compensate for any shortfall. This is even more relevant for the child, who is considered to be at the centre of a development process in close interaction with other important agents such as family, school, etc. Such agents and the continuous and dynamic interaction with the child re-shape the potential capability set and can enhance (or restrict) the range of possible functionings for children (Biggeri, Santi 2012). In fact, as Sen has underlined “while exercising your own choices may be important enough for some types of freedoms, there are a great many other freedoms that depend on the assistance and actions of others and the nature of social arrangements” (2007, p.9). This is why in this survey we will first analyse the microsystem, the small, immediate environment the child lives in; any immediate relationships or organizations they interact with, such as their family, school, neighbourhood. How these groups or organizations interact with the child will have an effect on how the child grows; the more encouraging and nurturing these relationships and places are, the better the child will be able to develop.

9.3 Families’ Capabilities and Children’s Well-being: Results of Empirical Investigation Before going into details of the survey results, it is appropriate to highlight some aspects of the context in which the survey was carried out. The survey took place in Rome’s District n.10, a peripheral urban area with constant population growth (230,000 inhabitants) and a foreign population which has doubled over the last decade (from 5% in 2000 to 10% in 2010). The District’s Social Care Services Department supports almost 2000 new individuals and the staff is composed of 22 social workers who have approximately 100 new social service users each year. This figure is of great interest since the average time of takeover is more than two years, thus stressing the social services system and human resources dedicated to it. Again, almost 30% of the budgetary resources are dedicated to interventions for children, however, they belong largely to the category of what we can call ‘reactive programmes’ and only in a few cases to the category of ‘prevention programmes’. As a matter of fact, the most requested service is economic

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assistance in order to deal with unexpected expenses (medical expenses, bills, rent/ mortgage), with an indicative annual per capita expenditure of just 200 euro. During the survey, 570 valid assisted completion questionnaires were collected. The questionnaire, consisting of 108 questions, was divided into six areas (one for each life domain plus a registry) and was anonymous. As already mentioned at the beginning of our paper, we try to analyse children’s well-being indirectly, considering the parents’ perspective. In order to make our analysis more complete and effective, we are going to develop the discussion in two main directions: the first one, comparing the parents’ situation and the situation of individuals without children (the two sub groups of our sample) according to our model; the second one, taking into account some features of the local institutional context in order to understand if and how institutions can affect parents’ well-being and children’s well-being. Some features of our (not representative) sample must be highlighted: as far as the educational level is concerned, approximately 46% of surveyed parents have a middle school level, 45% have a diploma (secondary school level) and about 9% have a degree. The situation is not significantly different from respondents without children, except for the fact that the latter have a much higher percentage of primary school diplomas (over 20%). Therefore, along with a significant share of parents with a particularly low education level, there are some parents with a high education level. Again, according to our results, parents with a low education level are twice as likely to be in the most deprived situation. With regard to the parents’ employment status only 27% of respondents have a permanent job (only 17% have a full-time job) and about 34% are unemployed. Therefore, job insecurity and unemployment are two distinctive features of sampled households. It is useful to present some evidence of the households’ material deprivation: 70% of families with children cannot afford even a one-week vacation during the year; 18% state having difficulties getting a balanced diet during the week; 18% state not being able to heat the house adequately; 78% state that their income is not high enough to satisfy the household’s needs; nearly 60% would have difficulty coping with an unexpected expense of €200. Finally, with regard to health status, two significant aspects should be highlighted: first, 80% of parents state that they are in good health (much higher than families with no children, 52%); secondly, 26% of parents state that there is one family member with health problems. Within the latter case, 10% are families with disabled children. We are going to present now how our model and the multidimensional index can help us represent and analyse the situation of families with and without children (see fig.2).



