Children’s rights in appellate asylum proceedings in Belgium: a legal ethnography

Description: This project investigates how children's rights are perceived, mobilised and practiced by the actors involved in the Belgian asylum procedure on appeal. We combine research methods from law (case law analysis) and anthropology (ethnography) to study the role of children's rights in these procedures from the point of view of children and young people, their parents or guardians, lawyers, first instance representatives and judges of the Council for Alien Law Litigation (CALL). We answer three questions: how do individuals experience and understand children’s rights; to what extent do they define their situation in terms of children's rights; and what standards and practices shape the internal legal culture in which the Council operates? The project contributes to the field of 'critical children's rights studies', paying particular attention to how children's rights are shaped by children themselves and by children's interaction with other groups.
Promoter(s): Ellen Desmet
Researcher(s): Sara Lembrechts
Faculty: Faculty of Law and Criminology
Period of time: 2020 - 2024