ABSTRACT
The child's right to physical and emotional protection is different from his right to representation in court. The confusion of the whole debate is increased by the fact that substantive rights and procedural ones are justified separately by different arguments, often used at one and the same time. But the achievement of a coherent moral position is prejudiced unless the ideas are brought into a satisfactory relationship with each other. The underlying idea was that children need protection, not merely from acts of cruelty, but from the effects of being made to take responsibility for decisions of major importance to themselves and others. The difference between children and adults as social participants has to be noted; but in the justice-for- children approach, the ironing out of these differences seems less serious than the very limited way in which substantive justice for adults is conceived.