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Figure 9.2: ‘Social services users with children’

This figure represents the general situation of the families with children, all domains considered. People are distributed over four quadrants representing four possible conditions generated by our model as already explained in the previous paragraph. The axes represent the mean values of ​​ the two categories of indicators considered (status and functioning) and the individual’s situation gets worse when moving away from the origin (0). The maximum values of ​​ deprivation both in terms of functioning achievement and status are therefore represented by the extremes of the cartesian axes (Y=16 and X=25). As we can see in the next figure, the situation of individuals without children is quite different. As is made quite clear by the two figures is that the distribution of the two sub groups is quite different: the share of individuals without children in quadrant C (worst situation) is greater than the other group, and families with children in quadrant A (best situation) are relatively more than the other category (43.8% 29.6%). Although it may seem unexpected, we can therefore assume that families with children are better off than those without children. This seems to be enhanced by an additional aspect: the average degree of deprivation in terms of functioning achievement is higher in the group of individuals without children. In the first case the group is deprived on average in 8 indicators out of 16 (6 out of 16 in the second

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Figure 9.3: ‘Social service users with no children’

group). As far as the status indicators are concerned, the situation appears almost the same: the average is 11 in the first group and 10 in the second. We can argue that the main difference between the two subgroups is determined by the level of functioning achievement and then agency perhaps plays an important role in this. However, the result that is more striking in absolute terms is the one regarding the 30% of families with children exposed to multiple forms of capabilities deprivation. What happens if we move from an aggregated picture to a disaggregated one by decomposing our index? The next table shows the distribution of the two sub groups for each domain considered:



Families’ Capabilities and Children’s Well-being: Results of Empirical Investigation 

Figure 9.4: ‘Aggregated and disaggregated distribution’

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The content of the table allows us to develop a more complex analysis, showing the difference between the general distribution and the disaggregated one: we can detect the domains that most influence and affect the general distribution. As a matter of fact, focusing the attention on quadrants A and C (where most of our sub groups are concentrated) we can point out some peculiar aspects related to three dimensions: living in a house, being part of a community and expressing emotions (some of the most interesting results concerning the other three dimensions were reported at the beginning of this chapter). With regard to the domain ‘living in a house’, it is possible to point out how 38% of the population (within the two sub groups) is placed in quadrant C. Thus, according to our model, poor housing conditions are crucial in explaining deprivation of individuals in greatest need. Two indicators explain this result: the type of ownership of the house and the cost of rent or mortgage with respect to the available income. As a matter of fact, most of the social services users in our survey live in rented houses or pay a mortgage and have to spend more than 30% of their (low) income on affording these expenses. Concerning the domain ‘Being part of a community’, it is possible to highlight that on average more than 30% of our sample is very deprived both in terms of functioning indicators and status indicators. Most of the indicators developed within this domain relate to the research field of neighbourhood effects on people’s well-being (also children’s well-being) which takes into account issues like: child and family-related institutions, social organization and interaction, normative environment and labour and marriage markets (Pebley, Sastry 20038). According to our survey results, less than a quarter of families with children claim to have little access to libraries, theatres, cinemas, parks, etc. About 30% perceive as critical issues those related to pollution, crime, noise, dirt and slightly less than 60% of families with children cannot find a solution to these problems even though they would like to. With regard to households’ social relationships, if almost 80% perceive their family environment as positive and supportive, on the other side, 67% of households with children under the age of 12 rarely or never spend time with their own family, neighbours and friends. These figures reflect poor external relatedness, which could lead to social exclusion. Regarding the domain ‘Expressing emotions’, although a significant share of people is not severely deprived (more than 40% of respondents in each sub group are in quadrant A), it is interesting to highlight that there is a marked difference in the distribution of quadrant C. The group of individuals with no children is more

8 On the same subject see also: Coulton, Korbin, Su, ‘Measuring Neighborhood Context for young children in an urban area’, American Journal of Community Psychology, Vol. 24 n.1, 1996 – Sampson, Morenoff, Rowley ‘Assessing ‘Neighborhood Effects’: social process and new directions in research’, Annu. Rev. Sociol. 2002, 28: 443–78.



