ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the relationship between law and governance in the context of administrating access to, and provision of services to, vulnerable Scottish children. It explores the role law plays in shaping discourses of legitimacy for intervention into children's lives in conjunction with the bureaucratic policies and procedures that frame the contexts for such intervention. The chapter focuses on the connection with children under 16 who are referred to the Scottish children's hearings system. It examines how law in this area has developed over time, drawing a different legal model that fluctuates between a welfare-based paradigm, a more formal, rights-based paradigm, and a proactive, regulatory paradigm. In our discussion of these models, we explore how those participating in or serving the system respond to them as they accommodate, resist with transnational law embodied in international conventions such as the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC), or the European Convention on Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (ECHR).