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deprived than the one with children and this result, as will be seen more specifically, is confirmed by almost all indicators considered. This domain gives us information regarding the way parents perceive their wellbeing (both in emotional terms – happiness, and in cognitive terms – life satisfaction), what is their emotional state, their empathy level, how well-embedded they feel in a positive and supportive social context, the internal cohesion of the family, how much they believe they are able to control the world around them and to have clear life goals, what is their level of perceived stress and their self-efficacy perception. One aspect that is worth highlighting is the fact that, though in general the level of deprivation in this domain is higher among people without children, in the empathy indicator, this trend is inverted. In fact, families with children under the age of 12 are more deprived (20.5%) than those without children (18.2%) in the aspect related to the ability to tune into the moods of others, anticipate help demands and provide help in difficult situations. Parental sensitivity and responsiveness are essential to perceiving and evaluating children’s distress signs and being able to respond to those needs in an appropriate manner. This will develop a secure base for a child and a better adaptation to the social world. Reciprocity between parent and child, which is built through empathy, actually favours the development of the child’s social functions and supports learning. Another important aspect concerns perceived stress in the past year: 79% of families with children under the age of 18 have experienced a high level of stress. This aspect has an inevitable impact on children who perceive their parents’ moods. It is in stressful situations that empathy and sharing with children becomes crucial in order to avoid them suffering as much as possible. In relation to this figure, we can explore the emotional state of the respondent parent: 88.5% of parents with children under the age of 12 state that in the last four weeks, they could not sleep because of worries, they felt mostly unhappy and depressed and they felt that had lost confidence in themselves. Although we cannot make any diagnostic inferences, we can certainly say that long-term exposure to parents’ anxious and depressed moods makes the child more vulnerable to the development of various diseases. Another aspect to highlight is related to the perceived self-efficacy: 24% of parents with children under the age of 18 (and 23.1% of parents with children under the age of 12) report feeling unable to face difficulties/problems, to make decisions and to play an important role in their lives. If we now consider locus of control, which refers to the extent to which individuals believe that they can control events that affect them, it can be seen that 42.4% of parents with children under the age of 12 state that their lives are largely predetermined by fate. However, only 15% state they do not have clear life goals. If, we now consider the measurement of well-being (expressed in its affective component – happiness – and cognitive component – life satisfaction), we see how in the last 4 weeks, 34% of parents of children under the age of 18 report being very

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or quite unhappy and 50.5% state they are very or fairly dissatisfied with different aspects of their lives (work, relationships with family members, etc.). Paying attention to the most critical aspects related to families with children’s situation within the three dimensions considered, we did not give proper emphasis to the positive factors that can be found in the households surveyed. If we re-read the results concerning the different indicators, it is possible to point out how most of the parents have resources in terms of promotive and protective factors that can be effectively exploited. Most of parents, regardless of low income-related issues, have a clear life goal, do not have ‘risk behaviours’ (such as alcohol-related problems), take care of their house and take care of their children.

9.4 Policy-making and children’s well-being: lessons and concluding remarks One of the main objectives of our model is to show policy makers and social workers how much heterogeneity of situations can be found even in a specific group of individuals, such as ‘social care services users’. Alongside expected critical issues such as economic difficulties, unemployment and low education level, there is a great variety of situations and other issues to be taken into account. Thus, it makes it even more difficult to imagine the ‘right’ policy intervention at national or local level9. As pointed out in the previous chapters, MACAD allows setting priorities for action to fight poverty and social exclusion: a aggregated and disaggregated multidimensional perspective makes it possible to identify which different kinds of services to deliver, according to services users needs. At the same time, the institutional context has to be considered: financial and human resources available, investments made and to be made, national and regional policy strategy to face pressing issues like children’s poverty/well-being. As a matter of fact, to set the range of available opportunities to families with children in our survey, to improve their condition (and, indirectly, their children’s well-being), we should also consider external factors that could affect the situation. Let’s imagine a local policy maker interested in taking a decision to improve the well-being of families with children in charge of the district social services department. He should take a decision both on the basis of the information of our survey (adopting a multidimensional approach) and on the current situation of the local social services system. The first issue to be considered is the significant number/volume of people using social services with at least one child: almost 50% of the people who turn to

9 A comprehensive overview of policies aimed at children’s well-being and their effectiveness is available in ‘Doing better for children’, OECD 2009



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social services (60% of our sample). Some questions, therefore, have to be answered by our policy maker: how many children are directly/indirectly affected by their parents’ disadvantaged situation (and then potentially ‘at risk’)? How many of these situations is the social services department able to follow effectively and what are the ‘operational tools’ available? In which life domain does the target population seem to be more deprived? Regarding this last question, according to our survey, the priority intervention areas coincide with some of the life domains considered, namely: income generating, living in a house and being part of a community. We know that the district’s social care services department has a very limited possibility of action in the aforementioned domains, since it has no direct competence in housing and labour market policies and it is quite complex to build a network with other local departments or agencies (such as the public employment services). Keeping in mind the question we asked at the beginning of our work and all the issues already faced, the probability that a child of a social service user will became a user himself, is determined by both the opportunities offered by his family environment (microsystem) and the opportunities that national and local institutions offer in order to assist and support disadvantaged families with children. There are of course many other aspects to be taken into account with respect to this second issue and we will focus on those that we consider most useful for the purposes of our work and with respect to the available information. Two closely linked aspects have to be considered: the scarcity of financial and human resources dedicated to social policies at national and local level; the ‘sensitivity’ of resource distribution for social policies to the electoral cycles, which greatly affects the ability to draft and plan effective policies at both national and local level. Finally, it is rather difficult to assess the ability of a system of social care services to intercept all critical situations (service uptake capacity), in particular those that relate to children. Yet, we believe that our model could represent a good ‘device’ to identify and prevent those situations not only from the material point of view but also with respect to other life dimensions. In this respect, dealing with households with multiple needs (or ‘multiple risk factors’) often means being able to offer ‘multiple answers’.

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Annex ‘A’ : list of indicators Domain

Status Indicators

Functioning Indicators

Living in a house

AB1- Type of home ownership (property, mortgage, rent) and AB 1.1 - Weight percentage of mortgage/rent on income AB2 - Availability of services in house AB3 - Number of rooms in house AB 5 - Presence of problems in house

AB4 - Care of your own house AB6 – Perception of relevant issues regarding house AB7 – Activation for resolution of a house problem

Being part of a Community

AM1 – Access to social infrastructure AM3 – Quality of family relationships AM6 – Quality of relationships with people living in neighbourhood AM4 – Presence of relevant issues/problems in the neighbourhood of residence

Generating Income

GR1 – Burdensome costs to pay rent/ mortgage/bills GR2 – Moments in 2010 when it was very difficult to pay certain expenses GR3 – Making ends meet GR4.1 –Bank account availability GR5 – Use of credit cards or similar

AM2 a)– Frequency in meeting relatives/friends AM2 b) – Frequency in practice of leisure/worship activities AM 5 – Activation in problem solving with respect to neighbourhood AM8 – Reasons to remain/ change area of residence GR6 – Capacity to meet basic needs (one week on holiday/ food/medical care/house heating) GR10 – Ability to upgrade own income with respect to needs GR12 – Propensity to save and/ or programme costs

Expressing emotions

E3 – Quality of life in last 4 weeks E4 – Level of life satisfaction in different domains in last four weeks E5 – Life satisfaction as a whole E6 – Help from others in certain situations E7 – Stress level in last year E12 – Level of autonomy and freedom to live the life one wants to live

Being healthy

SA7 – Difficulties in coping with health problems SA8 – Perceived level of health services in area of residence

Developing skills, improving education

Education level AC1 – Usefulness of education AC4 – Usefulness of having interests/hobbies AC6– Goods owned by family

E1 – Emotional maturity E2 – Level of happiness in last 4 weeks E8.2 – Contribution to implementation of change E9 – Self-efficacy and locus of control in last 4 weeks E11 – Clarity of life objectives E14 – Opinion on role of fate in personal life SA1 – Perception of health status SA2 – Risk behaviours

AC2 – Activate to improve knowledge AC 4.1 – Real chance to practice hobbies AC5 – Frequency of activities useful for gaining knowledge

References 

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References Alkire S. (2008) “Concepts and Measures of Agency”, Oxford Poverty & Human Development Initiative, OPHI Working Paper, (9) Alkire S., Foster J.E., (2007) “Counting and Multidimensional Poverty Measurement”, Oxford Poverty & Human Development Initiative OPHI Working Paper, (7) Bossert W., Satya R. (2009) Chakravarty S., D’Ambrosio C, “Multidimensional poverty and material deprivation”, ECINEQ, Society for the Study of Economic Inequality Working Papers (129) Bourguignon F., Chakravarty S. R. (2003) “The measurement of multidimensional poverty”, Journal of Economic Inequality, (1) Bourguignon F., Chakravarty S. R., “Multi-dimensional poverty orderings”, Paris, DELTA Working Paper 2002 (22) Biggeri, S. (2012) “The missing dimensions of children’s well-being and well-becoming in education systems: capabilities and philosophy for children”, Journal of human development and capabilities. Bronfenbrenner, U. (1979). “The ecology of human development”. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press Bowlby J. (1969) “Attachment and Loss” vol. 1: Attachment, Basic Books, New York Bowlby J (1988) “A Secure Base: Clinical Applications of Attachment Theory”. Routledge. London Crocker D. A. and Robeyns I. (2010), Capability and Agency, in C. W. Morris (Ed.), Amartya Sen, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press D’Emilione M., Fabrizi L., Giuliano G.A., Raciti P., Tenaglia S., Vivaldi Vera P. “Gli utenti dei servizi sociali nello spazio delle capabilities: una applicazione del Modello MACaD”, Collana ISFOL Occasional Paper, (4) D’Emilione M., Fabrizi L., Giuliano G.A., Raciti P., Tenaglia S., Vivaldi Vera P. “Multidimensional approach to an analysis of individual deprivation: the M.a.c.a.d. model and the results of empirical investigation” (to be published), Forum for Social Economics, 2013 Istat, Rapporto annuale 2012- La situazione del Paese. Available at: http://www.istat.it/it/ files/2012/05/Rapporto-annuale-2012.pdf Jones E., Gutman L., Platt L., (2013), Family stressors and children’s outcomes Childhood Well-being Research Centre, Research Report DFE RR 254, available at: https://www.gov. uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/219639/DFE-RR254.pdf Nussbaum M C., (2000) Women and Human Development: The Capabilities Approach, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press Nussbaum M.C (2011) Creating Capabilities: The Human Development Approach, Harvard University Press. OECD (2009), Doing better for children, available at: http://www.oecd.org/social/family/doingbetterforchildren.htm Pebley A., Sastry N. (2003) “Neighborhoods, poverty and children’s well-being: a review”, Draft RAND Programme. Sabates, R. and Dex, S. (2012). Multiple risk factors in young children’s development. CLS Working Paper 2012/1. London: Centre for Longitudinal Studies. http://www.cls.ioe.ac.uk/page.aspx?&s itesectionid=939&sitesectiontitle=CLS+working+paper+series Sen A. K., (1979) “Equality of What?” The tanner lecture on human values. Delivered at Stanford University

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Sen, A.K., (1993) Capability and Well-Being, in Nussbaum M., Sen A. K. (eds), The Quality of Life Sen, A.K., (2007) “Children and human rights” Indian journal of human development, 1 (2), p. 1-11 Unicef Innocenti Research Centre (2013) “Il benessere dei bambini nei paesi ricchi, un quadro comparativo”. Florence: Innocenti Report Card Unicef Innocenti Research Centre (2007) “Child poverty in perspective: an overview of child well-being in rich countries”. Florence: Innocenti Report Card Winnicott, D. W. (1964) “The Child the Family and the Outside World” Pelican Books, London

List of Figures Figure 9.1: ‘Living conditions in a capabilities space’ 146 Figure 9.2: ‘Social services users with children’ 151 Figure 9.3: ‘Social service users with no children’ 152 Figure 9.4: ‘Aggregated and disaggregated distribution’ 153

List of Tables Table 3.1:

51

Index agency 3, 8-9, 13-14, 20, 22, 24, 27, 29-30, 33, 49, 56-57, 95, 112, 145-147, 152, 159 autonomy , 12, 14, 21, 24-26, 30-31, 33, 43-46, 85-89, 91, 93-95, 111, 113-115, 119-124, 126, 130, 136 best interest , 12, 21, 33, 113-115, 124-125, 127 capabilities 1, 10-11, 16-17, 29, 33, 37, 68-81, 83, 89-95, 107, 119, 123, 142, 144-146, 149, 152, 159, 161 Capability Approach 10, 13, 16, 32, 68, 75-77, 79, 81, 83, 85, 89, 95-96, 142, 147, 149 childhood V, X, 4-9, 13, 17, 20-36, 38-50, 53-63, 66-71, 73, 75, 78-79, 81-83, 85, 87-88, 91, 94, 98, 109, 112, 119, 126, 148, 159 circumcision 11-12, 28, 113-128 conceptions of childhood 8, 20, 22, 26-27, 31, 55, 57-58 development 3-5, 10, 13, 16-17, 21, 23, 25, 32-33, 35-36, 47, 49-50, 53-54, 56, 61, 68-73, 76-77, 79-83, 86-87, 91, 94-96, 109-111, 123, 129-130, 132-134, 139-141, 143, 145, 147-149, 155, 159-160 education 2, 6, 11-13, 26, 38, 55, 59-60, 66, 79, 81-82, 86, 89-91, 94, 98-99, 101-102, 104-112, 114, 117-118, 120-121, 126, 129-132, 134, 138, 140, 143-145, 150, 156, 159 Ethics 1, 9, 36, 47-48, 57-59, 66-67, 81, 126-128, 136, 140 family 1, 4, 6-7, 13, 16-17, 24, 40, 48, 50, 80, 82, 92-93, 98, 126, 137, 139, 142-143, 147-150, 154-157, 159-160 functionings 10-11, 13, 68, 89-94, 144-145, 147, 149 health 2, 6, 12-13, 26, 34-39, 43, 48, 66, 69, 71, 73, 77-83, 86, 93, 99-100, 109-112, 115, 118-119, 122-123, 127, 129-131, 134, 141-145, 150

Heckman, James 82 Honneth, Axel 95 innocence 4, 7, 50, 54 Justice 2, 6-7, 9-11, 14-17, 21, 24-25, 32-33, 48, 67-68, 73, 76, 79-81, 83-96, 126-127, 140 liberal standard 12, 113-114, 119-120, 125-126 mental well-being 12-13, 129-137, 139-140, 148 Miller, David 95 obesity 9, 34-36, 38-40, 42-47 parents 2-4, 6, 12-13, 34, 40-42, 44, 50, 54-55, 63, 70, 78, 80, 106, 113-116, 119-120, 123-126, 133, 142-143, 150, 155-157 participation 9-10, 16, 21, 23, 25, 32-33, 56-58, 63, 67, 74, 86, 89, 91, 93, 101, 112 policy 1-3, 6, 10, 13-14, 16, 22, 24-25, 32-33, 56, 72-73, 77-79, 82-83, 86, 91, 95, 98-102, 104, 106-111, 113, 142, 144, 156-157 rights 1, 12-14, 16, 23, 25-27, 32-33, 56, 66-67, 69, 74, 76, 89, 91, 106-107, 110, 116, 118, 124-128, 132, 136-137, 139-140, 160 school VII, 11, 23-24, 40, 66, 70, 80, 82, 90, 93-94, 98-99, 101-102, 104-106, 108-112, 120, 130, 132-135, 137, 139, 142, 147, 149-150 Sen, Amartya 33, 48, 83 social construction of childhood 8, 20-21, 27, 66 social well-being 12-13, 129, 134 sociology of childhood 8, 20-26, 29-32, 66 subjective well-being 3, 11, 86, 91-92, 98-100, 103-105, 107-112, 133 vulnerability 4, 7-9, 20, 23-24, 29, 31, 41, 49-50, 54-58, 88 well-becoming 1, 5-8, 10-11, 15, 30, 84-92, 94-95, 97-98, 105-108, 132, 137, 159 well-being 1-8, 10-17, 19-22, 26, 28-32, 37, 41, 46-48, 68, 73, 76-77, 79-81, 84-95, 97-100, 103-112, 117, 126, 129-137, 139-145, 148-150, 154-156, 159-160